Shatha Khalil *
Ecosystem in Iraq witnessed serious transformations in the twentieth century, reflected in accelerated deterioration of its water and agricultural resources, and the destruction of biodiversity, and the tree and vegetation cover, high desertification levels, and the spread of toxins, food deficiency diseases, and the deterioration of services.
Iraq is polluted country at the highest standards not only by the pollution of occupation and the corruption of politics, but what affects the Iraqi man in his health and environment of the destruction and slow death, as Iraq has become very advanced country in the spread of cancerous diseases.
The chaos in the political and security conditions led to the disruption on the economic and social levels, where the control and watchful devices were absent for the protection of the consumer in his health and wealth , and to address the phenomenon of marginal trade that sell non-matching materials to the required specifications whereas the citizen pays the bill.
The environmental degradation includes to pull up water from inside the earth, without planning, digging land and left, and the construction of roads and sewage systems without planning, which reduced green cover and destroyed forests and led to the rise of pollutants ratios in the air due to the indiscriminate cutting, and acid rain.
At the same time, wars and sanctions have led to turn vast areas into a contaminated environment and full of radiation (radioactivity) , especially the desert in southern Iraq, and areas near the cities where the wrecked weapons, mines and ammunition, chemical and radiological materials are existed in a large quantities around it that contributed to the increase in polluting the environment and threaten the health of the population and regions.
And the researcher and Director General of the Ministry of Science and Technology Dr. Hussein Audah Creddy (1) confirms , the ratio of only 17% of wastewater was treated but in no modern ways , while leaving the rest to flow out to the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, referring to the spread of pollutants to water, soil and air, and the spread of dust storms that have become inherent to the environment of Iraq, and food contaminants entering through the border without control, and the process of cutting trees without accountability led to the destruction of the green belt in the cities.
He pointed out that most of the factories operating in Iraq are primitive, and vehicles depend on gasoline, a poor quality of gasoline, in addition to the presence of 11 old stations to generate electricity using poor oil.
Creedy considers that all reached by Iraq caused by the abhorrent quotas that decimated the scientists, confirming the ability of the Ministry of Science and Technology to address most of the problems related to the environment, pollution, and the reconstruction of the country.
Iraq is suffering the problem of a huge waste of water, which could become more expensive than oil, and what is missing from the minds of the officials that the dam Ilisu in Turkey will be opened , which can transfer the Tigris and Euphrates rivers to it , causing a drought on the land of Iraq, Agricultural Research Service is possible to suggest solutions to address the problem , noting the greatest problem facing Iraq is that annually 100 thousand acres turns into desert.
And Creedy indicated to the possibility of recycling and water treatment to reduce pollution, but the short-sighted view of the Ministry and the scarcity of allocations makes it difficult for them to perform their active role for the country, and even salary level is weak and privileges are few; prompting scientists to leave work where they work in the Ministry of Higher Education or travel outside of the country or seek for the retirement.
Currently, the ministry is inoperative, and can not reform without relying on the most important Ministry for Research, which has a high scientific potential.
And an important study of the reality of the agricultural sector and its role in the greening of the Iraqi economy ,Walid Khalif showed , that Iraq did not suffer serious pollution only after the Second Gulf War, and the burning of about 600 oil wells between Iraq and Kuwait, where the cancer has spread and began to spread with a proportion that it exceeds other countries, as 40% of the air has become polluted, and the number of old cars has been increased in more than 8,000 old car, especially in 2013, let alone it produced toxic oxides and carbon monoxide , and benzene which carries lead nitrate, and high numbers of generators operating by gasoline , and remnants of brick plants and spread fertilizer plants and tanning without plans and control and note to its impact on the environment, and the use of bad fuel, led to a high proportion of lead which works to destroy the nervous system.
And Khalif added that the quality of the environment in Iraq has suffered greatly from the impact of inadequate environmental policies with regard to pollution and resource management, as a result, Iraq has a range of environmental problems and for decades due to wars involved in it that have brought only depleted uranium, and waste of toxic military industries, accompanied by the lack of environmental culture for citizens in general.
He noted that the human use of various weapons and explosive materials harmful to the environment through what is generated from gas and toxic fumes produced acid rain which are poisons to spoil the soil and pollute the air.
And the spread of the phenomenon of generators in most parts of Iraq to generate electricity for citizens after aggravating the problem of providing national electricity to them led to the high rate of pollution and achieve high levels of environmental degradation represented by the spread of many chronic diseases and epidemics noting that it has been allocated for these stations from the 2011 budget 600 billion Iraqi dinars as the expenses for the import of fuel
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(2) and the use of depleted uranium in the Gulf War and war munitions against Iraq in the years 1991-2003, that it was made from the radioactive waste resulting from the process of enriching uranium for military purposes in making bombs, which led to heavy acid rain, and formed a negative impact on Iraq’s environment and the spread of cancerous diseases widely, especially in the southern regions and many types of endemic cancer were appeared in cities such as Basra, Maysan and Nasiriyah in southern Iraq, constituting (74.9%) of the total cancer deaths.
Iraq is witnessing high ratio of air pollution with the lead leaking to the air produced by the chemicals and the amounts of depleted radioactive elements by the following concentrations and components: –
Thorium 243; radium 226 and bismuth 214; zinc produced by bombs rockets.
After a year (2003) , it was formed for the first time in Iraq the Ministry of Environment concerned with this matter , however, Iraq is living in a reality in which pollution is aggravated daily , with no studies or productive solutions so far, causing to drought, desertification and increased soil salinity and chronic deterioration for the environmental reality of country, Iraq has suffered from shrinking the space (39%) of its agricultural land.
The problem of air and soil pollution is worsened, as well as what was left between (2007-2009), and the effects of pollution that it is affecting the lives and safety of millions of Iraqis as a result of chemical contamination and unexploded ordnance (UXO).
Radioactive contamination risk:
After the 2003 occupation the nuclear Tuwaitha site was exposed , the largest site of nuclear research in the previous era , to the looting and reached to the extent of the use of barrels and containers to save water that were originally intended for the storage of nuclear materials led to the illness of many Iraqis by radiations and serious illnesses related to it, and despite the site was fallen under the control of the American forces again, but the danger still exists and the file is still asleep in the drawers of oblivion.
Then the first foreign field reports began to appear about the problem of radiation leakage in the Tuwaitha area as a group of American experts who were sent by the Pentagon to the site confirmed at that time for this leakage of varying amounts and according to other reports stated that other infections recorded among Iraqis who live near the site ranged from the symptoms of skin rash and bleeding from the nose, they are symptoms usually accompanied the radiation poisoning.
Tuwaythah area is the site that contained the July nuclear reactor in Iraq bombed by Israeli aircraft in 1981, and ten years later targeted it again and completely destroyed, in which Iraqi government was forced to shut down its nuclear program while retaining tons of uranium within this site, and after 2003, the US forces realized the seriousness of the site so it controlled it and kept silent on its secrets but then left it to fall in the hands of citizens to misuse its contents and throw some of them in rivers and adjacent lands.
The Dean of the Faculty of Science, the competence of atomic and Biochemistry Anis al-Rawi (2) said that the pollution of the sound and pollution by the electromagnetic spectrum, magnetic pollution, thermal pollution, all these pollutions by the light are invisible pollutions that we can not feel of it and the pollution of atomic radiation as you know when there is a burst of a atomic bomb , a radiation come out floating around the Earth at speeds six times per second and all this invisible pollution but now there is a unseen energy by which the world is contaminated noting that the world is now a small village when there is a broadcast television there is invisible rays come from television , noting that this light we have , there is also a contamination by Internet , waves that come from the Internet are light and sound waves going around the globe six times per second so all these rays and these spectra pass through our bodies , some of which is absorbed and affects and some others goes away.
Al-Rawi indicates that the effects of “uranium, which pollute Iraq , will continue forever and any human being in Iraq is exposing to the pollution as these substances can penetrate the human body through inhalation or drink and the food and they contain alpha particles that were emitted , it could to rupture tissues and cells ”
And confirms that Iraq suffered from the 1991 till this moment from a very large pollution, And if we measured the levels of it , we would find high accounts of the quantities of the light that we received during the explosions, for example, there are approximately one hundred and fifty thousand tons of explosives have been exploded, and these are all under the brightness of this light that comes to us from the bombings added to the sunlight in a very big quantity and we are now in Iraq, there is life and a particular environment, for example, the sun rises at eight o’clock and sets at six o’clock when there is more light than it should be , a case of contamination will be occurred .
Pollution is an entry of undesirable materials or elements in the environment which means, for example, we in Iraq , the activity starts at eight O’clock in the morning when the cortisone hormone is high and the hormone cortisone begins to rise until the evening and then at six O’clock decreases and when you give an additional amount of the light to the country , it will increase the amount of cortisone, which will be harmful to the health. If any new material entering the atmosphere, it will be a terrible contamination.
And what happened in Tuwaitha, unfortunately the ignorance of people for the bad effects of these materials, Residents living near Tuwaitha reportedly took barrels of nuclear material and other containers because they needed them to store food, water and other things. They were unaware that the barrels were radioactive and toxic and that they were exposing themselves to severe risk. Witnesses report seeing people carrying containers and empting low level radioactive contents into the soil or rivers. This means that these materials which are poured out , some of them are absorbed into the soil and some others goes to the river and runs , especially now that the flow of the river water is very slow so it is possible that these materials which were poured out could to cause the contamination of the whole region, and radiation means to us uranium , and they call it the (half life) 4,5 x 10 exponent 9 year means four and a half billion years , a half-life of uranium means every four and a half billion years the amount of uranium will be decreased to half in the sense that this uranium, which was poured will remain forever and any man of us deal with this uranium, it will enter into his body and sends alpha particles and Alpha particles are a big , giant and very harmful that it is possible to tear all tissues and cells.
Al-Rawi added the current danger is very simple and clear, compared to the fear of the future because this will affect the genetic and activate the genetic changes which will appear in future generations, as happened in Hiroshima and Nagasaki means the number of dead was a little at the beginning but now diseases began to appear such as the disease of nuclear fever and diseases of cancer and can lead to cancer because these radioactive materials have effects which are called in English (Accumulated effects) means for example, when you want to kill an animal , you hit him ten shots until dies one after the other so you gave these ten shots once meant giving it large amount of dose as it is possible to kill this man if you give him a simple dose when people receive this depleted uranium , he receives it even with a small amount of this radiation that will affect his genes in the future.
Environmental and medical reports were talking in 2015 about high pollution levels, especially in the Tigris River where large cities like Baghdad and Mosul are located on its banks, as these banks turned into a large dump for wastes .
According to the Iraqi Ministry of Environment reports, swage water that are thrown into the river causing higher ratios of the salinity of its water , due to the content of salts up to 40%.
According to the same reports, it is thrown in the Tigris River more than one billion cubic meters per year of Swage water in addition of remnants of plants using toxic chemicals, which threaten aquatic life and fisheries in it.
These reports also indicate that 42 thousand liters are thrown into the water of the river every second, while every liter of which causes the pollution of four clean liters.
Another pollution causes are the delay in the establishment of infrastructure projects and on the top of it is the sewer networks, in addition to the delay in the completion of waste recycling projects.
What increase the seriousness of the problem is that some of Iraq’s hospitals lacked special medical incinerators, making it to throw its waste in the Tigris River, according to reports of environmental organizations.
The media director at the Medical City in Baghdad Hospital, Dr. Munir Anbuge confirms that all government hospitals in Iraq have incinerators and modern equipment for the disposal of medical waste, indicating that the Mayoralty of Baghdad is responsible for the sewage leak to the City of Medicine, and then to the Tigris River through the old building of the Ministry of Defense.
And stresses that they have tried hiring engineers to repair private hospital sewage network, the Mayoralty of Baghdad refused to do so, referring to the worsening of the problem due to infrastructure deterioration in the cities, and damage to sewage networks in Baghdad, leading to a lot of sewage leaks around the Tigris River, directly or indirectly.
According to reports, this negligence produces a daily 1.25 million cubic meters of wastewater.
Pollution in Basra, causing cancer for 60% of citizens
Basra (3) is not far from the dangers of pollution resulting from dealing with oil at all stages of investment, particularly the activity of its extraction that will contribute to increasing toxic emissions to the atmosphere of the city which is rich of oil wells, where the people suffer in the areas adjacent to the oil fields, from the medical conditions such as allergies and asthma and lung infections, as well as the exposure of children to serious respiratory infections, in addition to the extension of the effects of pollution to the sources of water and agricultural soil.
Against the backdrop of the adoption of the Iraqi government of the policy of investment licenses , however the increase of the number of oil companies operating in some of the Basra oil fields led to the aggravation of the fear of many specialists in the field of environment from the threats of pollutants derived from the extraction of oil to the environment of life in the province due to the negative effect on it with levels of record pollution under official and popular charges against exploration companies for its ignorance to the rules aimed at reducing pollution and exceeding the basic design for some areas of the province, as well as health and environmental problems inherited from the years of the former regime’s wars that include river pollution and negative remnants of mines and other remnants of military operations.
The activities of the oil sector in the province of Basra, constitute the most prominent pollutants of life environment and the most able to disrupt the ecosystem of living and non-living components due to the impact of serious damages caused by production processes for oil projects on the local population. According to official sources in the province of Basra, the giant oil companies operating in the fields of the city ignore the legal legislations issued by the Iraqi government with a view to contributing to the task of ensuring the preservation of the environment noting that its departments prefer to pay the fines which are relatively modest on the installation of special treatment devices to reduce toxic gas emissions in the air, which its pollution rates reached record levels. It is important to note here that the investment of oil companies operating in the oil fields in various regions of the country, bound to address the pollutants resulting from the extractive and exploration processes through the adoption of modern techniques in the treatment of oil pollution resulting from these processes in order to reduce the level of pollution.
Based on the announcement by the Iraqi Oil Ministry, it was hoped that the oil licensing rounds will contribute to the recovery of the national economy, and contribute to the provide job opportunities that will assist in reducing unemployment rates gradually; in view of the positive results of its mechanisms in the task of growing income resources resulting from the pledge of foreign companies to work on the development of the country’s oil fields, leading to a rise in oil production ceiling in the oil fields of Basra, and thus increase the financial revenues generated from the sale of crude oil, but the reality indicates to the opposite of this perception, as the high production ceiling of the oil is still a major source of the increase of toxins emissions of the process of associated gas flaring, which is one of the most important factors contributing to increasing the proportion of pollution in the province.
Local officials in the province of Basra indicate that the oil companies such as Lukoil, Shell, Exxon Mobil, BB and the Italian Eni S.P.A are responsible for poisoning the atmosphere of some areas of the city, in addition to the environmental and health impacts caused by oil investments, particularly the shrinking area of agricultural land and increasing the space of land suffering from the problem of desertification.
Academic at the Marine Sciences Center at the University of Basra, Dr. Talib Abbas revealed , that “laboratory tests proved the existence of serious infections among aquatic organisms due to pollution, as a proportion of water pollution in the waters of the Shatt al-Arab and Khor Abdullah exceed 77%, which threatens aquatic species” by extinction ,
And concerning the proportion of pollution in the province of Basra, the Chairman of the Committee on Health and the Environment in the province of Basra, Haider al-Saadi reveals that the proportion of pollution in the province of Basra, reached nearly 60% during the year 2016 and the most infections are congenital deformities caused by oil pollution in the rivers where this ratio was given by the Department of Health and by the pursuit of some non-governmental organizations.
Despite the talk about the attempt of some of the local parties in Basra to prosecute foreign oil companies operating in the fields on the cause of threatening people’s health as a result of pollutants associated with the extraction of oil, the judicial proceedings to be taken may succeed in saving the lives of many people in the future, but whatever the strength of its impact , it will remain unable to contribute to restoring hope to heal the people where the disease grow in their bodies, as well as potentially what is carried by some people of the disease that can not be diagnosed only after many years.
Economic Unit
Rawabet Center for Research and Strategic Studies