The Greek paper, Kathimerini, reports that the water situation on the Euphrates and Tigris Rivers is getting worse. Iraqi dam storage is down 75% from 3 years ago, while the river flow in Euphrates has fallen by a similar percentage as compared with the year 2000. And since rainfall in the region has been average, all finger’s point to Turkey and its ongoing hydro projects.
For the past 30-plus years, Turkey has been constructing a series of dams and related waterworks collectively known as the Southeastern Anatolia Project, better known by its Turkish acronym as the “GAP.” The 22 dams and 19 hydro-electric power plants are intended to expand irrigation by 1.7 million hectares in southeastern Turkey, and provide up to 27 billion kilowatt/hours of electricity annually. While it is difficult to argue against the expected benefits to Turkey, the question is: “at what expense?”
Turkey is the upper riparian on both the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, which flow from Turkey’s eastern mountains down through Syria and into Iraq. The two rivers eventually join in southern Iraq to form the Shat al Arab before entering the Persian Gulf. Both Syria and Iraq, downstream riparians, have complained that Turkey’s GAP activities and the downstream impacts violate international law. The statistics presented in this article give their complaints credence.
The difficulty is that Turkey doesn’t seem to care. The country has long championed an absolutist international law perspective – absolute territorial sovereignty – that posits that sovereignty entitles states to unrestrained use of resources found within their territories. They claim that since the majority of water originates within their territory (more than 95% for the Euphrates and some 43% of the Tigris), they should have the right to use it for their benefit.
This position is also seen in Turkey’s observance of (or lack thereof) the solitary bilateral water sharing agreement between Turkey and Iraq. Under the 1946 Treaty of Friendship, Turkey is obliged to inform Iraq of any projects it undertakes that are likely to affect the flow of the rivers. Turkey, however, has argued that its activities will only serve to improve water flow in the two rivers and has discounted evidence to the contrary.
Turkey was one of three nations (China and Burundi were the other two) that voted against the 1997 UN Watercourses Convention in the UN General Assembly. That instrument stands for the principle of limited territorial sovereignty and obligates states to an equitable and reasonable use of a transboundary watercourse as well as to ensure that activities within their territory do not cause significant harm to other riparian states. Both Iraq and Syria have ratified or acceded to that instrument. That the Convention has yet to go into force (see the Status of the Convention here and my recent post on the subject) is irrelevant as most of its provisions have the status of customary international law. Yet, Turkey continues to espouse its absolutist position.
The principal shortcoming of Turkey’s approach is that it is nearly alone in its championing of this approach, one that was discarded long ago by the vast majority of nations. China is the only other nation that I know of that continues to actively assert this position (primarily in relation to the Mekong River). Practically speaking, this absolutist approach disregards downstream consequences and the rights of downstream states to the use of the two rivers. As Turkey is nearly exclusively an upstream state in all of its transboundary rivers, it has not experienced life as a downstream riparian. I suspect that if Turkey had an opportunity to be reliant on an upstream state’s goodwill and good faith, it too would change its perspective (the US so did when it repudiated the Harmon Doctrine in its relations with Mexico when it later negotiated transboundary waters agreements with Canada; but that is a discussion for another time).
Possibly, Turkey will eventually find itself reliant on the goodwill and good faith of Syria and Iraq on other issues important to its interests, though, at the moment, I can’t think of any that could be used to counterweigh the water issue. It is more likely that Turkey will find itself reliant on the goodwill and good faith of other nations who might be sympathetic to the plight of Turkey’s downstream neighbors. Membership in the European Union – something Turkey may covet more than the waters of the Tigris and Euphrates – has often been suggested as the likely carrot for Turkey’s cooperation with Syria and Iraq. That, however, presupposes that the EU truly is interested in this dilemma. Given most of Europe’s disdain for the US’s activities in Iraq, there could be a leadership opportunity in the Middle East for the sidelined Europeans. Does Europe have the tenacity and determination to take on this challenge? If not, Iraq and Syria are in for a very long drought.
Thanks to Rich Rapier for sending me the link to the Greek article.
