Word: abadan
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...refuge in Basra. On a tour of Khorramshahr last week, TIME Correspondent William Drozdiak found very few signs of life; emaciated dogs foraged for scraps in the rubble, swarthy Iraqi soldiers lounged in the shade as they listened to the echo of sporadic shelling in what was left of Abadan (pop. 300,000), seven miles away. Drozdiak's report...
...between Iraq and Iran raged into its seventh week, there were few signs that a decisive victory or a cease-fire would soon end the fighting. After seizing control of Khorramshahr on the disputed Shatt al Arab waterway, Iraqi troops mercilessly pounded the besieged refinery city of Abadan with artillery and tank fire. But fierce resistance by Iranian army troops, Revolutionary Guards and urban guerrillas halted the invaders at a key bridge over the Karun River, north of the embattled city. As the Iraqis shelled other major towns in oil-rich Khuzistan province, Iran struck back at enemy positions with...
...outskirts of Basra on the Shatt al Arab estuary. The Iraqis were also proceeding toward one of their key tactical goals: cutting off most of the supply of oil from Khuzistan to Iran's heartland by severing pipelines and inflicting heavy damage on the huge refinery at Abadan, which will take years to rebuild. As part of this strategy, the Iraqis have repeatedly shelled Dezful, nexus for most of the oil pipelines running northward from Khuzistan. The Tehran government has already been forced to ration gasoline and heating oil, and reserves of jet fuel are dwindling...
Tehran has not yet managed to launch a major counteroffensive, but Iranian ground troops have reportedly driven the Iraqis back at some points. Said a senior Iranian military officer: "As you go north from Abadan, our position steadily improves. From Ham all the way to Baveysi we have the initiative and the Iraqis have been regularly falling back." Iranian sources said last week that most of the 1 million residents of the Khuzistan cities under Iraqi attack had reportedly fled either to central Iran or to nearby mountain refuges. One farfetched rumor had it that if the Iraqis captured Ahwaz...
Radio Tehran contested the Iraqi claims, insisting that Revolutionary Guards still held key quarters of Khorramshahr. But Iran admitted that the major refinery city of Abadan, ten miles to the south, had been totally surrounded by Iraqi forces seeking to starve out its last defenders. The Iraqis reportedly blew up sections of the main pipeline linking Abadan to Tehran, thereby depriving Iran of most of its domestic fuel supply. The Iranian Oil Ministry imposed a drastic rationing of home heating oil, following earlier restrictions on gasoline. The fall of Khorramshahr gave Iraqi President Saddam Hussein his first major victory...