Tehran Times - The level of water in Lake Urmia, northwestern Iran, has increased by 33 centimeters compared to the same time last year, head of the provincial department for the Lake Urmia restoration program in West Azarbaijan province has said.

Currently, the volume of water of the lake is 1.920 billion cubic meters which experienced 250 million cubic meters increase compared to last year which was recorded at 1.250 bcm, ISNA quoted Farhad Sarkhosh as saying on Wednesday.

On the other words, the Lake�s water level reached 1,270.24 centimeters, which shows a 33cm increase year on year, he noted.

Referring to the first phase of water release from a damn in Salmas county in West Azarbaijan province which started on February 2, he stated that according to a recent announcement by Iran Water Resources Management Company, water to a ceiling of 4 million cubic meters will be released into the lake.

Lake Urmia was once the largest permanent hypersaline lakes in the world. The volume of water at the lake in 1997 measured at 30 billion cubic meters which has dramatically decreased to 2.5 billion cubic meters in 2017.