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Article: Tide stays out: desert grows as Aral Sea dies.
- Article from:
- New Internationalist
- Article date:
- May 1, 1998
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1998 New Internationalist Magazine. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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`WHEN I was a small child I used to go swimming all the time,' says Kubeisin Ikmitulayev. He is talking about the Aral Sea, in Central Asia. `The water came right up to our backyard. But by the time I was eight years old, it was too far to walk.' He has recently celebrated his 30th birthday and the Sea is now 112 kilometres away from his home. In his lifetime the Aral has shrunk by more than half, from 65,000 square kilometres - the world's fourth-largest lake - to 31,200 square kilometres.
When Kubeisin was born, Muynak was a thriving port and a popular resort on the Aral Sea. Its population has now dropped from 45,000 to 28,000. Cotton crops to supply the ...