Iran's environmental official: We have lost 70 percent of prominent wildlife species

The deputy head of the Iranian Environmental Protection Agency says that over the past half century, we have lost 70 percent of prominent wildlife species.

Hassan Akbari added on Sunday, March 12: "Many species, including the Asiatic cheetah, are on the brink of extinction."

According to him, to save the environment, we must take participatory measures and seek solutions that directly involve citizens in the process of protecting the urban environment.

The Iranian official's statements calling for direct citizen intervention come at a time when environmental activists have been arrested by the Revolutionary Guards over the past few years and faced security charges, including espionage and "corruption on earth."

Among these activists, Sam Rajabi, Sepideh Kashani, Amir Hossein Khaleghi and Abdolreza Kouhpayeh, Morad Tahbaz, Niloufar Bayani, Taher Ghadirian, and Hooman Jokar have been in detention since 2017.

Kavous Seyed Emami was also one of the defendants in this case. He died in prison a few days after his arrest, and judicial authorities declared his cause of death to be "suicide."

While the Ministry of Intelligence and other officials of the former government had stated that these individuals were not spies, the judiciary and IRGC intelligence persist in their claims.

Source: Radio Farda