The lands were confiscated by the state from their original Arab owners and then transferred to the government.
Since then, the state has systematically abandoned the land and people of the area, leading the fertile land to become a small desert and a source of pollution in the region.
According to government reports, around 40 percent of gas which is extracted alongside oil in the province and could be used as an energy resource is actually burned off.
The production of sugar cane in the region – which requires massive amounts of water and produces hazardous toxins when it is refined – has also harmed Alahwaz’s environment.
Not only are massive amounts of water from the Karoun River, the main source of drinking and irrigation water in the region, used in the process, but also the substances created in the refinery process are poured into the river.
By law, the state is allowed to take ownership of the land if resources are discovered.
"The sugar cane project has had devastating effects on air pollution in the towns of Ahwaz and Al-Falahiya (Shadegan in Farsi) and their surrounding villages," said Jawad Kazem Nasab, an Ahwaz city delegate in the Iranian parliament.
“However, as the delegate later confirmed, the sugar cane industry burnt its plants for economic purposes, which eventually caused even more air pollution in the region and left the lives of residents of the villages adjacent to these plantations under serious threat.” Even the head of the environmental protection department in the province, Sayed Amid Hajti, reportedly said recently that "the oil and petrochemicals, sugar cane and other major industries in the region did not positively contribute to the lives of the people of the region, but instead increased the proportion of pollution in the air and environment”.
The Iranian regime should respect its own people, take its international obligations seriously and avoid violating the rights of its own people.
Ahwazi Arabs would like to know that the international community will take a stance and stop the Iranian regime from committing human rights abuses against them.