Drying Lake Urmia Puts 15 Million People at Risk

ERBIL (Kurdistan24) – In a stark and sobering admission of a looming environmental and humanitarian catastrophe, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has acknowledged the dire state of the once-magnificent Lake Urmia, which has now effectively dried up, leaving behind a vast and toxic salt flat that threatens the lives and livelihoods of more than 15 million people.

The President's remarks, made during a tense meeting with parliamentary representatives from the Urmia region, came as a local Azeri-speaking MP delivered a blistering critique of the government's inaction and accused authorities of diverting the very water meant to revive the lake to other provinces.

As salt storms begin to rise from the exposed lakebed, endangering public health and devastating the agricultural sector, the complete desiccation of Iran's "turquoise jewel" has become a potent symbol of environmental mismanagement, broken promises, and a deepening crisis of public trust.

The crisis has reached a critical tipping point. Despite the complete drying up of the lake, a much-touted project to transfer water from the Silveh, Jaldian, and Kani Sev dams—a plan that was supposed to be a cornerstone of the lake's revival—has still not been implemented.

This failure has fueled a profound sense of frustration and betrayal among the local population and their elected representatives.

In his meeting with the Urmia MPs, President Pezeshkian, himself a native of the region, openly criticized his own government's plans and programs for the lake's revival, though he also pointed to the unavoidable reality of climate change.

"The truth is that the rate of rainfall has decreased," he stated. "I grew up in that region; in Urmia province alone there are three rivers that used to have continuous water flow. Now the climate has changed and due to the drought, the rivers have no water left."

He noted that the water crisis has also hit surrounding areas like Bokan, Miandoab, and Saqqez, with the Bokan dam now holding only enough water for daily use.

While the President acknowledged the role of drought, Salman Zaker, an Azeri-speaking parliamentarian from the city of Urmia, delivered a far more pointed and politically charged accusation. He argued that the problem was not just a lack of water, but the deliberate diversion of what little water remains.

Zaker asserted that the majority of the water allocated to revive Lake Urmia from the crucial Jaghatu and Tatahu rivers never actually reaches the lake. He claimed that annually, "more than 300 million cubic meters of water from these two rivers are transferred to other provinces of Iran."

Zaker's address to the President was a direct and impassioned plea, reflecting the deep anxiety of his constituents. "Do not forget the water transfer project," he urged Pezeshkian. "Our people are concerned that during your presidency the revival of Lake Urmia will be forgotten."

He presented a stunning statistic to underscore his point, stating, "51% of Lake Urmia's water share is provided by the Jaghatu and Tatahu rivers, but it does not reach Urmia and is sent to other provinces of Iran."

This accusation of water diversion transforms the narrative from one of a natural disaster to one of political malfeasance and regional inequity, suggesting that the needs of the Urmia basin are being sacrificed for the benefit of other parts of the country.

The on-the-ground reality is one of complete and utter desolation.

This was confirmed in a stark and damning assessment in September 2025 by Hakem Mamkan, another representative for Urmia in the Iranian Parliament. As previously reported by Kurdistan24, Mamkan declared that the 4,000-year-old body of water had effectively ceased to exist.

"I can say that there is currently no water surface on the lake," he said in an interview with the Iranian Labour News Agency (ILNA). "It can be said that ninety-nine percent of it has dried up, and only a section around the mid-lake causeway is left."

Mamkan's critique of successive government administrations was scathing. He accused them of engaging in years of fruitless "talk therapy" and endless studies while failing to take the practical, executive measures needed to avert the crisis.

"Although significant funds were spent on studying and restoring Lake Urmia in previous administrations, none of these efforts have yielded results," he said, noting that both previous and current administrations have held countless meetings with no tangible improvement to the lake's condition.

He dismissed the government's frequent excuse that the necessary measures would be too costly, stating, "We do not accept this because this is a national, international, and regional issue, and it is necessary to use national funds to prevent these problems."

The consequences of this inaction, which Mamkan warned would be "irreparable," are now beginning to manifest. The vast, exposed lakebed, a saline desert shimmering under the sun, has become the source of a new and terrifying environmental threat: salt storms. As winds whip across the dry basin, they are picking up toxic salt dust and carrying it across a vast region.

This phenomenon is a direct danger to the health of more than 15 million people, with experts predicting a spike in high blood pressure, an increase in skin cancer, and severe respiratory problems. The salt dust is also causing immense damage to the agricultural sector, destroying vast swathes of farmland and rendering the soil sterile.

Mamkan had previously warned that "experts predict that this dust will have an impact as far as the vicinity of Zanjan and Qazvin," highlighting the far-reaching nature of the disaster.

The slow-motion death of Lake Urmia is a complex disaster, driven by a combination of factors that have been known for years.

Excessive water extraction for agriculture, fueled by the drilling of thousands of illegal wells, has dramatically reduced the inflow to the lake.

The unrestrained construction of dams on the rivers that feed the basin has choked off its lifelines. And a significant, long-term reduction in rainfall has exacerbated this man-made crisis.

The solutions, too, have been known for years. Mamkan had previously outlined a series of practical, multi-faceted measures that have long been proposed but never properly implemented, including reforming crop patterns to favor less water-intensive agriculture, cracking down on illegal wells, and improving irrigation methods and techniques.

The failure, he and other critics argue, has not been a lack of knowledge, but a fatal absence of political will.

As the salty winds begin to blow across the barren plains of what was once one of the largest saltwater lakes on Earth, the words of the Urmia parliamentarian to the President echo with a new and desperate urgency.

The concern of his people is not just that the revival of their beloved lake will be forgotten; it is that their homes, their health, and their entire way of life will be sacrificed on the altar of government inaction and political neglect.