Reporting by PMOI/MEK
Iran, June 5, 2020—Wildfires that began in five Iranian provinces last week have once again displayed the Iranian regime’s inefficiency in handling natural disasters. The fires, which have been raging in Kohgiluyeh and Boyer Ahmad, Ilam, Khuzestan, Kurdistan, and Bushehr, have caused much damage. Earlier this week, the fires extended to the Dalahou mountain ranges of Kermanshah province.
Lack of coordination and disarray in government institutions have resulted the fires spinning out of control. The regime claims the affected regions are hard to reach with fire trucks, though locals say that the government has the necessary aerial equipment to deal with the situation.
In Khuzestan, environmental activists held demonstrations on Monday, protesting the regime’s inaction in extinguishing the fires in the Zagros mountains. One of the participants said the government’s crisis management bodies have themselves contributed to exacerbating the environmental crises.
“Our beautiful jungles and tress are burning, and no one is there to protect them,” an activist said. “We have been trying to put out these fires for two days.” There’s no sign of government relief efforts.
Mohammad Movahedi, a member of the Iranian regime’s Majlis (parliament), acknowledged on Sunday, May 31, that forest fires are expanding in Iran’s jungles and failing to address this crisis. “Once again, as seen in the past several years, we are witnessing how forests and natural resources in Kohgiluyeh & Boyer Ahmed province (southwest Iran) has been targeted by fires and irrecoverable damages have been inflicted to our national treasures. Locals with their bare hands are braving all odds to confront the fires that are destroying trees and wildlife, killing innocent animals in the Khaeiz mountains. It is necessary for certain [officials] to wake up and take some action,” he said.
The regime’s environment protection history is dark. According to a report by "Strategic Majlis Research Center" published on September 2016, 60 percent of Iran's forests have been destroyed in the past three decades". The report estimates the rate of destruction to be at 400,000 acres per year and concludes, "If this trend continues for 31 more years, there will be no forests left in Iran."
Instead of aiding in preserving jungles and wildlife in Iran, the regime has had an active role in deforestation and destroying Iran’s vegetation, which in turn has led to other calamities such as seasonal floods.
The regime also has a terrible track record in treating environmentalists. Earlier this year, an Iranian court sentenced eight environmentalists to a collective 58 years in prison under bogus national security charges. Kavous Seyed-Emami, another environmentalist and the founder of the Persian Wildlife Heritage Foundation, died under torture in 2018 while he was in custody of security forces under suspicious conditions in 2018.
