there is no evidence of continued subduction of oceanic crust beneath the eurasian plate along this part of the plate boundary, in contrast to the neighbouring segment along the makran trench, an active subduction zone, where a dipping slab is well imaged by seismic tomography. the ending of subduction has been linked to evidence that the main zagros reverse fault is no longer active, suggesting that further deformation is occurring by distributed deformation of the leading edge of the arabian plate. this is consistent with observations of recent seismicity.