Construction of a restaurant under one of the trademark arcs of Shushtar Historical Hydraulic System in Khuzestan Province has triggered a public outcry. People demand the immediate closure of the restaurant for endangering the world heritage site. Speaking to Persian travel news website Donyaye Safar, Mojtaba Gahestouni, director of Khuzestan-based cultural heritage group Taryana, said, “There is no justification for the presence of a restaurant in that particular area.” Gahestouni said he has apprised Mohammad Hassan Talebiyan, cultural heritage deputy at Iran’s Cultural Heritage Handicrafts and Tourism Organization, of the matter, adding that the provincial cultural heritage department has assured the activists that they would look into the case. “They denied issuing a construction permit for the restaurant and declared that they would immediately shut the place down, should they find evidence that construction regulations were not followed,” he said. Inscribed on the World Heritage List in 2009, Shushtar Historical Hydraulic System is one of the three UNESCO-listed sites in the oil-rich Khuzestan Province.
