Iran detains 30 Azerbaijanis

A group of Azerbaijanis, who attended Iftar dinner in Tabriz, has been detained by the Iranian security forces yesterday, official website of the Association for Defense of Azerbaijani Political Prisoners in Iran.

According to the report, security forces attacked on participants of Iftar dinner. They detained 30 people, injuring several others. Place of detention of the arrested peoples is not reported.

The Iftar dinner participants planned to hold a rally against drying of the Lake Urmia on Saturday.

During the demonstrations of Iranian Azerbaijanis to save Lake Urmia on April 2, 2011, 70 protesters were arrested and several were injured. The demonstrators brought water in a glass and poured it into the lake. Protesters made slogans such as "We are too late", "No water in the Lake and we have not woke up yet".

The Lake Urmia is the second most salty lake in Iranian Azerbaijan Province.

Iran's largest lake, Urmia has dried up almost a third, director of the Iranian State Department for Lakes Protection Ali Nazardust said earlier. Building dams, decrease in rainfall and other negative factors led to drying up of the Lake Urmia.

At present, the salinity of the lake's water is 330 percent, Nazardust said. Earlier, this figure was 160-170 percent. Earlier the reservoir covered 5,000 square meters.


/Trend/