The Atrek (, , ), also known as the Attrack, Atrak, and Etrek, is a fast-moving river which begins in the mountains of north-eastern

Iran Iran, officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI) and also known as Persia, is a country in West Asia. It borders Iraq to the west, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and Armenia to the northwest, the Caspian Sea to the north, Turkmenistan to the nort ...

() and flows westward, draining into the south-eastern corner of the

Caspian Sea The Caspian Sea is the world's largest inland body of water, described as the List of lakes by area, world's largest lake and usually referred to as a full-fledged sea. An endorheic basin, it lies between Europe and Asia: east of the Caucasus, ...

Turkmenistan Turkmenistan is a landlocked country in Central Asia bordered by Kazakhstan to the northwest, Uzbekistan to the north, east and northeast, Afghanistan to the southeast, Iran to the south and southwest and the Caspian Sea to the west. Ash ...

. Because of the high use of its waters for irrigation, the Atrek only flows into the Caspian when it is in its flood stage.

Geography

The Atrek is long and drains a basin of .

Politics

Beginning at , where its tributary the Sumbar joins it, the river forms the border of Iran with

; this helped keep the area closed throughout the

Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...

years. A 1957 treaty between

and the USSR assigns equal rights to 50% of the water of the frontier parts of the Atrek. The same treaty also applies to the

Aras River The Aras is a transboundary river in the Caucasus. It rises in eastern Turkey and flows along the borders between Turkey and Armenia, between Turkey and the Nakhchivan exclave of Azerbaijan, between Iran and both Azerbaijan and Armenia, and, fin ...

, which now forms part of the border between Iran and

Azerbaijan Azerbaijan, officially the Republic of Azerbaijan, is a Boundaries between the continents, transcontinental and landlocked country at the boundary of West Asia and Eastern Europe. It is a part of the South Caucasus region and is bounded by ...

Ecology

Even though

sturgeon Sturgeon (from Old English ultimately from Proto-Indo-European language, Proto-Indo-European *''str̥(Hx)yón''-) is the common name for the 27 species of fish belonging to the family Acipenseridae. The earliest sturgeon fossils date to the ...

s concentrate in the area of the Caspian Sea next to the Turkmen coast, they do not currently migrate into the Atrek River owing to its low water level and pollution. Since the Atrek is the only Caspian watershed river of the Turkmen coast, sturgeons no longer reproduce in Turkmenistan.Sturgeons in Turkmenistan

References

{{Rivers of Turkmenistan Rivers of North Khorasan Province Rivers of Turkmenistan International rivers of Asia Iran–Turkmenistan border Landforms of Golestan province Border rivers Landforms of North Khorasan province Tributaries of the Caspian Sea

Geography

Politics

Ecology

See also

References