51% reduction in water volume in Sistan and Baluchestan dams; Zahedan representative calls for negotiations with Taliban to solve water problem

Mohammad Dalmaradi, CEO of the Sistan and Baluchestan Regional Water Company, said that the current volume of water in the province's dams has "decreased by 51 percent" compared to the previous water year, and "the volume of water in the reservoirs of Sistan and Baluchestan's dams is 34 percent of the total volume of the reservoirs."

According to IRNA, the largest reduction in water reserves has occurred in the Sarbaz and Zirdan dams, and the deficit in the underground water resources reservoir is 430 million cubic meters.

Meanwhile, Hossein Fadamaleki, a representative from Zahedan in the parliament, has emphasized that the most important issue in Sistan and Baluchestan is water, and has called on the government to have the Minister of Energy travel to Afghanistan and, in negotiations with the Taliban, force them to solve the water supply problem "based on the right to water."

Iran and Afghanistan have been at odds for years over the rights to the Helmand River and Lake Hamun due to an unprecedented drought in the region.

The Helmand Water Rights Agreement was signed between Tehran and Kabul in 1972, but in the late 1970s, as monsoon rains decreased, the water level in Lake Hamun, whose main source of water is the Helmand River, reached a minimum.

In recent years, dozens of villages in Sistan and Baluchestan province have been deserted, and according to an Iranian parliamentarian, only 19 percent of the province's residents have access to clean drinking water.

Source: Radio Farda