Basra sits on the main highway to Kuwait, south of Baghdad. It was common news in the media as the staging force for Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990 and then as a hard fought city in the US led coalition in 1991 to liberate Kuwait. It sits near to the confluence of the Tigris and the Euphrates and is effectively Iraq’s port city.
On the way we visit the marsh Arabs who live in the wetlands between the Tigris and the Euphrates. These people have eked out an existence in these wetlands for centuries. After the defeat of Saddam in 1991 after the gulf war, it was thought that many of the regimes opponents had sought refuge there. Taking rvenge Saddam built a series of dikes to divery water away and dry up the marshes. In a final act of bastardry he set fire to the marshes. It was only after Saddam’s defeat in 2003 that water flow was restored to the marshes and the community is thriving again.
Our final stop was Basra city itself which is a new and modern city. A cruise through the harbour area paints a different picture with half submerged ships in the middle of the harbour and rotting hulks everywhere, a veritable ship’s graveyard.
A short walk through Old Basra has a few old buildings being restored by UNESCO but the rubbish and sulphurous sewer smell make this a less than pleasant experience.
