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Garden of Eden

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Wed, 30 Jun 2010 7:30p.m.

It went largely unnoticed, but back in the 1990s an ancient civilisation was almost wiped out by Saddam Hussein.

In an extraordinary feat of engineering, Saddam drained the magical marshlands of southern Iraq, the probable site of the biblical Garden of Eden, turning them into desert.

But all is not lost.

Scott Pelley has discovered that the Marsh Arabs are making an amazing comeback.

Watch the video.

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Comments

01 Jul 2010 04:06p.m.

Mark wrote:

Nice story. Inspiring. The man who is behind the restoration of these wetlands is clearly passionate and well motivated, and I wish him and his people every success.

30 Jun 2010 08:57p.m.

Ian Rodger wrote:

An excellent doco about what was Mesoptamia, part of the Fertile Cresent and now desert thanks to mans intervention with short-sighted greed for commercial gain. Water is THE most valuable commidity in the world. It also can cause drowning and the carriage of toxic materials turning both potable water and fine grazing land into desert and disaster.
New Zealand is rich in water 'a renewable resource'.
We should not take this lightly.
Ian R