Latest Stories for Center for Climate & Security
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Jan 11, 2023
CLIMATE, WATER AND MILITIAS: A FIELD STUDY FROM SOUTHERN IRAQ
When recruiters for Iraq’s various militias came to the North Abu Zarag Marsh near Nasiriyah in southern Iraq in August of 2014, it didn’t take them long to empty the surrounding villages of most…
Aug 18, 2022
Water and Sabotage in Paradise: Greece’s Hidden Climate Conflict
Greece’s islands might seem like unlikely settings for a wild years-long sabotage campaign, but the explosions tell a different story.
May 10, 2022
Learning to Love Deserts
I used to hate deserts. They scorch in the day and then chill at night. They can infuriate in ways few other landscapes do, that pesky sand sneaking into every book, bag, and electronic cranny. Most…
Nov 5, 2021
A Recipe for Perpetual Insecurity? The Case of a Syrian Protected Area
As snapshots of Syria’s environmental degradation go, Jebel Abdelaziz, in the northeastern part of the country, is hard to beat. The mountain’s rocky flanks offer little for livestock. The semi-arid…
Apr 14, 2021
The Use of Climate as a Scapegoat for Governance Abuses and Failures – and Why That’s a Problem
Getting environmental officials to expound on their countries’ crises can be futile in much of the Middle East and North Africa (and well beyond). These officials might not want to talk about pollution…
Feb 26, 2021
Why Water Conflict is Rising, Especially on the Local Level
That future wars will be fought over water, rather than oil, has become something of a truism, particularly with regard to the Middle East. It’s also one that most water experts have refuted
Jul 16, 2020
Why the Nile Constitutes a New Kind of Water Dispute – and Why That’s Dangerous
Ever since workers first broke ground on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) in 2011, international commenters have fixated on the Nile as a possible harbinger of future
Sep 9, 2019
How Jordan’s Climate and Water Crisis Threatens its Fragile Peace
For years, security service recruitment has masked climate instability in rural Jordan. Now that strategy is breaking down and no one knows what will take its place.
Oct 1, 2018
How a Metastasizing Food Crisis Threatens Sudan’s Stability: A Dispatch from Khartoum
At 10am on a midweek summer morning, the village of Hasa in Sudan’s River Nile state feels all but abandoned. Stray dogs idle in the shade; vultures peck at what remains of a cow carcass. Only in…