NUKUS, Uzbekistan – The drying up of the Aral Sea is one of the
planet's most shocking environmental disasters, U.N.
Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Sunday as he urged Central Asian
leaders to step up efforts to solve the problem.
Once the world's fourth-largest lake, the sea has shrunk by 90
percent since the rivers that feed it were largely diverted in a
Soviet project to boost cotton production in the arid region.
The shrunken sea has ruined the once-robust fishing economy and
left fishing trawlers stranded in sandy wastelands, leaning over as
if they dropped from the air. The sea's evaporation has left layers
of highly salted sand, which winds can carry as far away as
Scandinavia and Japan, and which plague local people with health
troubles.
Ban toured the sea by helicopter as part of a visit to the five
countries of former Soviet Central Asia. His trip included a
touchdown in Muynak, Uzbekistan, a town once on the shore where a
pier stretches eerily over gray desert and camels stand near the
hulks of stranded ships.
"On the pier, I wasn't seeing anything, I could see only a
graveyard of ships," Ban told reporters after arriving in Nukus,
the nearest sizable city and capital of the autonomous Karakalpak
region.
"It is clearly one of the worst disasters, environmental
disasters of the world. I was so shocked," he said.
The Aral Sea catastrophe is one of Ban's top concerns on his
six-day trip through the region and he is calling on the countries'
leaders to set aside rivalries to cooperate on repairing some of
the damage.
"I urge all the leaders ... to sit down together and try to find
the solutions," he said, promising United Nations support.
However, cooperation is hampered by disagreements over who has
rights to scarce water and how it should be used.
In a presentation to Ban before his flyover, Uzbek officials
complained that dam projects in Tajikistan will severely reduce the
amount of water flowing into Uzbekistan. Impoverished Tajikistan
sees the hydroelectric projects as potential key revenue
earners.
Competition for water could become increasingly heated as global
warming and rising populations further reduce the amount of water
available per capita.
Water problems also could brew further dissatisfaction among
civilians already troubled by poverty and repressive governments;
some observers fear that could feed growing Islamist sentiment in
the region.
Ban also is taking on the region's frequently poor human rights
conditions.
That is likely to be an especially tense issue when he meets
Monday with Uzbek President Islam Karimov, who has led the country
since the 1991 Soviet collapse and imposed severe pressure on
opposition and civil rights activists.
The meeting comes less than two weeks after the U.N. Human
Rights Committee issued a report criticizing Uzbekistan, including
calling for fuller investigation of the brutal suppression of a
2005 uprising in the city of Andijan. Opposition and rights groups
claim that hundreds were killed, but authorities insist the reports
are exaggerated and angrily reject any criticism.