干上がったサワ湖　水の過剰使用と気候変動のはざまで　イラク

【サワ湖ＡＦＰ＝時事】イラク西部の砂漠の端に立つ「釣り禁止」の標識。この場所がかつては湿地帯で多様な生物が生息し、行楽地としても知られたサワ湖だったことを示すわずかな手掛かりの一つだ。（写真はサワ湖周辺にあるホテルや観光施設の廃虚。イラク南部ムサンナ州で）
　砂岸に囲まれた塩湖は、１９９０年代のピーク時には水泳やピクニックを楽しむ新婚カップルや家族連れでにぎわっていた。だが、当時のホテルや観光施設は今や廃虚となっている。
　首都バグダッド南方のサマワ市に近いサワ湖は現在、ほぼ完全に干上がっている。人的活動と気候変動が、大量の塩に覆われた不毛の荒れ地に変えてしまったのだ。
　塩をまぶしたような砂地に残っているのは、地下水面とつながる、小さな魚が泳ぐ池一つだけだ。
　ムサンナ州の環境局長ユセフ・ジャバー氏によると、約５キロ平方メートルあった湖は「気候変動と気温上昇」が原因で、２０１４年から水位の低下が続いている。加えて政府は最近、農業用に掘られた「違法な井戸が１０００か所以上に上る」と指摘した。
　さらにジャバー氏によると、近くのセメント工場や製塩工場が「湖に流れ込む地下水から大量の水を引いている」という。
　砂漠化に見舞われ、気候変動の影響を最も受けやすい５か国の一つに数えられているイラクでは、サワ湖が息を吹き返すのは奇跡以外にないだろう。地域一帯は３年続いた干ばつの後で数シーズン分の豊富な雨が必要であり、地下水の使用は抑制しなければならない。
　スウェーデンに長年住んでいるサマワ市出身のラティフ・ディベスさんはこの１０年、環境活動家として二つの国を行き来している。ユーフラテス川の岸辺を清掃し、広大で緑豊かな自宅の庭園を公共の公園に変えた。
　ディベスさんは、子どものころ、遠足や家族との休暇でサワ湖に泳ぎに来たときのことを覚えている。「当局が関心を寄せていれば、湖はこんなに速く消失しなかったでしょう。信じられません」
　「この湖で育ってきた私は今、６０歳です。私の方が先にいなくなると思っていましたが、残念なことに、湖の方が先にいなくなってしまいました」
　干ばつの影響を受けている湖沼や河川はサワ湖だけではない。国連教育科学文化機関（ユネスコ）の世界遺産に登録されている南部ハウエイザ湿地や中部カルバラ州のラザザ湖などの、ひどくひび割れた地表の写真がソーシャルメディアに投稿されることも多い。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2022/05/09-08:56）

A No Fishing sign on the edge of Iraq's western desert is one of the few clues that this was once Sawa Lake, a biodiverse wetland and recreational landmark.
Human activity and climate change have combined to turn the site into a barren wasteland with piles of salt.
Abandoned hotels and tourist facilities here hark back to the 1990s when the salt lake, circled by sandy banks, was in its heyday and popular with newly-weds and families who came to swim and picnic.
But today, the lake near the city of Samawa, south of the capital Baghdad, is completely dry.
Bottles litter its former banks and plastic bags dangle from sun-scorched shrubs, while two pontoons have been reduced to rust.
This year, for the first time, the lake has disappeared, environmental activist Husam Subhi said. In previous years, the water area had decreased during the dry seasons.
Today, on the sandy ground sprinkled with salt, only a pond remains where tiny fish swim, in a source that connects the lake to an underground water table.
The five-square-kilometre (two-square-mile) lake has been drying up since 2014, says Youssef Jabbar, environmental department head of Muthana province.
The causes have been climate change and rising temperatures, he explained.
Muthana is a desert province, it suffers from drought and lack of rainfall.
- 1,000 illegal wells -
A government statement issued last week also pointed to more than 1,000 wells illegally dug for agriculture in the area.
Additionally, nearby cement and salt factories have drained significant amounts of water from the groundwater that feeds the lake, Jabbar said.
It would take nothing short of a miracle to bring Sawa Lake back to life.
Use of aquifers would have to be curbed and, following three years of drought, the area would now need several seasons of abundant rainfall, in a country hit by desertification and regarded as one of the five most vulnerable to climate change.
The Ramsar Convention on Wetlands, a global treaty, recognised Sawa as unique... because it is a closed water body in an area of sabkha (salt flat) with no inlet or outlet.
The lake is formed over limestone rock and is isolated by gypsum barriers surrounding the lake; its water chemistry is unique, says the convention's website.
A stopover for migratory birds, the lake was once home to several globally vulnerable species such as the eastern imperial eagle, houbara bustard and marbled duck.
- 'Lake died before me' -
Sawa is not the only body of water in Iraq facing the perils of drought.
Iraqi social media is often filled with photos of grotesquely cracked soil, such as in the UNESCO-listed Howeiza marshes in the south, or Razzaza Lake in the central province of Karbala.
In Sawa, a sharp drop in rainfall -- now only 30 percent of what used to be normal for the region -- has lowered the underground water table, itself drained by wells, said Aoun Dhiab, a senior advisor at Iraq's water resources ministry.
And rising temperatures have increased evaporation.
Dhiab said authorities have banned the digging of new wells and are working to close illegally-dug wells across the country.
Latif Dibes, who divides his time between his hometown of Samawa and his adopted country of Sweden, has worked for the past decade to raise environmental awareness.
The former driving school instructor cleans up the banks of the Euphrates River and has turned the vast, lush garden of his home into a public park.
He remembers the school trips and holidays of his childhood, when the family would go swimming at Sawa.
If the authorities had taken an interest, the lake would not have disappeared at this rate. It's unbelievable, he said.
I am 60 years old and I grew up with the lake. I thought I would disappear before it, but unfortunately, it has died before me.