By Richard Porter, adviser on bird conservation for BirdLife international, founder of OSME, and author and co-author of several books, including Field Guide to Birds of the Middle East
Stepping off the Orient Express in Istanbul in April 1966, my eyes were opened to the world of Islam. The haunting voice of the Muezzin from the Blue Mosque rang out and may have said, ‘Young man, the Middle East is now your ornithological and conservation playground’. So begins my magical journey.…….
That year was spent surveying Turkish lakes and counting migrating raptors over the Bosphorus. Returning in 1967 and, while searching for the mythical Brown Fish Owl, I was aware of fighter-plane activity: in preparation for an escalation of the Six Day War? My first taste of conflict in a troubled region. Half a century ago there were few trouble-free years in the Middle East. Turkey was safe, but venturing further was often unwise.
It was, however, safe to travel in Iran and trips in the 1970s made me realise that a bird field guide for the region was needed. That project dominated the next two decades. Checking on the identification of Asian Crimson-winged Finch without a guide was near impossible!
Many visits were against UK Foreign Office advice, but the chance to explore Iraq’s Mesopotamian Marshes or finding a new bird for Socotra trumped officialdom! Yemen became a lure. Little-known ornithologically, it was in 1979 so I enjoyed the country’s endemics in dramatic landscapes, beguiling cultures and kind people. Since then, Yemen’s fortunes have fluctuated, as we know from daily news on the civil war and the escalating humanitarian crisis. But spells of stability made it possible to explore the country and for the Ornithological Society of the Middle East to take two long expeditions, enabling comprehensive surveys and the identification of Important Bird Areas.
These extended to the magical island of Socotra, to census the breeding species, including the 12 endemics. Among the good times were frightening moments. When the 1994 civil war started I had just arrived in Sana’a to help launch Yemen’s first conservation conference. Staying near the president’s palace, the first Scud missiles landed and tracer bullets filled the night-time sky. We had to take shelter for several days, during which I studied the garden ecology of Yemen Serins. We were airlifted out during a ‘guaranteed’ cease-fire window.
Then in 2011, at the start of the Yemen civil war there was a rapid evacuation. I was studying Socotra’s Egyptian Vultures and also helping Yemeni colleagues with a project in the Highlands of Ibb. Financed by the Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund, it encouraged a greater understanding among the villagers and decision-makers of the importance of the wildlife of this outstanding IBA that holds nine Arabian endemics.
The political situation worsened and an e-mail arrived from my colleague, Abdulrahman, in Ibb:
We are so sorry for dis contacting you due to the crazy war which killed everything in Yemen including human, birds, butterflied and flowers. Besides, our Yemen never deserves that. We wish, they could stop this useless war in order to live in peace.
But the Yemeni team completed their work – and on Socotra my friends still celebrate the International Vulture Awareness Day.
Back to 1994. The year BirdLife launched its Middle East programme and by 2000 a regional office opened in Amman. Country partners were appointed with SPNL being one of the first with my good friend, Assad Serhal, chairing the regional meetings.
The 1990/91 headline-catching Gulf War was an environmental disaster. Oil, from sabotaged pipes, poured into the Arabian Gulf and Kuwait’s deserts, killing thousands of birds. BirdLife organised a task force to assess the damage and prepare a recovery plan. The scenes from the Kuwait and Saudi Arabia coasts speak for themselves.
Syria and Iraq have few birdwatchers, but I had the privilege of often joining them. After the demise of Saddam in 2003, a conservation movement blossomed, spear-headed by Nature Iraq. Their first project was to identify the country’s Key Biodiversity Areas and I was lucky to help their young biologists. Initially it wasn’t safe in Iraq so Syria became the training ground. Its wetlands and deserts simulated two of Iraq’s major habitats.
Once again, conflict arose, Syria became unsafe and for the next six years, training courses and survey reviews were held in Iraq, although not before three of my Iraqi colleagues were kidnapped and held to ransom in the Marshes.
Despite everything, Nature Iraq produced a field guide in Arabic, published the monumental Key Biodiversity Areas of Iraq and celebrated the re-flooding of the Mesopotamian Marshes with a festival on the Euphrates, ending with a boat race!
In Syria the situation worsened, with ISIS strengthening its grip. Palmyra was under siege and being bombed daily. In 2015, a young birdwatcher posted a poignant image on Facebook of a field guide in the rubble, writing:
‘What is very precious to us is totally worthless to others.’
Watching Lesser Spotted Eagles migrating south over Lebanon’s Akkar Mountains in 2013, I looked down on Syria’s Lake Homs, a site for our Iraqi training, the town of Homs in ruins. Yet Syria has an Arabic field guide and the Syrian Society for the Conservation of Wildlife has held a workshop on the illegal hunting of wildlife.
I love Lebanon and its courageous people. Every day I pray that we will soon see an end to the troubles that now, sadly, extend across its borders. I pray too for all involved in the terrible conflict. I often reflect on my wonderful visits to help SPNL with their world-famous HIMA revival programme, especially on the border south of Tyre and in the Upper Beirut River Valley. I remember fondly counting migrating raptors and storks and taking bird of prey training courses in the autumn in the Akkar Mountains and at Hima Hammana.
What has given me the greatest pleasure from my Middle East years? Well helping start BirdLife’s Middle East programme and also the launch of OSME. But on a personal level I have been so pleased to be associated with the region’s bird guides and educational booklets, especially when published in Arabic. Indeed it was SPNL that funded the Arabic translation of the first edition of Birds of the Middle East. Information on our precious wildlife is fundamental to the next step of its conservation.
My favourite Middle East country? ‘My heart is in Yemen, but my soul is in Turkey.’ So many memories over the years, Turkey is indelibly etched on my soul.
Maybe it will be some time before I can again visit Lebanon, Yemen, Syria or even Iraq, but I can still hold dear the resilience, determination and friendship of my Middle East conservation colleagues and the knowledge that, even in these difficult times, they are dedicated to making a better world for wildlife – and people. I wish them well. Inshallah!
