U.S. President Donald Trump delivered a rare and pointed critique of the Iranian regime’s environmental corruption during a speech in Saudi Arabia on May 13. It was rare not only because this issue is often ignored, but because Trump himself is hardly known as an environmental protection advocate.
“While your skill has turned dry deserts into fertile farmland,” he said, addressing Arab leaders, “Iran’s leaders have managed to turn green farmland into dry deserts, as their corrupt water mafia—let’s call it the water mafia—causes droughts and empty riverbeds. They get rich, but they don’t let the people have any of it.”
This wasn’t the first time Trump spotlighted Iran’s environmental mismanagement. In 2018, he warned that the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei-led Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), particularly through its construction arm, Khatam al-Anbiya, was hastening Iran’s ecological collapse:
“The IRGC’s corruption and mismanagement have exacerbated the effects of an ongoing drought and created an ecological crisis. Unregulated dam construction by its companies like Khatam al-Anbia has dried rivers and lakes and helped create unprecedented dust storms that threaten Iranians’ jobs and lives.”
To many Iranians, Trump’s Riyadh speech was not a revelation. It was overdue recognition of a reality that activists, experts, and whistleblowers have spoken out on for years: Iran’s water crisis is not natural. It is engineered, exploited, and sustained by the very institutions that claim to protect the nation.
The term “water mafia” has long been used inside Iran to describe an unofficial but deeply entrenched network of individuals, including certain ministers, deputy ministers, and the heads of major construction firms. Operating under the umbrella of Iran’s Supreme Water Council, they manipulate or violate regulations to gain wealth and influence through water-management schemes. At the center of this machinery is the Iran Water and Power Resources Development Company (IWPC), the main state contractor responsible for overseeing large-scale infrastructure projects, including dam construction and inter-basin water transfers. Since the end of the Iran-Iraq War, IWPC officials have emerged as key players in the water mafia, directing and enabling the policies pushing Iran’s ecosystems to the brink.
This broader network extends to experts, engineers, and academics, many of whom are embedded within state institutions. Together, they have profited—politically, professionally, and financially—from a legacy of ecologically catastrophic megaprojects. This coalition funnels public funds into concrete-heavy projects—without real environmental oversight—to serve corrupt interests, not the people or the planet. Their business model thrives on scarcity, silence, and state protection.
Political and profit-driven dam-building, river diversions, and reckless agricultural expansion have devastated ecosystems, triggered severe water shortages, and displaced millions across Iran. In desperation, many farmers have turned to over-pumping groundwater—often illegally—draining aquifers and causing the land itself to sink, a crisis known as land subsidence.
The scale of the disaster is staggering. According to Iranian government data, 500 of Iran’s 609 plains are now critically affected by groundwater overuse and land subsidence. Tens of millions of people live in areas at risk.
This crisis is most visible in places like southern Tehran and the province of Isfahan, where satellite imagery and government data confirm accelerating ground collapse. Subsidence rates in some areas in and around Tehran have reached up to 31 centimeters per year—an alarming figure, given that even a few millimeters of annual subsidence can damage infrastructure. Foundations shift, bridges weaken, roads buckle, and pipelines rupture. This is not a slow-motion problem—it’s a structural emergency. Meanwhile, groundwater tables are falling by as much as 2 meters annually. The damage is widespread and compounding and creates a creeping, invisible environmental breakdown.
This phenomenon isn’t unique to Iran. California’s Central Valley and parts of Arizona also suffer from land subsidence caused by excessive groundwater pumping. But in Iran, the crisis is supercharged by institutional corruption, the absence of regulatory oversight, and a regime that treats environmental degradation as acceptable collateral in the maintenance of political control.
Nowhere is the collapse more symbolic—or more tragic—than in Isfahan. Once the capital of a flourishing empire, and long revered as a center of architecture, art, and commerce, Isfahan now faces a slow-motion death. The Zayandeh Rud—literally “the life-giving river”—has become a seasonal memory, flowing only during rare floods or when dam gates are opened far upstream. While the Zayandeh Rud Dam was built before the Islamic Revolution and is not one of the regime’s infamous megaprojects, the mismanagement of the basin—and the way the water mafia exploits it—has triggered a full-blown crisis. Water meant for the people of Isfahan is routinely diverted to politically connected agricultural and industrial ventures, including steel plants, large-scale farms, and elite-controlled developments in Yazd and beyond.
Meanwhile, the government, under pressure from vested interests, siphons water from other watersheds to cover the damage, compounding the ecological toll. Instead of investing in conservation, efficient irrigation, or aquifer recharge, the authorities continue to extract, waste, and misallocate, pushing the region closer to collapse.
As land subsidence worsens and infrastructure weakens, Isfahan risks becoming literally uninhabitable—victim to a creeping disaster often called a “silent earthquake.” A city that once defined Iranian civilization may soon be reduced to ruin.
At its core, the Islamic Republic’s environmental crisis is not just a consequence of drought or climate change—though reduced rainfall, rising temperatures, and shifting weather patterns have clearly worsened the situation. It’s the regime doubling down on unsustainable practices, not only by promoting megaprojects with no ecological oversight, but also by failing to modernize aging water infrastructure and doubling down on water-intensive agriculture in regions where water is already critically scarce. What Iran requires is a shift from extraction to restoration—including investment in sustainable irrigation, transparent governance, and groundwater recharge efforts to replenish the aquifers that millions depend on. Without this, both the land and the society built on it will continue to sink.
Iran’s water scarcity has driven unrest, especially in regions like Khuzestan and Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari, where government-led water transfers and industrial priorities have devastated local livelihoods. In Khuzestan, water has been diverted to sustain sugarcane plantations and steel factories, while in Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari, agricultural communities have watched their rivers—tributaries of the Karun—rerouted to feed cities in central provinces like Isfahan and Yazd. In these areas, protests over water access are not simply about thirst—they are about injustice. Protesters are calling for an end to exploitative transfers and the restoration of their local water rights—along with greater accountability and transparency in how water is managed. The government’s typical response has been denial, suppression, and, increasingly, militarized crackdowns—treating citizens as threats to national security rather than people defending their homes and futures.
As agriculture collapses, jobs disappear, and rural life becomes unsustainable, millions of Iranians may be forced to migrate over the next two to three decades—not only due to drought, but because of the deeper economic and ecological breakdown it fuels. Many will seek refuge in Western countries, including the United States.
The pattern is clear: Those with political leverage benefit from water manipulation, while rural communities and marginalized provinces suffer. The state’s refusal to engage with environmental grievances has made water a flash point for broader social anger, and the worsening drought conditions are only deepening the divide.
If Trump wants to do more than make headlines, he must follow his water mafia remarks with bold action.
What can Trump do? Hit the water mafia where it hurts. Sanction the corrupt elites and IRGC-linked contractors who caused the crisis and now live comfortably abroad. Some argue that lifting sanctions would help Iran recover economically, but this assumes the current regime would invest in its people. In reality, sanctions relief without transparency or structural reform would only strengthen the same networks responsible for looting Iran’s water. The regime has already shown that when given cash, it builds dams and diverts rivers, not sustainable water-saving projects or aquifer recharge systems. That’s why targeted sanctions, not blanket ones, are the better tool—they isolate the profiteers while sparing the public. Expose the corrupt networks and seize their assets. Then, back Iranian farmers, scientists, and engineers—not with handouts, but with access to tools and data that promote local solutions and long-term stability. They can implement satellite imagery, groundwater tracking, and open-source platforms to monitor water theft, land subsidence, and aquifer loss.
The United States can support policies that help Iranians build resilience at home—like efficient farming, groundwater recovery, and small-scale clean tech—not more megaprojects. Help them fix their country so they don’t flee it.
At a time of U.S. aid pullbacks, this isn’t just humanitarian—it’s strategic. As seen during Trump’s recent Middle East visit, environmental collapse fuels instability, migration, and regional unrest. Empowering Iranians to stay and thrive supports long-term U.S. interests without boots on the ground.
This is “America First” done right: Stop the next refugee wave, weaken the regime’s grip, and let Iranians reclaim their future. Trump exposed the corruption. Now he can lead the plan to stop it—before it floods over America’s borders.
The post The ‘Water Mafia’ Is Real—and It’s Draining Iran Dry appeared first on Foreign Policy.
