Municipality Confirms: Entry of Wastewater and Sewage into Tehran's Channels and Streets

A Tehran municipality official has confirmed that part of the polluted wastewater and environmentally harmful sewage from "Areas 18 and 19" of the capital is entering "urban channels and streets." Helya Sadat Hosseini, the director general of environment and sustainable development at Tehran Municipality, stated that in "Areas 21 and 22," the urban sewage network has made "very little progress," and told the ILNA news agency that in the "southern areas of the capital," especially in Areas 18 and 19, there is a sewage network and consequently "wastewater acceptance upstream exists." This municipality official confirmed that due to the "lack of connection" of parts of the urban sewage network to treatment plants and the "open end of the line," part of the sewage "enters the city streets." In July 2017, Farhad Jalali Amin, the engineering and development deputy of Tehran Sewage Company, claimed that "64 percent of Tehran citizens are connected to the sewage network," but in December 2021, the state news agency IRNA reported that "41 percent of the capital's population is covered by the urban sewage plan." According to the "Regulation for Preventing Water Pollution" approved in May 1994 by the Environmental Protection Organization and communicated by the Islamic Republic's government, any type of "liquid waste" resulting from industrial, agricultural, livestock, urban, hospital, laboratory, and household activities is considered "sewage." According to Helya Sadat Hosseini, the director general of environment and sustainable development at Tehran Municipality, "water recycling" in the capital's water and sewage network has so far been "neglected," a matter that could also exacerbate the "subsidence process of the capital." As it has finally been confirmed that in "Areas 18 and 19" of the capital, "wastewater" and sewage are entering urban channels and streets, Mehdi Babaei, vice chairman of the Environment Commission of Tehran City Council, described the situation of land subsidence in "Areas 18 and 19" of this multi-million metropolis as "dangerous" and stated that "land subsidence" near Shahriar has been recorded at more than "20 centimeters per year." The intensification of environmentally destructive actions in Iran coincides with the fact that in recent years, many environmental activists and experts have faced serious restrictions and harassment, including prevention of activities, summons, arrests, long-term imprisonment, or heavy judicial sentences by various institutions of the Islamic Republic. The dire state of Iran's environment has worsened during the presidency of Ebrahim Raisi, and Iran is heading towards territorial and social collapse. Continuing environmental crises in Iran; "Hoor al-Azim" in a coma, water scarcity, subsidence, and the risk of the Caspian Sea's destruction; the dire state of the environment during Ebrahim Raisi's term; government agents' attack on the "Chia Green Association" meeting; at least 25 environmental activists arrested.