The Kabul Tribune (KT) — The governor of Iran’s Razavi Khorasan province has called on the Taliban to help provide water for Afghans living in Mashhad, saying the city’s water shortage has reached a “catastrophic” level.
Gholam-Hossein Mozaffari said Saturday that Mashhad’s
underground water reserves had been depleted and that excessive water
extraction had contributed to the worsening crisis.
He said providing water for about 1 million Afghan migrants
living in Mashhad could help ease pressure on the city’s water resources.
Mozaffari called on the Taliban to help meet the water needs
of Afghans living in Mashhad as part of bilateral cooperation between Iran and
Afghanistan.
He pointed to Afghanistan’s Salma Dam, which has a capacity
of more than 380 million cubic meters, and said he expected Taliban authorities
to provide at least the minimum amount of water needed by Afghan residents of
Mashhad.
The Salma Dam is in western Afghanistan’s Herat province and
is one of the country’s major water infrastructure projects. Its main reservoir
began filling in 2015, and the dam became operational in 2016.
The dam is located in the Hari River basin, a major water
system shared by Afghanistan, Iran and Turkmenistan.
