"Significant" Damage to Natural Resources Due to Sirvan Fire

The director general of crisis management in Ilam announced that the fire in the forests of Sirvan County, which began on Thursday, July 25, was controlled after 25 hours with the use of helicopters and water-dropping planes. According to the state news agency IRNA, Ahmad Karami, the crisis management director in Ilam, stated on Friday evening, July 26, that "significant" portions of natural resource areas have been damaged due to this fire, but he could not comment on the exact extent of the damage. He mentioned that this was the "first mission" for this aircraft in firefighting operations in Iran. According to Mr. Karami, this aircraft, with a capacity of 40,000 liters of water, played a crucial role in completely controlling the fire. On Thursday afternoon, a dispute between two residents of the village of Shah Qalandar Aliyah in the Karzan district of Sirvan led to the death of one of them, and the murderer also set fire to the victim's agricultural products. The report indicated that due to the wind and the proximity of the fire to forested areas and the protected region of Qalarang, the fire quickly engulfed vast sections of the forests. According to Morad Yeganeh, the governor of Sirvan, "200 hectares" of the region's forests were consumed by the fire. Forest areas in Ilam province have repeatedly caught fire since the beginning of this year, with sections of these forests being destroyed. Reports indicate that in the forest fires in Ilam province on June 3 and 4, at least 100 hectares of these forests were damaged. Meanwhile, Reza Ahmadi, the director general of natural resources and watershed management in Ilam, stated on Sunday, July 21, that 171,000 hectares of the 641,000 hectares of forests in this province are in "critical hotspots." In recent months, there have been reports of widespread fires in forested areas of other provinces in Iran as well. For instance, Morteza Mahdizadeh, head of the natural resources department in Noor County, Mazandaran province, reported a fire in six hectares of forest land in the Beldeh section on Thursday. Additionally, according to IRNA, over "380 hectares" of forest and pasture areas in Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad province have been "destroyed" due to fires in the past three months. On Tuesday, July 22, Mohammad Rahim Barzmand, commander of the protection unit of the natural resources department in Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad, reported a fire in over 110 hectares of the forests in the Deh Sheikh Boyer-Ahmad area, stating that this fire has been controlled. In this context, there was a renewed fire in Abidar, Sanandaj, less than 24 hours after it was controlled, and another fire in the forests of Ilam, which "has not yet been controlled" after a day. There has been a "20% increase" in fires in pastures and forests in Iran.