Basra protests set deadline for escalating action

Shafaq News – Basra

Dozens of citizens in Shatt al-Arab, Basra Province, protested on Monday against worsening water salinity, giving the local government four days to address the crisis.

Once Iraq’s southern lifeline, the Shatt al-Arab River has become a toxic, saline stream unfit for human use, forcing families in Basra to rely on tanker trucks for drinking water. Years of upstream damming, seawater intrusion, and unchecked pollution have turned the city’s water crisis into an environmental and public health emergency.

Read more:Iraq’s southern drought: Policy paralysis and upstream pressures deepen rural collapse

Demonstrators told Shafaq News that while potable water still reaches some residential compounds, it is completely absent from entire neighborhoods. They stressed their rejection of “political exploitation of the problem, as some officials running in the upcoming elections are reportedly collecting voter cards in exchange for supplying water tankers.”

The protestors set a deadline of Friday, October 17, for the Basra authorities to dismiss the current water department directors and implement concrete measures to resolve the issue; otherwise, escalatory steps, including road blockades, civil disobedience, and an open sit-in would be taken.”

Basra has witnessed recurring protests this month over urgent solutions to worsening water salinity and shortages.