Eighteen lawmakers representing constituencies from the central Iranian province of Esfahan, where water scarcity has reached an alarming state, have resigned collectively in a symbolic move against what they believe is an unfair distribution of water resources. In response, their counterparts from three other provinces, which share the same water supplies, hit back. They demanded in a public letter that the heads of the three branches of the Iranian state — president, parliament speaker and judiciary chief — as well as the country's powerful Supreme National Security Council intervene to bridge the widening divide over who should have more water.
The latest confrontation has not been without a precedent. Last August, Iran's interior minister reported at least 20 water-related clashes, some of them deadly, in a period of less than 140 days.