The Aral Sea

For centuries, two rivers, the Amu Darya and the Syr Darya, fed a 5-million-year-old lake, Lake Aral, which extends from both sides of the border between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. Aral was the fourth largest lake in the world. Due to its salty water and size, it was named the “Aral Sea”. In the 1960s artificial channels were built on the side of Uzbekistan in order to extend the irrigation system to the cotton plantations in the region, which offered the Soviet Union an abundance of cotton. The rivers were diverted and the Aral Sea steadily started to dry up. When the environmental authorities became aware in the 1980s, it was already too late. The part of the lake on the side of Uzbekistan had become a desert and a ship graveyard. This led to the disappearance of fish, animals and plants in the area, and the inhabitants of the neighbouring village of Muynak still suffer from respiratory problems and cancer caused by the toxic dust and salt that are carried by the wind like snow to faraway places, up to the Himalayas.
Many attempts are being made today to stabilise the situation, which is absolutely irreversible. The aquatic environment has only been preserved on the side of Kazakhstan. Thus, the Aral Sea has become a synonym of ecological disaster.