Politics and Water

First Edition, 2012

ISBN 978-81-323-3792-8

© All rights reserved. Published by: University Publications 4735/22 Prakashdeep Bldg, Ansari Road, Darya Ganj, Delhi - 110002 Email: [email protected] 

Table of Contents Chapter 1 - Water Conflict Chapter 2 - Water Politics Chapter 3 - Sharing the Water of the Ganges Chapter 4 - Kaveri River Water Dispute Chapter 5 - Water Politics in the Middle East Chapter 6 - California Water Wars Chapter 7 - Water Politics in the Jordan River Basin Chapter 8 - Colorado River Compact Chapter 9 - Water Politics in the Nile Basin Chapter 10 - Indus Waters Treaty

Chapter- 1

Water Conflict

Water conflict is a term describing a conflict between countries, states, or groups over an access to water resources. The United Nations recognizes that water disputes result from opposing interests of water users, public or private. A wide range of water conflicts appear throughout history, though rarely are traditional wars waged over water alone. Instead, water has historically been a source of tension and a factor in conflicts that start for other reasons. However, water conflicts arise for several reasons, including territorial disputes, a fight for resources, and strategic advantage. These conflicts occur over both freshwater and saltwater, and between international boundaries. However, conflicts occur mostly over freshwater; because freshwater resources are necessary, yet limited, they are the center of water disputes arising out of need for potable water. As freshwater is a vital, yet unevenly distributed natural resource, its availability often impacts the living and economic conditions of a country or region. The lack of cost-effective water desalination techniques in areas like the Middle East , among other elements of water crises can put severe pressures on all water users, whether corporate, government, or individual, leading to tension, and possibly aggression. Recent humanitarian catastrophes, such as the Rwandan Genocide or the war in Sudanese Darfur, have been linked back to water conflicts.

Causes Water conflicts occur because the demand for water resources and potable water extend far beyond the amount of water actually available. Elements of a water crisis may put pressures on affected parties to obtain more of a shared water resource, causing diplomatic tension or outright conflict. 1.1 billion people are without adequate drinking water; the potential for water disputes is correspondingly large. Besides life, water is necessary for proper sanitation , commercial services, and the production of commercial goods. Thus numerous types of parties can become implicated in a water dispute. For example, corporate entities may pollute water resources shared by a community, or governments may argue over who gets access to a river used as an international or inter-state boundary.

The broad spectrum of water disputes makes them difficult to address. Locale, local and international law, commercial interests, environmental concerns, and human rights questions make water disputes complicated to solve – combined with the sheer number of potential parties, a single dispute can leave a large list of demands to be met by courts and lawmakers.

Economic and trade issues Water’s viability as a commercial resource, which includes fishing, agriculture, manufacturing, recreation and tourism, among other possibilities, can create dispute even when access to potable water is not necessarily an issue. As a resource, some consider water to be as valuable as oil, needed by nearly every industry, and needed nearly every day. Water shortages can completely cripple an industry just as it can cripple a population, and affect developed countries just as they affect countries with lessdeveloped water infrastructure. Water-based industries are more visible in water disputes, but commerce at all levels can be damaged by a lack of water. International commercial disputes between nations can be addressed through the World Trade Organization, which has water-specific groups like a Fisheries Center that provide a unified judicial protocol for commercial conflict resolution. Still, water conflict occurring domestically, as well as conflict that may not be entirely commercial in nature may not be suitable for arbitration by the WTO.

Fishing Historically, fisheries have been the main sources of question, as nations expanded and claimed portions of oceans and seas as territory for ‘domestic’ commercial fishing. Certain lucrative areas, such as the Bering Sea, have a history of dispute; in 1886 Great Britain and the United States clashed over sealing fisheries , and today Russia surrounds a pocket of international water known as the Bering Sea Donut Hole. Conflict over fishing routes and access to the hole was resolved in 1995 by a convention referred to colloquially as the Donut Hole Agreement. .

Pollution Corporate interest often crosses opposing commercial interest, as well as environmental concerns, leading to another form of dispute. In the 1960’s, Lake Erie, and to a lesser extent, the other Great Lakes were polluted to the point of massive fish death. Local communities suffered greatly from dismal water quality until the United States Congress passed the Clean Water Act in 1972. Water pollution poses a significant health risk, especially in heavily industrialized, heavily populated areas like China. In response to a worsening situation in which entire cities lacked safe drinking water, China passed a revised Water Pollution Prevention and Control Law. The possibility of polluted water making it way across international boundaries, as well as unrecognized water pollution within a poorer country brings up

questions of human rights, allowing for international input on water pollution. There is no single framework for dealing with pollution disputes local to a nation.

Classifications According to Aaron Wolf, et all. there were 1831 water conflicts over transboundary basins from 1950–2000. They categorizied these events as following:       

No water-related events on the extremes Most interactions are cooperative Most interactions are mild Water acts as irritant Water acts as unifier Nations cooperate over a wide variety of issues Nations conflict over quantity and infrastructure

Response International organizations play the largest role in mediating water disputes and improving water management. From scientific efforts to quantify water pollution, to the World Trade Organization’s efforts to resolve trade disputes between nations, the varying types of water disputes can be addressed through current framework. Yet water conflicts that go unresolved become more dangerous as water becomes more scarce and global population increases.

United Nations The UN International Hydrological Program aims to help improve understanding of water resources and foster effective water management . But by far the most active UN program in water dispute resolution is its Potential Conflict to Co-operation Potential mission, which is in its third phase, training water professionals in the Middle East and organizing educational efforts elsewhere. Its target groups include diplomats, lawmakers, civil society, and students of water studies; by expanding knowledge of water disputes, it hopes to encourage co-operation between nations in dealing with conflicts. UNESCO only just recently published a complete map of transboundary aquifers. Academic work focusing on water disputes has yet to yield a consistent method for mediating international disputes, let alone local ones. But UNESCO faces optimistic prospects for the future as water conflicts become more public, and as increasing severity sobers obstinate interests.

World Trade Organization The World Trade Organization can arbitrate water disputes presented by its member states when the disputes are commercial in nature. The WTO has certain groups, such as

its Fisheries Center, that work to monitor and rule on relevant cases, although it is by no means the authority on conflict over water resources. Because water is so central to agricultural trade, water disputes may be subtly implicated in WTO cases in the form of virtual water , water used in the production of goods and services but not directly traded between countries. Countries with greater access to water supplies may fare better from an economic standpoint than those facing crisis, which creates the potential for conflict. Outraged by agriculture subsidies that displace domestic produce, countries facing water shortages bring their case to the WTO. The WTO plays more of a role in agriculturally-based disputes that are relevant to conflict over specific sources of water. Still, it provides an important framework that shapes the way water will play into future economic disputes. One school of thought entertains the notion of war over water, the ultimate progression of an unresolved water dispute -- scarce water resources combined with the pressure of exponentially increasing population may outstrip the ability of the WTO to maintain civility in trade issues

Notable conflicts Water conflicts can occur on the intrastate and interstate levels. Interstate conflicts occur between two or more neighboring countries that share a transboundary water source, such as a river, sea, or groundwater basin. For example, the Middle East has only 1% of the world's freshwater shared among 5% of the world's population. Intrastate conflicts take place between two of more parties in the same country. An example would be the conflicts between farmers and industry (agricultural vs industrial use of water). According to UNESCO, the current interstate conflicts occur mainly in the Middle East (disputes stemming from the Euphrates and Tigris Rivers among Turkey, Syria, and Iraq; and the Jordan River conflict among Israel, Lebanon, Jordan and the Palestine territories), in Africa (Nile River-related conflicts among Egypt, Ethiopia, and Sudan), as well as in Central Asia (the Aral Sea conflict among Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan). Some analysts estimate that due to an increase in human consumption of water resources, water conflicts will become increasingly common in the near future. During World War One, the Battle of Beersheba (1917) was fought with the expressed intention of securing water resources in Palestine.

Water conflicts between Malaysia and Singapore Singapore and Malaysia have a long standing conflict over water supplies.

The first water agreement was signed between His Highness the Sultan and Sovereign Ruler of the State and Territories of Johore and the Municipal Commissioners of the Town of Singapore on 5 December 1927. This agreement is no longer in force. On 1 September 1961, the Federation of Malaya signed an agreement giving Singapore the right to draw up to 86 million gallons of water per day collectively from the Tebrau River, the Scudai River, the Pontian Reservoir, and the Gunung Pulai Reservoir, with effect through 2011. On 29 September 1962, a further agreement was signed providing Singapore the right to draw up to 250 million gallons per day from the Johore River, with effect through 2061. Both agreements stipulated the price of 3 Malaysian cents per 1,000 gallons. The Malaysian government has stated that the agreements were signed during a different time and that the price should increase. They cite the example of water sold by China to Hong Kong in the past, which was approximately $8 per 1,000 gallons. However, this price comparison is not directly applicable because while China has borne the cost of constructing and maintaining the infrastructure to provide water to Hong Kong, Singapore paid for all the costs of the reservoirs in Johore, the dams, pipelines, plant, equipment, etc. and Singapore continues to pay all the costs of operating and maintaining this infrastructure. Malaysia has always been a reliable provider of water to Singapore, but Malaysia has often used threats of cutting off the water supply to pressure Singapore politically. Seeking greater political independence and freedom from such pressures, Singapore has pursued a costly strategy of developing self-sufficiency of water sources. As of 2003, about 40% of Singapore's water came from Malaysia. This proportion has been decreasing as Singapore has pursued its Four Tap Strategy of sourcing water from rainwater, recycling, desalination, and importation. As new desalination and recycling plants come online and new dams are built to create additional reservoirs, Singapore's dependence on imported water decreases. With decreasing dependence, the potential for water conflicts is reduced. By 2010, Singapore had constructed 5 Newater plants, a desalination plant and a new water barrage to increase rainwater supply. The Newater/Desalination plants have the capability to supply 40% of Singapore's water needs as at 2010. Due to the limit of rainwater catchment, new investment is being planned with a tender for 2nd and larger desalination plant to be constructed by 2013. Singapore's water needs are anticipated to double in the next 50 years. Planned Newater output will triple to meet 50% of needs by year 2060 whilst desalination investment will raise output to meet 30% of needs. By the expiry of the 1962 water agreement in 2061, the necessity for Malaysia water import should be eliminated.

Chapter- 2

Water Politics

People waiting in line to gather water during the Siege of Sarajevo Water politics, sometimes called hydropolitics, is politics affected by the availability of water and water resources, a necessity for all life forms and human development. The first use of the term, hydropolitics, came in the book by John Waterbury, entitled Hydropolitics of the Nile Valley. The availability of drinking water per capita is inadequate and shrinking worldwide. The causes, related to both quantity and quality, are many and varied; they include local scarcity, limited availability and population pressures, but also human activities of mass consumption, misuse, environmental degradation and water pollution, as well as climate change. Water's essential nature makes it a strategic natural resource globally, and in its absence, an important element of political conflicts in many areas, historically. With decreasing availability and increasing demand for water, some have predicted that clean

water will become the "next oil"; making countries like Canada, Chile, Norway, Colombia and Peru, with this resource in abundance, the water-rich countries in the world. The UN World Water Development Report (WWDR, 2003) from the World Water Assessment Program indicates that, in the next 20 years, the quantity of water available to everyone is predicted to decrease by 30%. Currently, 40% of the world's inhabitants have insufficient fresh water for minimal hygiene. More than 2.2 million people died in 2000 from diseases related to the consumption of contaminated water or drought. In 2004, the UK charity WaterAid reported that a child dies every 15 seconds from easily preventable water-related diseases; often this means lack of sewage disposal; see toilet. The United Nations Development Programme sums up world water distribution in the 2006 development report: "One part of the world sustains a designer bottled water market that generates no tangible health benefits, another part suffers acute public health risks because people have to drink water from drains or from lakes and rivers." Fresh water — now more precious than ever in our history for its extensive use in agriculture, high-tech manufacturing, and energy production — is increasingly receiving attention as a resource requiring better management and sustainable use. Riparian water rights have become issues of international diplomacy, in addition to domestic and regional water rights and politics. World Bank Vice President Ismail Serageldin predicted, "Many of the wars of the 20th century were about oil, but wars of the 21st century will be over water". This is debated by some, however, who argue that disputes over water usually are resolved by diplomacy and do not turn into wars

Water as a critical resource Most importantly, fresh water is a fundamental requirement of all living organisms, crops, livestock and humanity included. The UNDP considers access to it a basic human right and a prerequisite for peace. UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan stated in 2001, “Access to safe water is a fundamental human need and, therefore, a basic human right. Contaminated water jeopardizes both the physical and social health of all people. It is an affront to human dignity.” With increased development, many industries, including forestry, agriculture, mining, manufacturing and recreation require sizable additional amounts of freshwater to operate. This, however, has led to increases in air and water pollution, which in turn have reduced the quality of water supply. More sustainable development practices are advantageous and necessary. According to the WHO, each human being requires a bare minimum of 20 litres of fresh water per day for basic hygiene; this equals 7.3 cubic metres (about 255 ft3) per person, per year. Based on the availability, access and development of water supplies, the specific usage figures vary widely from country to country, with developed nations having existing systems to treat water for human consumption, and deliver it to every home. At the same time however, some nations across Latin America, parts of Asia, South East Asia, Africa and the Middle East either do not have sufficient water resources or have not developed these or the infrastructure to the levels required. This occurs for many varied reasons. It has resulted in conflict and often results in a reduced level or quantity of fresh

water per capita consumption; this situation leads toward disease, and at times, to starvation and death. The source of virtually all freshwater is precipitation from the atmosphere, in the form of mist, rain and snow, as part of the water cycle over eons, millennia and in the present day. Freshwater constitutes only 3% of all water on Earth, and of that, slightly over two thirds is stored frozen in glaciers and polar ice caps. The remaining unfrozen freshwater is mainly found as groundwater, with only a small fraction present in the air, or on the ground surface. Surface water is stored in wetlands or lakes or flows in a stream or river, and is the most commonly utilized resource for water. In places, surface water can be stored in a reservoir behind a dam, and then used for municipal and industrial water supply, for irrigation and to generate power in the form of hydroelectricity. Sub-surface groundwater, although stored in the pore space of soil and rock; it is utilized most as water flowing within aquifers below the water table. Groundwater can exist both as a renewable water system closely associated with surface water and as a separate, deep sub-surface water system in an aquifer. This latter case is sometimes called "fossil water", and is realistically non-renewable. Normally, groundwater is utilized where surface sources are unavailable or when surface supply distribution is limited. Rivers sometimes flow through several countries and often serve as the boundary or demarcation between them. With these rivers, water supply, allocation, control, and use are of great consequence to survival, quality of life, and economic success. The control of a nation's water resources is considered vital to the survival of a state. Similar crossborder groundwater flow also occurs. Competition for these resources, particularly where limited, have caused or been additive to conflicts in the past.

Water politics by country OECD countries

Hopetoun Falls near Otway National Park, Victoria, Australia With nearly 2,000 cubic metres (70,000 ft3) of water used per person per year , the United States leads the world in water consumption per capita. Among the developed OECD countries, the U.S. is highest in water consumption, then Canada with 1,600 cubic meters (56,000 ft3) of water per person per year, which is about twice the amount of water used by the average person from France, three times as much as the average German, and almost eight times as much as the average Dane. A 2001 University of Victoria report says that since 1980, overall water use in Canada has increased by 25.7%. This is five times faster than the overall OECD increase of 4.5%. In contrast, nine OECD nations were able to decrease their overall water use since 1980 (Sweden, the Netherlands, the United States, the United Kingdom, the Czech Republic, Luxembourg, Poland, Finland and Denmark).

India

Ganges river delta, Bangladesh and India India - Bangladesh The Ganges is disputed between India and Bangladesh. The water reserves are being quickly depleted and polluted, while the Gangotri glacier that feeds the sacred Hindu river is retreating hundreds of feet each year (experts blame climate change ) and deforestation in the Himalayas, which is causing subsoil streams flowing into the Ganges river to dry up. Downstream, India controls the flow to Bangladesh with the Farakka Barrage, 10 kilometers (6 mi) on the Indian side of the border. Until the late 1990s, India used the barrage to divert the river to Calcutta, to keep the city's port from drying up during the dry season. This denied Bangladeshi farmers water and silt, and it left the Sundarban wetlands and mangrove forests at the river's delta seriously threatened. The

two countries have now signed an agreement to share the water more equally. Water quality, however, remains a problem, with high levels of arsenic and untreated sewage in the river water. Cauvery dispute

Mexico In Mexico City, an estimated 40% of the city's water is lost through leaky pipes built at the turn of the 20th century.

Middle East The Middle East region has only 1% of the world's available fresh water, which is shared among 5% of the world's population. Thus, in this region, water is an important strategic resource. By 2025, it is predicted that the countries of the Arabian peninsula will be using more than double the amount of water naturally available to them. According to a report by the Arab League, two-thirds of Arab countries have less than 1,000 cubic meters (35,000 ft3) of water per person per year available, which is considered the limit. Water politics is not an emerging field within international relations discourse, nor is it a force insignificant in comparison to other political pressures, such as those of critical infrastructure (for example, petroleum for the United States), or that of strategic geopolitical control (for example, control of the Suez canal or the Persian Gulf). In the context of the Middle East, with a multitude of existing national, subnational, ideological, ethnic, religious and pan-national tensions, conflicts and associations, water politics has already been considered to have played a major role in tensions between Iraq, Syria and Turkey in 1990, when Turkey commenced the Southeastern Anatolia Project (also known as GAP) to dam sections of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers north of the Syrian/Turkey border. Finding themselves without control of their waterways, Syria and Iraq formed an alliance, ignoring the previous disputes which had divided them, to confront the issue of water control. Within the Middle East, all major rivers cross at least one international border, with rivers like the Tigris and Euphrates crossing through three major Middle Eastern nations. This means that the nations, cities and towns downstream from the next are hugely effected by the actions and decisions of other groups whom one has little practical control over. In particular this is evident with the cutting of water supply from one nation to the next, just as issues of air pollution effect the states surrounding that which is producing the pollution initially. It is believed that up to 50% of water required for any specific state within the Middle East finds its source in another state. Iraq and Syria watched with apprehension the construction of the Atatürk Dam in Turkey and a projected system of 22 dams on the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. According to the BBC, the list of 'water-scarce' countries in the region grew steadily from three in 1955 to eight in 1990 with another seven expected to be added within 20 years, including three

Nile nations (the Nile is shared by nine countries). According to Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, the only conceivable flashpoint Egypt may encounter as it heads into the 21st century is the control of fresh water resources. With substantial, but falling rates of fertility, the issue of water distribution in the Middle East will not be easily dismissed. The River Jordan The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan has little water, and dams in Syria have reduced its available water sources over the years. Confronted by this lack of water, Jordan is preparing new techniques to use non-conventional water resources, such as second-hand use of irrigation water and desalinization techniques, which are very costly and are not yet used. A desalinization project will soon be started in Hisban, south of Amman. The Disi groundwater project, in the south of Jordan, will cost at least $250 million to bring out water. Along with the Unity Dam on the Yarmouk River, it is one of Jordan's largest strategic projects. Born in 1987, the "Unity Dam" would involve both Jordan and Syria. This "Unity Dam" still has not been implemented because of Israel's opposition, Jordan and Syrian conflictive relations and the disinterest of international investors. However, Jordan's reconciliation with Syria following the death of King Hussein represents the removal of one of the project's greatest obstacles.

The Jordan River

As per the 1994 Israel-Jordan Treaty of Peace Israel has agreed to provide 50 million cubic meters of water (1.7 billion ft3) to Jordan annually. According to the treaty the two countries would cooperate in order to allow Jordan better access to water resources, notably through dams on the Yarmouk River. The Golan Heights provide 770 million cubic meters (27 billion ft3) of water per year to Israel, which represents a third of its annual consumption. The Golan's water goes to the Sea of Galilee—Israel's largest reserve—which is then redistributed throughout the country by the National Water Carrier. Water is an important issue in the Arab-Israeli conflict—indeed, according to former Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon quoted by Abel Darwish of the BBC, it was one of the causes of the 1967 Six-Day War. In practice the access to water has been a casus belli for Israel. Palestinians complain of a lack of access to water in the region. Israelis in the West Bank use four times as much water as their Palestinian neighbors. According to the World Bank, 90% of the West Bank's water is used by Israelis, despite their making up only a fraction of its population. Article 40 of the appendix B of the September 28, 1995 Oslo accords stated that "Israel recognizes Palestinians' rights on water in the West Bank". Israel obtains water from four sources: rainwater collected naturally into the Sea of Galilee and the Jordan River(~36%), the mountain aquifers (~28%), the coastal aquifer (~14%), and water recycling (~23%). Almost all the water used in the Palestinian areas other than rainwater is drawn from the underground aquifers (mountain aquifer ~52%, coastal aquifer ~48%). The Palestinian Authority has not developed any significant wastewater treatment facilities. The mountain aquifers lie mostly under the West Bank and the coastal aquifer mostly under the Israeli coastal plain. Israel took control of the West Bank in 1967, including the recharge areas for aquifers that flow west and northwest into Israel and limits were placed on the amount withdrawn from each existing well. Since that time, the only permits for new Palestinian wells that have been granted are for domestic needs. Currently, a total of 150 million cubic meters per year is consumed by its residents—115 million cubic meters per year by Palestinians and 35 million cubic meters per year by Israelis. Water usage issues have been part of a number of agreements reached between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. For these reasons, the question of water supply for both Israel and Palestine is a very serious obstacle to a comprehensive agreement.

South America The Guaraní Aquifer, located between the Mercosur countries of Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia and Paraguay, with a volume of about 40,000 km³, is an important source of fresh potable water for all four countries.

United States Ninety-five percent of the United States' fresh water is underground.

Case Studies Water politics is about how water is polluted by some force, making it unusable and undrinkable, and how it affects the people who use and need that water to survive. Such is the case in northern Montana for the Cheyenne Indian tribe. More than 1 million indigenous people will be relocated to allow for the development of hydroelectric dam projects in the next decade. The United States has detonated all its nuclear weapons in the lands of indigenous people, more than 600 of those tests within land legally belonging to the Shoshone nation. One-half of all uranium resources within the borders of the United States lay under native reservations. In 1974, Indians produced 100% of all federally controlled uranium. One-third of all low-sulfur coal in the western United States is on Indian land, with four of the ten largest coal strip mines in these same areas. Fifteen of the eighteen recipients of phase one nuclear waste research grants, socalled Monitored Retrievable Nuclear Storage sites, are Indian communities. For example, one battle is the unfolding in Montana as preparations begin for a massive attack on the lands of the Crow and Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation] in search of coal. The coal they are in search of is destined to fuel the proposed North Central Power Project, a development that could severely shrink the Four Corners Project in its physical and environmental impact. In 2006 in Window Rock, Arizona, Navajos marched to the Navajo Nation Council and protested the tribe's negotiations with Peabody Coal, opposing the use of Navajos' pristine aquifer water by coal mines and power plants. Navajos from remote areas, many of whom live without running water and drive long distances to haul their drinking water, protested ongoing negotiations with Peabody Coal for continued use of the N and C aquifers' water for coal slurry in Arizona. Navajos pay the price with their health and lives so corporations can reap the benefits by producing electricity for non-Navajos in the Southwest. "We have to pay for gasoline and wear and tear on our vehicles to haul water. What does that tell us? We live in the United States of America, a country that is supposed to be the richest nation in the world; but here we are indigenous peoples with natural resources making other people rich and providing electricity in other states, but we are the poorest nation. That is wrong (Norrell 2006).” It is said the power plant will increase pollution and health hazards for Navajos in New Mexico, where power plants and industries have fouled the air and water in the Four Corners region, affecting even more people in our country. Doctors from the region have pointed out the long-term health damage to Navajos from coal mining for those who live around the mines, including asthma and lung diseases and many different types of cancer. One more example would be the Northern Cheyenne and was discussing the coal wars on their reservation. Their reservation is surrounded by Montana’s largest power plant of five strip mines and is the largest coal fire generator in the United States. Because of the Bush Administration, their land was open to massive development; the companies wanted to increase their drilling for oil and acted as though they could take whatever they wanted. The companies ended up looking for methane natural gas, and would dump saline water, from their power plants, into the river valley on the Cheyenne reservation. The sodium in the water kills all the plants and anything near or around the river. The

company could and should use wells to collect the water, but it is too expensive for them and they resort to dumping polluted water into the river valley. Montana has become the national sacrificer. Essentially, the coal company is participating in a genocide, they are destroying people and a culture; they are taking their groundwater, polluting the air and destroying rivers. The Cheyennes will not be able to survive much longer.

Africa case studies Obuasi, Ghana is the home of one of the world’s top gold mining sites. It was in 1987 when the first machinery was used to mine the gold from the region (AngloGold Ashanti,2005,2). As the years went by, new strategies were needed to establish out ways to “treat the ores” (AngloGold Ashanti,2005, 2). By 1908, A leading chemist was brought in to help with the strategies and brought his Australian method of “dry crushing and roasting preparatory to treatment with cyanide” (AngloGold Ashanti,2005,3). Many rivers, fishing areas, and irrigation systems have been either slightly or permanently damaged (Action Aid,2006,3). The mining industry has tried to compensate by building standpipes but for many, they have been to no use.The average amount of contamination in the water system of Obuasi was over 10-38 times the maximum amount that is allowable by law (Action Aid,2006, 9). The two main sources of the contamination is the arsenic powder that flows out from the mills (Galow et al., 703) and the extensive amount of run-off water that is disposed of through dams (Action Aid,2006,9). “Thus in the processing of the ore for gold, the dust may contain particles of the ore, ferric oxide, oxides of arsenic and sulphur” (Galow et al.,2010, 703). The dust will then get carried into the atmosphere and settle on the soil, humans, and rivers (Galow et al.,2010,703). In Obuasi, they receive a high annual rainfall due to the tropical rainforest that surrounds it (Smedley,1996,464). During precipitation or rainfall, the dust “may be oxidized to the trioxide by the air and be converted to the sulphate in dew and rainwater” (Galow et al.,2010,703). The soil is the main target of contamination because the soil is contaminated and whatever vegetation grows and decays goes right back in the soil which results in the contamination of the groundwater (Galow et al.,2010,703). However, the groundwater is not as polluted as the streams or rivers mainly due to the high dissolving process of the arsenic and due to the basement rocks that lie between the groundwater and the soil. “The only disadvantage is that whatever is deposited on the surface soil may be carried to greater depths with time by rainwater (Gish et al,2010, 1973)” (Galow et al.,2010, 703). The most extensively damaged areas are the ones closest to the mines, but with the wind carrying the dust, areas hundreds of miles away are getting contaminated by the chemicals (Galow et al.,2010,706). Due to the extensive output of the chemicals from the mining mills and un resolved toxic spills, many rivers, streams, lakes and irrigation systems have been damaged or obsolete (Action Aid,2006, 5). The local residents have been affected greatly by this phenomenon. Residents have seen the environmental changes especially in the water. Sludge floats down on streams that were once main sources of drinking water according to local residents (Action Aid,2006, 3). All the marine life in the rivers and streams has died due to the high amounts of chemicals in the water (ActionAid,2006, 3). According to Action Aid,

residents have seen pipes that run straight in to local streams and rivers that were depositing the waste directly sometimes causing flooding of the streams and rivers (2006,11). Many local farmers suffered the hardest with the contamination of the water. Due to the irrigation systems using the contaminated water to irrigate all of the soil were then contaminated as well (Action Aid,2006,3). The soil was no longer usable, causing the killing off their crops that were used for their business as well as for their own families (Action Aid,2006,3). Children have also been targeted and affected by the pollution. According to Action Aid, many schools have been flooded with the over flow of the local streams, causing the children to leave school, sometimes permanently. The AGA (AngloGold Ashanti,2005,2) has put up standpipes to compensate for the contaminated water supplies, but these have also been useless to the locals. Standpipes were installed in the 1940s and 50’s that have now been contaminated with arsenic from the mills (Action Aid,2006,15). AGA staff claim it is because of them being made of iron, but studies have shown large amounts of arsenic in the water (Action Aid,2006,15). Many standpipes have been either broken or obsolete (Action Aid,2006,3). This leads to the residents to walk at least 1.5 miles to go get clean water (Action Aid,2006,16). All the work the local people have to go through to get clean water is uncalled for. No compensation has been giving to the local residents for the damage they have done to their water and environment.

Privatization Privatization of water companies has been contested on several occasions because of poor water quality, increasing prices, and ethical concerns. In Bolivia for example, the proposed privatization of water companies by the IMF was met by popular protests in Cochabamba in 2000, which ousted Bechtel, a US engineering firm based in San Francisco. Suez has started retreating from South America because of similar protests in Buenos Aires, Santa Fe, and Córdoba, Argentina. Consumers took to the streets to protest water rate hikes of as much as 500% mandated by Suez. In South and Central America, Suez has water concessions in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil and Mexico. "Bolivian officials fault Suez for not connecting enough households to water lines as mandated by its contract and for charging as much as $455 a connection, or about three times the average monthly salary of an office clerk", according to the Mercury News. South Africa also made moves to privatize water, provoking an outbreak of cholera that killed 200. In 1997, World Bank consultants assisted the Philippine government in the privatization of the city of Manila's Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage Systems (MWSS). By 2003, water price increases registered at 81% in the east zone of the Philippines and 36% in the west region. As services became more expensive and inefficient under privatization, there was reduced access to water for poor households. In October 2003, the Freedom from Debt Coalition reported that the diminished access to clean water resulted in an outbreak of cholera and other gastrointestinal diseases.

Chapter- 3

Sharing the Water of the Ganges

Map of the Ganges River from its origin in northern India to its entry into the Bay of Bengal through Bangladesh. The sharing of the Ganges' waters is a long-standing issue between India and Bangladesh over the appropriate allocation and development of the water resources of the Ganges River that flows from northern India into Bangladesh. The issue has remained a subject of conflict for almost 35 years, with several bilateral agreements and rounds of talks failing to produce results. However, a comprehensive bilateral treaty was signed by the then-Indian Prime Minister H. D. Deve Gowda and the then-Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wajed on December 12, 1996 in the Indian capital of New Delhi. The treaty established a 30-year

water-sharing arrangement with guaranteed minimum quantities of water supply for Bangladesh, whose right as a lower-level riparian was recognised.

Background

A Map showing major rivers in Bangladesh, including the Padma River. Descending from India's northern plains, the Ganges river forms a boundary of 129 kilometres between India and Bangladesh and flows for 113 km in Bangladesh. At Pakaur in India, the river begins its attrition with the branching away of its first distributary, the Bhagirathi River, which goes on to form the Hooghly River. About 10 kilometres from the border with Bangladesh the Farakka Barrage, built in 1974, controls

the flow of the Ganges, diverting some of the water into a feeder canal linking the Hooghly to keep it relatively silt-free. After entering Bangladesh, the main branch of the Ganges is known as the Padma River until it is joined by the Jamuna River, the largest distributary of the Brahmaputra River, which descends from Assam and Northeast India. Further downstream, the Ganges is fed by the Meghna River, the second-largest distributary of the Brahmaputra, and takes on the Meghna's name as it enters the Meghna estuary. Fanning out into the 350 km wide Ganges Delta, it finally empties into the Bay of Bengal. A total of 54 rivers flow into Bangladesh from India.

Efforts at resolution The then-Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and Bangladesh's founding leader Sheikh Mujibur Rahman signed the wide-ranging Indo-Bangladeshi Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation and Peace on March 19, 1972; as per the treaty, the two nations established a Joint River Commission to work for the common interests and sharing of water resources, irrigation, floods and cyclones control.

Farakka Barrage The Farakka Barrage is a dam on the Bhagirathi river located in the Indian state of West Bengal, roughly 10 km (6.2 mi) from the border with Bangladesh. India uses it to control the flow of the Ganges river. The dam was built to divert the Ganges River water into the Hooghly River during the dry season, from January to June, in order to flush out the accumulating silt which in the 1950s and 1960s was a problem at the Kolkata Port on the Hooghly River. Bangladesh claims that its rivers were drying up because of excess drawing of water by India. In May 1974 a joint declaration was issued to resolve the water–sharing issue before the Farakka Barrage was put into operation. This was followed by an interim agreement in 1975 to allow India to operate feeder canals of the barrage for short periods. However, India withdrew from the process of negotiations by September 1976 as both nations grew apart after the killing of Sheikh Mujib and establishment of military rule. Bangladesh protested India's unilateral action at a summit of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) and at the 31st session of the U.N. General Assembly. At the urging of other nations and the U.N., both India and Bangladesh agreed to resume dialogue, but with no results.

Temporary agreements Bilateral relations had improved in 1977 during the governments of the then-Prime Minister Morarji Desai of India and the then-President Ziaur Rahman of Bangladesh; in 1977 both leaders signed a 5-year treaty on water-sharing, but this duly expired in 1982 without being renewed.

On October 4, 1982 the then-Bangladeshi president Hossain Mohammad Ershad signed with India a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on water sharing for 2 years. On November 22, 1985 another MoU for 3 years was signed. As still there was no agreement on augmenting the flow, India did not agree to a further extension of the accord and reduced the river's dry season flow for Bangladesh in 1993 to lower than 10,000 cu ft/s (280 m3/s) in place of around 34,500 cu ft/s (980 m3/s) in the last accord. Bangladesh attempted to internationalise the affair by lobbying the U.N. General Assembly and the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) without result.

1996 Treaty

The Ganges Delta spanning India and Bangladesh.

The formation of an Awami League government under Sheikh Hasina Wajed, the daughter of Sheikh Mujib, in 1996 led to a fresh thaw in bilateral relations and both nations restarted negotiations. Both leaders met in the Indian capital on December 12, 1996 and signed a 30-year, comprehensive treaty. According to the treaty, the water of the Ganges river would be distributed from Farakka for the two countries between January 1 and May 31 and that India would maintain the flow at Farakka at the average level of previous 40 years. At any critical period, Bangladesh would get a guaranteed flow of 35,000 cu ft/s (990 m3/s). The two countries also agreed to the need for mutual cooperation in augmenting the flow of the Ganges on a long-term basis, and for entering into similar accords in sharing the flows and developing the water resources of other shared rivers. It established India's precondition for augmenting the flow of the Ganges and recognised Bangladesh's right as a lower riparian to an equitable share of its existing flow. Both nations were able to cooperate in harnessing the water resources; the treaty also permits the construction of barrages and irrigation projects in Kushtia and the Gorai-Madhumati River in Bangladesh, draining the southwestern districts and thus preserving the environment, natural and economic resources including the world's largest mangrove forests in Sundarbans by preventing salinity from the Bay of Bengal.

Assessment The 1996 treaty established a long-term solution and considerably easing strains in IndoBangladeshi relations. The 1996 treaty has been attacked by the Awami League's main rival, the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP), which is regarded as hostile to India, but it did not renege from the treaty when it came to power in 2001. The BNP and other Bangladeshi political factions allege that India is drawing excessive water and the amount allocated to Bangladesh is unjust and insufficient. India in turn complains that the water allocated to Bangladesh leaves it with less water than necessary for the functioning of the Kolkata Port and the National Thermal Power Corporation in Farakka. Other critics have also stressed environmental reasons for India to reconsider its drawing of water at Farraka. Alarming increases in deforestation and erosion at the upper levels of the Ganges river increases the deposition of silt at the lower level, which is already measured at 2 million tonnes annually, along with increased salinity have also led to desertification. In Bangladesh, the diversion has raised salinity levels, contaminated fisheries, hindered navigation and posed a threat to water quality and public health. Such silt levels are believed to be adversely affecting the Hooghly river and the Kolkata Port.

Chapter- 4

Kaveri River Water Dispute

Kaveri river flows in South Karnataka and then to Tamil Nadu. The sharing of waters of the river Kaveri had been the bone of contention of a serious conflict between the Indian states of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. The genesis of this disparity, itself, lies in two controversial agreements, one signed in 1892 and another in 1924, between the Madras Presidency and the Princely State of Mysore.

The state of Karnataka feels that it has not got its due share of water utilization viv a vis Tamil Nadu. Karnataka claims that these agreements were skewed heavily in favour of the Madras Presidency, and has since demanded a renegotiated settlement based on "equitable sharing of the waters". Tamil Nadu, on the other hand, pleads that it has already developed almost 3,000,000 acres (12,000 km2) of land and as a result has come to depend very heavily on the existing pattern of usage. Any change in this pattern, it says, will adversely affect the livelihood of millions of farmers in the state. Decades of negotiations between the parties bore no fruit. The Government of India then constituted a tribunal in 1990 to look into the matter. After hearing arguments of all the parties involved for the last 16 years, the tribunal delivered its final verdict on 5 February 2007. In its verdict, the tribunal allocated 419 billion ft³ (12 km³) of water annually to Tamil Nadu and 270 billion ft³ (7.6 km³) to Karnataka; 30 billion ft³ (0.8 km³) of Kaveri river water to Kerala and 7 billion ft³ (0.2 km³) to Puducherry. The dispute however, seems far from over with all four states deciding to file review petitions seeking clarifications and possible renegotiation of the order. Karnataka Basin Area (in km²) Drought area in the basin (in km²) Contribution of state (in billion ft³ according to Ktaka)

34,273 (42%) 21,870 (63.8%) 425 (53.7%)

Tamil Nadu 44,016 (54%) 12,790 (29.2%)

2,866 (3.5%)

148(-)

81,155

--

--

34,660

252 (31.8%)

113 (14.3%)

Kerala Pondicherry Total

790

126 Contribution of state (in 392 (52.9%) 222 (30%) (17%) billion ft³ according to TN) Quantity demanded by each 465 (41%) state Share for each state as per 177 (24%) TN's demand Share for each state as per 270 (37%) tribunal verdict of 2007

740

566 (50%) 100 (9%) 9.3 (1%)

1140.3

566 (76%) 5 (1%)

748

-

419 (58%) 30 (4%) 7 (1%)

726

History of the dispute The history of this conflict goes back a long way. Disputes have occurred since 1807, but British influence mediated tensions for several decades. The British controlled both Mysore and Madras for a short period in the middle of the 19th century. During their regime, numerous plans were drawn up for the utilization of the Kaveri waters by both states. However, the drought and subsequent famine in the mid 1870s put a hold on the implementation of these plans. The plans were revived by Mysore in 1881, by which time

Mysore was back in the hands of the Mysore kings, while present day Tamil Nadu continued to remain a part of the Madras Presidency. Mysore's plans to revive the irrigation projects met with resistance from the Madras Presidency. Mysore state made a representation to the then British government; as a result of which, a conference was held in 1890 with the objective of agreeing "…on the principles of a modus vivendi, which would on the one hand allow to Mysore reasonable freedom in dealing with her irrigation works, and on the other, give to Madras practical security against injury to her interests" and eventually the Agreement of 1892 was signed. Karnataka deems this agreement as having been between unequal partners because, while Mysore state was a princely state, Madras formed a part of the British Raj. Karnataka also considers this agreement to have been severely inimical to its interests as it gave sweeping powers and prescriptive rights to Madras, the lower riparian state. As per this agreement, Mysore was required to obtain Madras' consent for any new irrigation reservoirs across any of the main rivers it wished to utilize and share information on any new irrigation scheme it wished to undertake to utilize the waters Things came to a head in 1910 when Mysore, under Nalvadi Krishnaraja Wodeyar as the king and Sir. M.Vishweshwariah as Chief Engineer came up with a plan to construct a dam at Kannambadi village to hold up to 41.5 TMC of water. The dam was planned to be built in two stages. In the first stage a capacity of 11 TMC was envisioned, while in the second stage the full capacity was set to be realized. Madras however, refused to give its consent for this move as it had its own plans to build a storage dam at Mettur with a capacity of 80 TMC. After a reference to the Government of India, permission was accorded to Mysore, but for a reduced storage of 11TMC. During construction, however, the foundation was laid to suit the earlier desired full storage. This raised Madras' hackles and the dispute continued. As a result, the then British Government of India referred the matter to arbitration under Rule IV of the 1892 Agreement. The Cauvery dispute thus had come up for arbitration for the first time. Sir H D Griffin was appointed arbitrator and M. Nethersole, the Inspector General of Irrigation in India, was made the Assessor. They entered into proceedings on 16 July 1913 and the Award was given on 12 May 1914. The award upheld the earlier decision of the Government of India and allowed Mysore to go ahead with the construction of the dam up to 11 TMC. The agreement also stipulated that Mysore was not to increase its area under irrigation more than 110,000 acres (450 km2) beyond what was already existing, while the same cap for Madras Presidency was pegged at 301000|acre|km2. Nonetheless, Madras still appealed against the award and negotiations continued. Eventually an agreement was arrived at in 1924 and a couple of minor agreements were also signed in 1929 and 1933. The 1924 agreement was set to lapse after a run of 50 years. As a result of these agreements, Karnataka claims that Mysore was forced to give up rights.

Post independence developments In 1947, India won independence from the British. This changed the equations drastically. Tamil Nadu was carved out of Madras Presidency and Mysore province became a state. Further in 1956, the reorganization of the states of India took place and state boundaries were redrawn based on linguistic demographics. Kodagu or Coorg (the birthplace of the Kaveri), became a part of Mysore state. Huge parts of erstwhile Hyderabad state and Bombay Presidency joined with Mysore state. Parts of Malabar which earlier formed part of Madras Presidency went to Kerala. Pondicherry had already become a de facto Union territory in 1954. All these changes further changed the equations as Kerala and Pondicherry also jumped into the fray. Kerala staked its claim as one of the major tributaries of the Kaveri, the Kabini, now originated in Kerala. Karaikal region of Pondicherry at the tail end of the river demanded the waters that it had always used for drinking and some minimal agriculture. While these additional claims complicated matters greatly at a technical level, Mysore state and Tamil Nadu still remained the major parties to the dispute. By the late 1960s, both states and the Central government began to realize the gravity of the situation as the 50 year run of the 1924 agreement was soon coming to an end. Negotiations were started in right earnest and discussions continued for almost 10 years.

1970s While discussions continued, a Cauvery Fact Finding Committee (CFFC) was constituted. The brief of the CFFC was to inspect the ‘ground’ realities and come up with a report. The CFFC came up with a preliminary report in 1972 and a final report in 1973. Inter state discussions were held based on this report. Finally in 1974, a draft agreement which also provided for the creation of a Cauvery Valley Authority was prepared by the Ministry of Irrigation. This draft however, was not ratified. While all these discussions went on, Tamil Nadu’s irrigated lands had grown from a preMettur command area of 1,440,000 acres (5,800 km2) to 2,580,000 acres (10,400 km2) while Karnataka’s irrigated area stood at 680,000 acres (2,800 km²). Karnataka maintains that these figures demonstrate the lop-sided nature of the agreement. In 1976, after a series of discussions between the two states and the Central government chaired by Jagjeevan Ram, the then Irrigation Minister, a final draft was prepared based on findings of the CFFC. This draft was accepted by all states and the Government also made an announcement to that effect in Parliament. Tamil Nadu came under President’s rule soon after that and the agreement was put on the backburner. When President’s rule was lifted, the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) with M. G.

Ramachandran at the helm came to power for the first time in Tamil Nadu and the dispute took a new turn. The Tamil Nadu government now rejected the draft agreement and started insisting that the 1924 agreement had only provided for an extension and not a review. It began insisting that status quo be restored and everyone go back to the agreements of 1892 and 1924. This however, did not cut ice with Karnataka which had throughout maintained that those agreements were partisan and had been signed between unequal partners. When Karnataka began construction of the Harangi dam at Kushalanagara in Kodagu, it was once again met with resistance from Tamil Nadu. Tamil Nadu went to court demanding the constitution of a Tribunal under the Inter State Water Disputes Act(ISWD) of 1956. It also demanded the immediate stoppage of construction work at the dam site. As a result of Tamil Nadu’s protests, Karnataka had to fund the construction under the non-plan head and this led to a severe strain on its finances.

1980s Later Tamil Nadu withdrew its case demanding the constitution of a tribunal and the two states started negotiating again. Several rounds of discussions were held in the 80s. The result was still, a stalemate. In 1986, a farmer’s association from Tanjavur in Tamil Nadu moved the Supreme Court demanding the constitution of a tribunal. While this case was still pending, the two states continued many rounds of talks. This continued till April 1990 and yet yielded no results.

The constitution of the tribunal The Supreme Court then directed the government headed by Prime Minister V. P. Singh to constitute a tribunal and refer all disputes to it. A three man tribunal was thus constituted on 2 June 1990. The tribunal was headquartered at New Delhi and was to be headed by Justice Chittatosh Mookerjee. The four states presented their demands to the tribunal as under    

Karnataka - claimed 465 billion ft³ (13 km³) as its share Kerala - wants 99.8 billion ft³ (2.83 km³) as its share Pondicherry - claims 9.3 billion ft³ (0.3 km³) Tamil Nadu - wants the flows to be ensured in accordance with the terms of the agreements of 1892 and 1924 (ie., 566 billion ft³ (16 km³) for Tamil Nadu and Pondicherry; 177 billion ft³ (5 km³) for Karnataka and 5 billion ft³ (0.1 km³) for Kerala).

Interim award and the riots Soon after the tribunal was set up, Tamil Nadu demanded a mandatory injunction on Karnataka for the immediate release of water and other reliefs. This was dismissed by the

tribunal. Tamil Nadu now went back to the Supreme Court which directed the tribunal to reconsider Tamil Nadu’s plea. The tribunal reconsidered Tamil Nadu’s plea and gave an interim award on 25 June 1991. In coming up with this award, the tribunal calculated the average inflows into Tamil Nadu over a period of 10 years between 1980–81 and 1989–90. The extreme years were ignored for this calculation. The average worked out to 205 billion ft³ (5.8 km³) which Karnataka had to ensure reached Tamil Nadu in a water year. The award also stipulated the weekly and monthly flows to be ensured by Karnataka for each month of the water year. The tribunal further directed Karnataka not to increase it irrigated land area from the existing 1,120,000 acres (4,500 km2) Karnataka deemed this extremely inimical to its interests and issued an ordinance seeking to annul the tribunal’s award. The Supreme Court now stepped in at the President’s instance and struck down the Ordinance issued by Karnataka. It upheld the tribunal’s award which was subsequently gazetted by the Government of India on 11 December 1991. Karnataka was thus forced to accept the interim award and widespread demonstrations and violence broke out in parts of Karnataka and Tamil Nadu following this. Thousands of Tamil families had to flee from Bangalore in fear of being attacked and lynched. The violence and show down, mostly centered in the Tamil populated parts of Bangalore, lasted for nearly a month and most schools and educational institutions in Bangalore remained closed during this period.

The crisis of 1995–1996 In 1995, the monsoons failed badly in Karnataka and Karnataka found itself hard pressed to fulfill the interim order. Tamil Nadu approached the Supreme Court demanding the immediate release of at least 30 billion ft³. The Supreme Court refused to entertain Tamil Nadu's petition and asked it to approach the tribunal. The tribunal examined the case and recommended that Karntaka release 11 billion ft³. Karnataka pleaded that 11 billion ft³ was unimplementable in the circumstances that existed then. Tamil Nadu now went back to the Supreme Court demanding that Karnataka be forced to obey the tribunal's order. The Supreme Court this time recommended that the then Prime Minister, Mr. P. V. Narasimha Rao intervene and find a political solution. The Prime Minister convened a meeting with the Chief Ministers of the two states and recommended that Karnataka release 6 billion ft³ instead of the 11 billion ft³ that the tribunal ordered. Karnataka complied with the decision of the Prime Minister and the issue blew over.

Constitution of the CRA Karnataka had all through maintained that the interim award was not 'scientific' and was inherently flawed. It had, nevertheless, complied with the order except during 1995–96 when rains failed. What complicated matters was that the Interim award was ambiguous

on distress sharing and there was no clear cut formula that everyone agreed upon to share the waters in the case of failure of the monsoon. In 1997, the Government proposed the setting up of a Cauvery River Authority which would be vested with far reaching powers to ensure the implementation of the Interim Order. These powers included the power to take over the control of dams in the event of the Interim Order not being honoured. Karnataka, which had always maintained that the interim order had no scientific basis and was intrinsically flawed, strongly protested the proposal to set up such an authority. The Government then made several modifications to the powers of the Authority and came up with a new proposal. The new proposal greatly reduced the executive powers of the Authority. The power to take over control of dams was also done away with. Under this new proposal, the Government set up two new bodies, viz., Cauvery River Authority and Cauvery Monitoring Committee. The Cauvery River Authority would consist of the Prime Minister and the Chief Ministers of all four states(Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Pondicherry, Kerala) and was headquartered in New Delhi. The Cauvery Monitoring Committee on the other hand, was an expert body which consisted of engineers, technocrats and other officers who would take stock of the 'ground realities' and report to the

The flare up and high drama of 2002 In the summer of 2002, things once again came to a head as the monsoon failed in both Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. Reservoirs in both states fell to record low levels and inevitably tempers rose. The sticking point yet again, as in 1995–96 was how the distress would be shared between the two states. The tribunal had overlooked this crucial point when it gave the interim award and it had returned once again to haunt the situation. Tamil Nadu demanded that Karnataka honour the interim award and release to Tamil Nadu its proportionate share. Karnataka on the other hand stated that the water levels were hardly enough to meet its own demands and ruled out releasing any water in the circumstances that prevailed. CRA meeting and the Supreme Court order A meeting of the CRA was called on 27 August but the Tamil Nadu chief minister Jayalalitha walked out of the meeting. The focus now shifted to the Supreme Court which ordered Karnataka to release 1.25 billion ft³ of water every day unless CRA revised it. Karnataka started the release of water but pressed for another meeting of the CRA which was fixed for 8 September. The Tamil Nadu Chief Minister this time boycotted the meet citing insufficient notice as the reason. A minister from her cabinet, however represented Tamil Nadu. The CRA revised the Court's order from 1.25 billion ft³ to 0.8 billion ft³ per day. This time however, the Karnataka government in open defiance of the order of the CRA, refused to release any water succumbing to the large scale protests that had mounted in

the Kaveri districts of the state. Tamil Nadu aghast at the defiance, went back to the Supreme Court. Karnataka now resumed the release of water for a few days, but stopped it again on 18 September as a protesting farmer committed suicide by jumping into the reservoir and the protests threatened to take a dangerous turn. The centre now stepped in and asked Karnataka to release the water. The SC meanwhile, in response to Tamil Nadu's petition asked the CRA for details of the water release and water levels in the reservoirs. The CRA in turn ordered for the inspections of the reservoirs. While the CRA inspected the reservoirs in Karnataka, Tamil Nadu (on 23 September) flatly refused to grant them permission to inspect its reservoirs. This move by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, coupled with her earlier walkout and boycott of the CRA meets, came in for severe criticism from all quarters. On 30 September the Supreme court ordered Tamil Nadu to co-operate with the CRA and Tamil Nadu gave in. Demonstrations The flare up had by now, well and truly taken an ugly turn and there were accusations and counter accusations being thrown all around in both states. The opposition parties in Tamil Nadu too had jumped into the fray and at the same time joining Jayalalitha in stinging rebukes of both the Centre and the CRA. To add to all this, the dispute had already spilled onto the streets in the district of Mandya in Karnataka and was threatening to spread to other parts of the state too. Precipitating the matters on the streets, the SC ordered Karnataka on 3 October to comply with the CRA and resume the release of water. Karnataka once again refused to obey the orders of SC. Tamil Nadu slapped another contempt petition on Karnataka and soon the issue degenerated into a 'free for all' with all and sundry from both states joining the protests. Soon, film actors and various other cross sections of society from both states were on the streets. The belligerence soon hit a crescendo and even as some groups in Tamil Nadu called for a stoppage of power from the Neyveli Power station to Karnataka as a tit-for-tat measure, a Pan-Tamil militant outfit (a month or so later) went ahead and blasted a major power transformer supplying power to the neighbouring states of Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. The Karnataka Chief Minister, Mr. S. M. Krishna on the other hand, fearing that the situation might spiral out of control, embarked on a padayatra from Bangalore to Mandya. While some saw this as merely a gimmick, some, like U R Ananthamurthy saw it as a good faith effort to soothe tempers and joined him in the yatra. Censure of both states by the Supreme Court In the meanwhile, Tamil Nadu's contempt suit on Karnataka, came up for hearing on 1 November. The Karnataka government, by now saw the spectre of a harsh rebuke and action by the SC, and in a bid to salvage the situation, decided to resume the release of water; while at the same time compensating its own farmers for the loss. The supreme

court deferred the case to 15 November and on 15 November, while reserving its comment on Karnataka, censured the Tamil Nadu Chief Minister for attacking the CRA and the Prime Minister and ordered Tamil Nadu to tender an unqualified apology. Tamil Nadu complied with it and tendered the apology. By now, with Karnataka's resumption of water release, compensation of its farmers and the first signs of the arrival of the north-east monsoon in Tamil Nadu, frayed tempers were on the wane. A couple of months later, the Supreme Court in an exceptionally stinging censure, pulled up the Karnataka government for its defiance of the courts. The Karnataka Chief Minister tendered an unqualified apology and soon the dispute blew over. Most importantly and equally unfortunately, once again the dispute had blown over without any agreement being reached on the issue of 'distress-sharing'.

2003–2006 The last four years haven't seen any major flare up in the dispute even though the summer of 2003 saw a dry spell in both states. The monsoons in 2004, 2005 and 2006 was quite copious and this helped a great deal in keeping the tempers calm. While the last 3 or 4 years have been relatively quiet as far as jingoistic voices are concerned, a flurry of development has been afoot in the courts. The term of the tribunal was initially set to expire in August 2005. However, in the light of the many arguments the court was yet to hear, the tribunal filed a request for extension of its term. The extension was granted and the tribunal's term was extended for another year until September 2006. Early in 2006, a major controversy erupted over the 'Assessor's report' that was apparently 'leaked' to the press. The report had suggested a decision which Karnataka summarily rejected. Another major controversy erupted when just a couple of months before the September 2006 deadline, the tribunal recommended the formation of another expert committee to study the 'ground realities' yet again. This was unanimously and vehemently opposed by all the four states party to the dispute. The states contended that this move would further delay a judgment which has already been 16 years in the making. More than the disapproval of all the four states of the new expert committee that was proposed, the proposal turned out to be a major embarrassment for the tribunal. This was because, not only were the four states opposed to it, even the Chief Judge of the tribunal, Mr.?? was opposed to it. However the other two assistant judges on the 3-man adjudication team, overruled the opinion of the main Judge. And all this was done in a packed courtroom and this led to petty bickering and heated arguments between the three judges in the packed courtroom. This left everyone in the courtroom shocked and the Tamil Nadu counsel was moved to remark that it was embarrassing that the judges probably needed help settling their own disputes before adjudicating on the dispute at hand. Nonetheless, the new expert committee was formed and carried out further assessments. Subsequently, the extended deadline of the tribunal also passed and the tribunal was given yet another extension.

Judgment The Cauvery Water Disputes Tribunal announced its final verdict on 5 February 2007. According to its verdict , Tamil Nadu gets 419 billion ft³ (12 km³) of Cauvery water while Karnataka gets 270 billion ft³ (7.6 km³). The actual release of water by Karnataka to Tamil Nadu is to be 192 billion ft³ (5.4 km³) annually. Further, Kerala will get 30 billion ft³ and Puducherry 7 billion ft³. Tamil Nadu appears to have been accepting the verdict while the government of Karnataka, unhappy with the decision, filed a revision petition before the tribunal seeking a review.

Chapter- 5

Water Politics in the Middle East

Water politics in the Middle East refers to the control of water sources in the Middle East, an arid region where issues of water use, supply, control, and allocation are vital.

Overview Water politics plays a role in various areas of politics in the Middle East, and it is particularly important in one of the defining features of the region’s political landscape. Water issues reflect a central aspect of the nature of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; namely, the original influx of an additional large population mass to a relatively fragile geographical area of land, and the massive expansion of previously existing populations. As Tony Allan notes, the initial arrival of Jewish migrants into the Middle East occurred ‘in the most water stressed of the Middle East and North African river basins’, putting extra pressure on basic natural resources there, most obviously water and land. Concerns over water have significantly helped to shape the Middle East’s political development.

Nile River, Egypt

International relations and water Issues relating to water supplies, then, affect international and inter-regional affairs, with disputes over countries’ rights and access to water resources most often the cause of tensions in this arena. The contended nature of some water provisions has tended to mean that certain waters become more prone to political conflicts (those which are primarily prone to this in the Middle East and northern Africa are the Nile, Jordan and TigrisEuphrates rivers). In order to secure reliable levels of water access for their populations, states must either have a large water supply in terms of economic availability, or their rights to such supplies must be established. Studies of water in the Middle East have also suggested that, in a sensitive hydrological location, a country’s existing surface- and ground-water access should be protected as a first priority if it is to begin to address any water difficulties or shortages. Such measures as these can be seen as being the primary responsibilities of national governments or ruling authorities; and water is therefore closely tied up with statehood and geographical territory in international relations, and with the recognition and rights of nation states as the central actors in this field.

The political process and interactions underlying the international relations of water have been characterised as having three stages. These are that a state must go through a process of; firstly claiming its right to water resources, secondly receiving recognition of this right, and finally seeking to attain its entitlement to water in accordance with the recognition of its claim. However, these processes have not always succeeded. In this regard, water politics in the Middle East has been impacted by changes in the international political order and their implications for the area. The involvement of the USSR in Middle Eastern political affairs was seen to have had a constraining effect upon this process, in terms of claims and recognition in the Cold War era. The post-Cold War period, therefore, has since been perceived to offer the opportunity for transforming water politics in the Middle East, in light of the shift which it has brought about in global political dynamics in the region. This potential, however, had failed to be fulfilled by the end of the decade, with states in the Middle East ‘still mainly involved in… asserting water rights over shared waters’. The consequence of this has been that ‘non-agreed water sharing is an unavoidable reality in present Middle Eastern international relations’, with attendant political problems invariably surfacing.

Jordan River near B'not Yaakov bridge, Israel

Middle Eastern river systems The claims over rights to water in the Middle East are centred around the area’s three major river systems. As mentioned above, these are the River Nile, the River Jordan, and the Tigris-Euphrates river basin. International water agreements in the Middle East have been rare, but the situation regarding regional water relations in the three main basins will be explored below.

The River Nile As with the other major Middle Eastern river systems, political agreements over access to the water of the Nile have been few and far between. The first such accord was the 1929 Nile Agreement. However, this was an agreement that largely represented the nature of world geopolitical realities at that time, rather than being a mutual expression of accord between the participating parties of the region. This, it is argued, is because it was essentially a product of British national interest. The priority of the United Kingdom, as part of its strategy as the dominant contemporary political and economic power in the Middle East, was maintaining secure supplies of water to Egypt, and this was what the agreement primarily provided for. The next agreement on water use in the Nile did not come for exactly three more decades. The new 1959 Nile Agreement was signed by Egypt and Sudan, and was at this point free from political influence by the UK. However, the limitation of this agreement was that it was not more than a bilateral treaty between the two participant countries and, as such, it provided solely for an agreement on the sharing of water between the two nations. The 1959 Nile Agreement has not been granted recognition by the other states through which the Nile also runs.

The Tigris-Euphrates river basin The countries which rely upon the Tigris-Euphrates water system remain at the first stage of claiming their rights to water. However, the key player in terms of water politics in this area is Turkey, who Allan reports as having ‘gone a substantial way to[wards]… what it regards as its water rights by its construction programmes on the Euphrates without having them recognised by downstream Syria and Iraq’. This refers to the dams built by Turkey from the 1970s, partially funded by World Bank loans.

River Jordan The Syria-Lebanon-Palestine boundary was a product of the post-World War I AngloFrench partition of Ottoman Syria. British forces had advanced to a position at Tel Hazor against Turkish troops in 1918 and wished to incorporate all the sources of the river Jordan within the British controlled Palestine. Due to the French inability to establish administrative control the frontier between Syria and Palestine was fluid. Until,

1920, when the French managed to asserted authority over the Arab nationalist movement and King Faisal had been deposed. In the unratified Treaty of Sèvres from the San Remo conference, the 1920 boundary extended the British controlled area to north of the Sykes Picot line (straight line between the mid point of the Sea of Galilee and Nahariya). The international boundary between Palestine and Syria was finally agreed by Great Britain and France in 1923 with the Treaty of Lausanne after Britain had been given a League of Nations mandate for Palestine in 1922. Banyas (on the Quneitre/Tyre road) was within in the French Mandate of Syria. The border was set 750 metres south of the spring.

Banias waterfall, Golan Heights n 1941 Australian forces occupied Banyas in the advance to the Litani during the SyriaLebanon Campaign. When Free French and Indian forces invaded Syria in the Battle of Kissoué Banias's fate was to be left in a state of limbo when Syria came under British military control. After the cessation of World War II and at the time of Syria being granted Independence (April 1946) France and Britain bilaterally signed an agreement to pass control of Banias to the British mandate of Palestine against the express wishes of the Syrian government who declared France's signature to be invalid. While Syria maintained its claim on Banias, it was administered from Jerusalem.

Following the 1948 Arab Israeli War, and the signing of the General Armistice Agreements in 1949, the Banias spring remained under Syrian control, while the Banias River flowed through the contested Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) and into Israel. In 1951 the tensions in the area were raised when, in the lake Huleh area (10 km from Banias), Israel initiated a project to drain the marsh land to bring 15,000 acres (61 km2) into cultivation. The project caused a conflict of interests between the Israeli government and the Palestinian Arab villages in the area and drew Syrian complaints to the United Nations. On 30 March in a meeting chaired by Ben-Gurion the Israeli government decided to assert Israeli sovereignty over the DMZs, consequently 800 inhabitants of the villages were forcibly evacuated from the DMZ. From 1951 Israel refused to attend the meetings of the Israel/Syria Mixed Armistice Commission. The Security Council condemned the attitude of Israel, in its resolution of 18 May 1951, as being "inconsistent with the objectives and intent of the Armistice Agreement". Under UN auspices and with encouragement from the Eisenhower administration 9 meetings took place between 15 January and 27 January 1953, to regularise administration of the DMZs. At the eighth meeting Syria offered to adjust the armistice lines, and cede to Israel's 70% of the DMZ, in exchange for a return to the pre 1946 International border in the Jordan basin area, with Banias water resources returning uncontested to Syrian sovereignty. On 26 April, the Israeli cabinet met to consider the Syrian suggestions; with head of Israel’s Water Planning Authority, Simha Blass, in attendance. Blass noted that while the land to be ceded to Syria was not suitable for cultivation, the Syrian map did not suit Israel’s water development plan. Blass explained that the movement of the International boundary in the area of Banias would affect Israel’s water rights. The Israeli cabinet rejected the Syrian proposals but decided to continue the negotiations by making changes to the accord and placing conditions on the Syrian proposals. The Israeli conditions took into account Blass’s position over water rights and Syria rejected the Israeli counter offer.

Lake Kinneret, Israel

Suez Canal In 1953, Israel unilaterally started a water diversion project within the Jordan River basin by the Israeli National Water Carrier. This caused shelling from Syria and friction with the Eisenhower Administration; the diversion was moved to the southwest. September 1953 Israel advanced plans to divert water to help irrigate the coastal Sharon Plain and eventually the Negev desert by launching a diversion project on a nine-mile (14 km) channel midway between the Huleh Marshes and Lake Galilee (Lake Tiberias) in the central DMZ to be rapidly constructed. Syria claimed that it would dry up 12,000 acres (49 km2) of Syrian land. The UNTSO Chief of Staff Major General Vagn Bennike of Denmark noted that the project was denying water to two Palestinian water mills, was drying up Palestinian farm land and was a substantial military benefit to Israel against Syria. The US cut off aid to Israel. The Israeli response was to increase work. UN Security Council Resolution 100 “deemed it desirable” for Israel to suspend work started on the 2nd September “pending urgent examination of the question by the Council”. Israel finally backed off by moving the intake out of the DMZ and for the next three years the US kept its economic sanctions by threatening to end aid channelled to Israel by the Foreign Operations Administration and insisting on tying the aid with Israel's behaviour. The Security Council ultimately rejected Syrian claims that the work was a violation of the Armistice Agreements and drainage works were resumed and the work was completed in 1957.

Yarmuk reservoir, 1933 After the 2nd Arab summit conference in Cairo of January 1964, Syria, started development of the water resources of Banias for irrigation along the slopes of the Golan toward the Yarmouk River. The project was to divert 20 to 30 million cubic metres of water from the river Jordan tributaries to Syria and Jordan for the development of Syria and Jordan. This led to military intervention from Israel, first with tank fire and then, as the Syrians shifted the works further eastward, with airstrikes. On June 10, 1967, the last day of the Six Day War, Golani Brigade forces quickly invaded the village of Banyas where a caliphate era Syrian fort stood. Eshkol's priority on the Syrian front was control of the water sources. This action has meant that Israel utilizes all water resources for the agricultural development of the Hula Valley. Jordan being a country that borders on the Jordan has riparian rights to water from the Jordan basin and upper Jordan tributaries. Due to the water diversion projects the flow to the river Jordan has been reduced from 1,300/1,500 million cubic metres (mcm)to 250/300 mcm. Where the water quality has been further reduced as the flow of the river Jordan is made of run-off from agricultural irrigation and saline springs. Paradoxically, despite being the site of probably the most fundamental political divisions in the Middle East, the Jordan basin has arguably seen the most progress when it comes to the regional politics of water. The agreement between Jordan and Israel over water is

the only one in the Middle East region in which the political process described above has reached its conclusion, with a mutual attainment and recognition of water rights on both sides. Even this relative success story is not without its considerable problems. The water agreement forms a part of the broader political treaty which was signed between Israel and Jordan in 1994. The nature and significance of the wider 1994 treaty meant that the water aspect was forced to cede importance and priority in negotiations, giving way to areas such as borders and security in terms of armed force, which were perceived by decision-makers as being the most integral issues to the settlement. These problems can be seen to have emerged in 1999, when the treaty’s limitations were revealed by events concerning water shortages in the Jordan basin. A reduced supply of water to Israel due to drought meant that, in turn, Israel which is responsible for providing water to Jordan, decreased its water provisions to the country, provoking a diplomatic disagreement between the two and bringing the water component of the treaty back into question. Israel's complaints that the reduction in water from the tributaries to the river Jordan caused by the Jordan/Syrian dam look to go unheeded due to the conflict of interest between Israel and her neighbours.

War and water Constant conflict in the Middle East has seen some major environmental consequences of water related damage. A report by Strategic Foresight Group, a think tank in Asia, details in the damage and destruction done to water systems and resources. The Middle East is an extremely water scarce region and any damage to this vital resource has an adverse impact on health, bio-diversity and eco-systems in the region. Water scarcity in the future could prove to be both cause and cost of conflict. Countries in the region are highly dependent on others for their water supply, and nations such as Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Israel, Kuwait and Syria have a dependency ratio above 50%. The first Gulf War in 1990 caused untold damage to the water network and the Shatt alArab waterways, and many of these systems have yet to be fully functional. 8 major dams were destroyed and over 30 municipal facilities were destroyed. The second Gulf War has resulted in over 70% of the population without adequate water supply. The Israel-Hezbollah war has also resulted in severe damage to water systems with the destruction of 45 distribution units and pumping stations.

Chapter- 6

California Water Wars

The California Water Wars were the disputes between Los Angeles and the Owens Valley in California over water rights. The disputes stem from Los Angeles' location in a semi-arid area and the availability of water from Sierra Nevada runoff in the Owens Valley.

Early views of Owens Valley water diversion In 1833, Joseph Reddeford Walker led the first known expedition into the area that would later be called the Owens Valley in central California. Walker saw that the valley’s soil conditions were inferior to those on the other side of the Sierra Nevada range and that runoff from the mountains was absorbed into the arid desert ground. After the United States gained control of California in 1848 the first public land survey conducted by A.W. Von Schmidt from 1855 to 1856 was an initial step in securing government control of the valley. Von Schmidt reported that the valley’s soil was not good for agriculture except for the land near streams, and incorrectly stated that the "Owens Valley [was] worthless to the White Man". The potential of the valley, however, was seen in 1859 by Army Captain J.W. Davidson who came in contact with the Paiute Indians and their use of irrigation ditches to divert water from streams. The first settlers downplayed the agriculture achievements of the Paiutes as a validation for forcing them off of their land. Pioneers claimed that the Paiute Indians diverted water to natural vegetation, not crops. Settlers failed to see the significance of the act of diverting water itself, an act that would devastate the Owens Valley in the twentieth century.

Early settlement: land use, water diversion and speculation Many settlers came to the area for the promise of riches from mining. Once pioneers reached the Owens Valley this dream faded and they took up farming and raising livestock instead. The Homestead Act of 1862 gave pioneers five years to claim and take title of their land for a small filing fee and a charge of $1.25 per acre. The Homestead Act limited the land an individual could own to 160 acres (64.7 ha) in order to create small farms. The Swamplands Act of 1850 allowed public lands deemed as swamp and overflow land to be turned over to the state. In 1873 Josiah Earl, the registrar of the newly created Independence Land District, set out to use the Swampland Act to acquire

land for the state. He declared that about one third of the valley to be swamp or overflow land, of which more than 40% was already occupied by settlers. This action by the Land District drew so much protest that Earl abandoned his plan, effectively postponing largescale land speculation in the Owens Valley. The amount of public land settled by the late 1870s and early 1880s was still relatively small. The Desert Land Act of 1877 allowed individuals to acquire more area, up to 640 acres (259.0 ha), in hopes of drawing more settlers by giving them enough land to make their settlement and land expenses worthwhile, but “included no residency requirements”. The Act resulted in three things: First, since the act gave settlers three years to set up residency and begin to develop irrigation systems, some livestock raisers, especially in the south, saw the act as a way to get free land for three years (longer if their claims went unchecked). Second, most farmers joined collective ditch companies, who built relatively small ditch systems that irrigated only the lower parts of the valley. Third, many claimed land for speculation, never intending to irrigate the land, but hoping to sell it for a profit as irrigation systems on surrounding holdings developed. By 1866 rapid acquisition of land had begun and by the mid 1890s most of the land in the Owens Valley had been claimed. The large number of claims made by land speculators hindered the region’s development because speculators would not participate in developing canals and ditches.

Los Angeles Aqueduct: the beginning of the water wars

Frederick Eaton

The water wars began when Frederick Eaton was elected mayor of Los Angeles in 1898, and appointed his friend, William Mulholland, the superintendent of the newly-created Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP). Eaton and Mulholland had a vision of a Los Angeles that would become far bigger than the Los Angeles of the turn of the century. The limiting factor of Los Angeles' growth was water supply. Eaton and Mulholland realized that the Owens Valley had a large amount of runoff from the Sierra Nevada, and a gravity-fed aqueduct could deliver the Owens water to Los Angeles.

Irrigation in the Owens Valley in 1901 Most of the 200 miles (320 km) of canals and ditches that constituted the irrigation system in the Owens Valley in 1901 were in the north, while the southern region of the valley was mostly inhabited by people raising livestock. The irrigation systems created by the ditch companies did not have adequate drainage and as a result oversaturated the soil to the point where crops could not be raised. The irrigation systems also significantly lowered the water level in the Owens Lake (a process that was intensified later by the diversion of water through the Los Angeles Aqueduct). Around the turn of the century the northern part of the Owens Valley turned to raising fruit, poultry and dairy. The discovery of new mining fields in the northern region of the valley also aided in an economic turn-around of the area. The southern region of the Owens Valley greatly differed from the northern region of the valley. In the south the climate was drier, irrigation was less developed and small farms were unable to compete with livestock owners with large land holdings. Most irrigable land in the south of the Owens Valley could not have water diverted to it by small, individual ditch systems. The land in the southern part of the Owens Valley required a system of canals and ditches capable of diverting part of the large Owens River. John Wesley Powell criticized laws that promoted settlement and development on the individual level and suggested that the magnitude of water diversion necessary for successful agriculture could only be achieved though many homesteaders joining together and creating irrigation districts with large-scale aqueduct systems. Each district would create its own rules and regulations for the use and division of the water for the parcels within the district. The failure to create a system of this scale resulted in the limited and inefficient settlement in the southern part of the Owens Valley and made this region increasingly vulnerable and attractive to Los Angeles authorities as a source of water.

Water rights and profit At the turn of the century, the United States Bureau of Reclamation was planning on building an irrigation system to help the farmers of the Owens Valley. However, the agent of the Bureau was a close friend of Eaton, so Eaton had access to inside information about water rights. Eaton bought land as a private citizen, hoping to sell it back to Los Angeles at a vast profit. Eaton claimed in an interview with the Los Angeles Express in 1905 that he turned over all his water rights to the city of Los Angeles without

being paid for them, "except that I retained the cattle which I had been compelled to take in making the deals ... and mountain pasture land of no value except for grazing purposes." Eaton lobbied Theodore Roosevelt and got the local irrigation system cancelled. Mulholland misled residents of the Owens Valley, by claiming that Los Angeles would take water only for domestic purposes, not for irrigation. By 1905, through purchases, intimidation and bribery, Los Angeles purchased enough water rights to enable the aqueduct. Many argue that Los Angeles paid an unfair price to the farmers of Owens Valley for their land. Farmers that resisted the pressure from Los Angeles until 1930 received the highest price for their land; most farmers sold their land from 1905 to 1925, and received less than Los Angeles was actually willing to pay. However, the sale of their land brought the farmers substantially more income than if they had kept the land for farming and ranching. None of the sales were made under threat of eminent domain. The aqueduct was sold to the citizens of Los Angeles as vital to the growth of the city. However, unknown to the public, the initial water would be used to irrigate the San Fernando Valley to the north, which was not at the time a part of the city. A syndicate of investors (again, close friends of Eaton, including Harrison Gray Otis) bought up large tracts of land in the San Fernando Valley with this inside information. This syndicate made substantial efforts to the passage of the bond issue that funded the aqueduct, including creating a false drought (by manipulating rainfall totals) and publishing scare articles in the Los Angeles Times, which Otis published.

The building and operation of the aqueduct

Terminus of the Los Angeles Aqueduct, near Sylmar. From 1905 through 1913, Mulholland directed the building of the aqueduct. The 223 miles (359 km) Los Angeles Aqueduct, completed in November 1913, required more than 2,000 workers and the digging of 164 tunnels. The project has been compared in complexity by Mulholland's granddaughter to building the Panama Canal. Water from the Owens River reached a reservoir in the San Fernando Valley on November 5. At a ceremony that day, Mulholland spoke his famous words about this engineering feat: "There it is. Take it." After the aqueduct was completed in 1913, the San Fernando investors demanded so much water from the Owens Valley that it started to transform from "The Switzerland of

California" into a desert. Inflows to Owens Lake were almost completely diverted, which caused the lake to dry up by 1924. Farmers and ranchers tried to band together to sell water rights to Los Angeles as a group, but again through what historians called "underhanded moves", Los Angeles managed to buy the water rights at a substantially reduced price.

Dynamite found during sabotage incidents of Owens Valley Aqueduct, circa 1924 So much water was taken from the valley that the farmers and ranchers rebelled. In 1924, a group of armed ranchers seized the Alabama Gates and dynamited part of the system. This armed rebellion was for naught, and by 1928, Los Angeles owned 90 percent of the water in Owens Valley. Agriculture in the valley was effectively dead.

The second Owens Valley aqueduct In 1970, LADWP completed a second aqueduct. In 1972, the agency began to divert more surface water and pumped groundwater at the rate of several hundred thousand acre-feet a year (several cubic metres per second). Owens Valley springs and seeps dried and disappeared, and groundwater-dependent vegetation began to die.

Because LADWP had never completed an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) addressing the impacts of groundwater pumping, Inyo County sued Los Angeles under the terms of the California Environmental Quality Act. Los Angeles did not stop pumping groundwater, but submitted a short EIR in 1976 and a second one in 1979, both of which were rejected as inadequate by the courts. In 1991, Inyo County and the city of Los Angeles signed the Inyo-Los Angeles Long Term Water Agreement, which required that groundwater pumping be managed to avoid significant impacts while providing a reliable water supply for Los Angeles, and in 1997, Inyo County, Los Angeles, the Owens Valley Committee, the Sierra Club, and other concerned parties signed a Memorandum of Understanding that specified terms by which the lower Owens River would be rewatered by June 2003 as partial mitigation for damage to the Owens Valley due to groundwater pumping. In spite of the terms of the Long Term Water Agreement, studies by the Inyo County Water Department have shown that impacts to the valley's groundwater-dependent vegetation, such as alkali meadows, continue. Likewise, Los Angeles did not rewater the lower Owens River by the June 2003 deadline. As of December 17, 2003, LADWP settled a lawsuit brought by California Attorney General Bill Lockyer, the Owens Valley Committee, and the Sierra Club. Under the terms of the settlement, deadlines for the Lower Owens River Project were revised. LADWP was to return water to the lower Owens River by 2005. This deadline was missed, but on December 6, 2006, a ceremony was held (at the same site where William Mulholland had ceremonially opened the aqueduct and closed the flow through the Owens River) to re-start the flow down the 62 miles (100 km) river. David Nahai, president of the L.A. Water and Power Board, countered Mulholland's words from 1913 and said, "There it is ... take it back." Groundwater pumping continues at a higher rate than the rate at which water recharges the aquifer, resulting in a long-term trend of desertification in the Owens Valley.

Mono Lake By the 1930s, the water requirements for Los Angeles continued to increase. LADWP started buying water rights in the Mono Basin (the next basin to the north of the Owens Valley). An extension to the aqueduct was built, which included such engineering feats as tunneling through the Mono Craters (an active volcanic field). By 1941, the extension was finished, and water in various creeks (such as Rush Creek) were diverted into the aqueduct. To satisfy California water law, LADWP set up a fish hatchery on Hot Creek, near Mammoth Lakes, California, ironically, not on a creek that was diverted.

Tufa towers in Mono Lake were exposed by water diversions. The diverted creeks had previously fed Mono Lake, an inland body of water with no outlet. Mono Lake served as a vital ecosystem link, where gulls and migratory birds would nest. Because the creeks were diverted, the water level in Mono Lake started to fall, exposing tufa formations. The water became more saline and alkaline, threatening the brine shrimp that lived in the lake, as well as the birds that nested on two islands (Negit Island and Paoha Island) in the lake. Falling water levels started making a land bridge to Negit Island, which allowed predators to feed on bird eggs for the first time. In 1974, David Gaines started to study the biology of Mono Lake. In 1975, while at Stanford, he started to get others interested in the ecosystem of Mono Lake. This led to a 1977 report on the ecosystem of Mono Lake that highlighted dangers caused by the water

diversion. In 1978, the Mono Lake Committee was formed to protect Mono Lake. The Committee (and the National Audubon Society) sued LADWP in 1979, arguing that the diversions violated the public trust doctrine, which states that navigable bodies of water must be managed for the benefit of all people. The litigation reached the California Supreme Court by 1983, which ruled in favor of the Committee. Further litigation was initiated in 1984, which claimed that LADWP did not comply with the state fishery protection laws. Eventually, all of the litigation was adjudicated in 1994, by the California State Water Resources Control Board. The SWRCB hearings lasted for 44 days and were conducted by Board Vice-Chair Marc Del Piero acting as the sole Hearing Officer. In that ruling (SWRCB Decision 1631), the SWRCB established significant public trust protection and eco-system restoration standards, and LADWP was required to release water into Mono Lake to raise the lake level 20 feet (6.1 m) above the then-current level of 25 feet (7.6 m) below the 1941 level. As of 2003, the water level in Mono Lake has risen 9 feet (2.7 m) of the required 20 feet (6.1 m). Los Angeles made up for the lost water through statefunded conservation and recycling projects.

Chapter- 7

Water Politics in the Jordan River Basin

Water politics in the Jordan River basin are the political issues of water within the Jordan River drainage basin, including competing claims and water usage, and issues of riparian rights of surface water along transnational rivers, as well as the availability and usage of ground water. Water resources in the region are scarce, and these issues directly affect the five political subdivisions (Israel, the West Bank, Lebanon, Syria and Jordan) located within and bordering the basin, which were created since the collapse, during World War I, of the former single controLling entity, the Ottoman Empire. Because of the scarcity of water and a unique political context, issues of both supply and usage outside the physical limits of the basin have been included historically. The basin and its water are central issues of both the Arab-Israeli Conflict and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The Jordan River is 251 kilometers (156 mi) long and, over most of its distance, flows at elevations below sea level in a northern extension of the Great Rift Valley. Its waters originate from the high precipitation areas in and near the Anti-Lebanon mountains in the north, and flow through the Sea of Galilee and Jordan River Valley ending in the Dead Sea at an elevation of minus 400 metres, in the south. Downstream of the Sea of Galilee, where the main tributaries enter the Jordan Valley form the east, the valley bottom widens to about 15 miles (24 km). This area is characterized by higher alluvial or beach terraces paralleling the river; this area is known as the Ghor (or Ghawr). These terraces are locally incised by side wadis or rivers forming a maze of ravines, alternating with sharp crests and rises, with towers, pinnacles and a badlands morphology. At a lower elevation is the active Jordan River floodplain, the zhor (or Zur), with a wildly meandering course, which accounts for the excessive length of the river in comparison to the straight line distance to reach the Dead Sea. Small dams were built along the river within the Zhor, turning the former thickets of reeds, tamarisk, willows, and white poplars into irrigated fields. After flowing through the Zur, the Jordan drains into the Dead Sea across a broad, gently sloping delta. In the upper Jordan river basin, upstream of the Sea of Galilee, the tributaries include:  

The Hasbani (Arabic: ‫)اﻟﺤﺎﺻﺒﺎﻧﻲ‬, Snir (Hebrew: ‫)שניר‬, which flows from Lebanon. The Banias (Arabic: ‫) سايناب‬, Hermon (Hebrew: ‫)חרמון‬, arising from a spring at Banias near the foot of Mount Hermon.

 

The Dan (Hebrew: ‫)דן‬, Leddan (Arabic: ‫)اﻟﻠﺪان‬, whose source is also at the base of Mount Hermon. Berdara (Arabic: ‫)دردرﻩ‬, or Braghith (Arabic: ‫)ﺑﺮاﻏﻴﺚ‬, The Iyon or Ayoun (Hebrew: ‫)עיון‬, a smaller stream which also flows from Lebanon.

The lower Jordan River tributaries include:  

 

The Jalud in the Beth Shean valley The Yarmouk River, which originates on the south-eastern slopes of Mount Hermon and the Hauran Plateau, forms the southern limit of the Golan Heights and flows into the Jordan River below the Sea of Galilee. It also defines portions of the border between Jordan and Syria, as well as a shorter portion between Jordan and Israel. The Zarqa River, the Biblical Jabbok Jabesh (Wadi Yabis) named after Jabesh-Gilead

Hydrology of the Jordan River The tyler meekerriparian rights to the Jordan River are shared by 5 different countries: Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Israel and Palestine; although Israel as the occupying authority has refused to give up any of the water resources to the Palestinian National Authority. The Jordan River originates near the borders of three countries, Israel, Lebanon, and Syria, with most of the water derived from the Anti-Lebanon Mountains and Mount Hermon to the north and east. Three spring-fed headwater rivers converge to form the Jordan River in the north: 1. The Hasbani River, which rises in south Lebanon, with an average annual flow of 138 million cubic metres, 2. The Dan River, in Israel, averaging 245 million cubic metres per year, and 3. The Banias River flowing from the Golan Heights, averaging 121 million cubic metres per year. These streams converge six kilometres inside Israel and flow south to the Sea of Galilee, wholly within Israel. Water quality is variable in the river basin. The three tributaries of the upper Jordan have a low salinity of about 20 ppm. The salinity of water in Lake Tiberias ranges from 240 ppm in the upper end of the lake (marginal for irrigation water), to 350 ppm (too high for sensitive citrus fruits) where it discharges back into the Jordan River. The salt comes from the saline subterranean springs. These springs pass through the beds of ancient seas and then flow into Lake Tiberias, as well as the groundwater sources that feed into the lower Jordan. Downstream of Tiberias, the salinity of the tributary Yarmouk River is also satisfactory, at 100 ppm, but the lower Jordan river becomes progressively more saline as it flows south. It reaches twenty-five percent salinity (250,000 ppm) where it flows in the Dead Sea, which is about seven times saltier than the ocean.

As a resource for freshwater the Jordan River drainage system is vital for most of the population of Palestine, Israel and Jordan, and to a lesser extent in Lebanon and Syria who are able to utilise water from other national sources. (Although Syrian riparian rights to the Euphrates has been severely restricted by Turkey's dam building programme, a series of 21 dams and 17 hydroelectric stations built on the Euphrates and Tigris rivers, in the 1980s, 90s and projected to be completed in 2010, in order to provide irrigation water and hydroelectricity to the arid area of southeastern Turkey.) The CIA analysis in the 1980s placed the Middle East on the list of possible conflict zones because of water issues. Twenty per cent of the region’s population lack access to adequate potable water and 35% of the population lack appropriate sanitation. Sharing water resources involves the issue of water use, water rights, and distribution of amounts. The Palestinian National Authority wished to expand and develop the agricultural sector in the West Bank to decrease their dependency on the Israeli labour market, while Israel have prevented an increase in the irrigation of the West bank. Jordan also wishes to expand its agricultural sector so as to be able to achieve food security. On May 21, 1997 the UN General Assembly adopted a Convention on the Law of Nonnavigational Uses of International Watercourses. Here we, establish two principles for the use of international watercourses (other than navigation): "equitable and reasonable utilization". and "the ‘due diligence’ obligation not to cause significant harm." Equitable and reasonable utilization requires taking into account all relevant factors and circumstances, including:       

(a) Geographic, hydrographic, hydrological, climatic, ecological and other factors of a natural character; (b) The social and economic needs of the watercourse States concerned; (c) The population dependent on the watercourse in each watercourse State; (d) The effects of the use or uses of the watercourses in one watercourse State on other watercourse States; (e) Existing and potential uses of the watercourse; (f) Conservation, protection, development and economy of use of the water resources of the watercourse and the costs of measures taken to that effect; (g) The availability of alternatives, of comparable value, to a particular planned or existing use.

Historical background Studies of regional water resources and their development, in modern terms, date from the early 1900s during the period of Ottoman rule; they also follow in light of a significant engineering milestone and resource development achievment. Based largely on geographic, engineering and economic considerations many of these plans included common components, but political considerations and international events would soon follow.

In the late 1930s and mid 1940s, Transjordan and the World Zionist Organization commissioned mutually exclusive competing water resource studies. The Transjordanian study, performed by Michael G. Ionides, concluded that the available water resources are not sufficient to sustain a Jewish state which would be the destination for Jewish immigration. The Zionist study, by the American engineer Walter Clay Lowdermilk, concluded that by diverting water from the Jordan basin to support agriculture and residential development in the Negev, a Jewish state supporting 4 million new immigrants would be sustainable. At the end of the 1948 Arab Israeli War with the signing of the General Armistice Agreements in 1949, both Israel and Jordan embarked on implementing their competing initiatives to utilize the water resources in the areas under their control. The first "Master Plan for Irrigation in Israel" was drafted in 1950 and approved by a Board of Consultants (of the USA) on March 8, 1956. The main features of the Master Plan was the construction of the Israeli National Water Carrier (NWC), a project for the integration of all major regional projects into the Israeli national grid. Tahal - Water Planning for Israel Ltd., an Israeli public corporate body, was established in 1952, being largely responsible for planning of water development, drainage, etc., at the national level within Israel, including the NWC project which was commissioned in 1965. In 1953, Israel began construction of a water carrier to take water from the Sea of Galilee to the populated center and agricultural south of the country, while Jordan concluded an agreement with Syria, known as the Bunger plan, to dam the Yarmouk river near Maqarin, and utilize its waters to irrigate Jordanian territory, before they could flow to the Sea of Galilee. Military clashes ensued, and US President Dwight Eisenhower dispatched ambassador Johnston to the region to work out a plan that would regulate water usage.

Jordan Basin Banias The Syria-Lebanon-Palestine boundary was a product of the post-World War I AngloFrench partition of Ottoman Syria. British forces had advanced to a position at Tel Hazor against Turkish troops in 1918 and wished to incorporate all the sources of the Jordan River within the British controlled Palestine. Due to the French inability to establish administrative control, the frontier between Syria and Palestine was fluid. Following the Paris Peace Conference of 1919, and the unratified and later annulled Treaty of Sèvres, stemming from the San Remo conference, the 1920 boundary extended the British controlled area to north of the Sykes Picot line, a straight line between the mid point of the Sea of Galilee and Nahariya. In 1920 the French managed to assert authority over the Arab nationalist movement and after the Battle of Maysalun, King Faisal was deposed. The international boundary between Palestine and Syria was finally agreed by Great Britain and France in 1923 in conjunction with the Treaty of Lausanne, after Britain had been given a League of Nations mandate for Palestine in 1922. Banyas (on

the Quneitra/Tyre road) was within in the French Mandate of Syria. The border was set 750 metres south of the spring. In 1941 Australian forces occupied Banyas in the advance to the Litani during the SyriaLebanon Campaign; Free French and Indian forces also invaded Syria in the Battle of Kissoué. Banias's fate in this period was left in a state of limbo since Syria had come under British military control. After the cessation of World War II hostilities, and at the time Syria was granted Independence (April 1946), the former mandate powers, France and Britain, bilaterally signed an agreement to pass control of Banias to the British mandate of Palestine. This was done against the expressed wishes of the Syrian government who declared France's signature to be invalid. While Syria maintained its claim on Banias in this period, it was administered from Jerusalem. Following the 1948 Arab Israeli War, and the signing of the General Armistice Agreements in 1949, and DMZs included in the Armistice with Syria in July 1949, were "not to be interpreted as having any relation whatsoever to ultimate territorial arrangements." Israel claimed sovereignty over the Demilitarised zones (DMZs), on the basis that, "it was always part of the British Mandated Territory of Palestine." Moshe Dayan and Yosef Tekoah adopted a policy of Israeli control of the DMZ and water sources at the expense of Israel’s international image. The Banias spring remained under Syrian control, while the Banias River flowed through the contested Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) and into Israel.

Hasbani The Hasbani River derives most of its discharge from two springs in Lebanon the Wazzani and the Haqzbieh, the latter being a group of springs on the uppermost Hasbani. The Hasbani runs for 25 miles (40 km) in Lebanon before crossing the border and joining with the Banias and Dan Rivers at a point in northern Israel, to form the River Jordan. For about four kilometres downstream of Ghajar, the Hasbani forms the border between Lebanon and northern Israel. The Wazzani's and the Haqzbieh's combined discharge averages 138 million m³ per year. About 20% of the Hasbani flow emerges from the Wazzani Spring at Ghajar, close to the Lebanese Israeli border, about 3 kilometres west of the base of Mount Hermon. The contribution of the spring is very important, because it is the only continuous year-round flow in the river in either Lebanon or Israel. Utilization of water resources in the area, including the Hasbani, has been a source of conflict and was one of the factors leading to the 1967 Six-Day War. The Hasbani was included in the Jordan Valley Unified Water Plan, proposed in 1955 by special US envoy Eric Johnston. Under the plan, Lebanon was allocated usage of 35 million cubic metres annually from it. The plan was rejected by the Arab League. In 2001 the Lebanese government installed a small pumping station with a 10 cm bore to extract water to supply Ghajar village. In March 2002 Lebanon also diverted part of the

Hasbani to supply Wazzani village. An action that Ariel Sharon said was a "casus belli" and could lead to war.

Dan largest tributary of the Jordan river, whose source is located at the base of Mount Hermon. Until the 1967 Six-Day War, the Dan River was the only source of the river Jordan wholly within Israeli territory. Its flow provides up to 238 million cubic metres of water annually to the Hulah Valley. In 1966 this was a cause of dispute between water planners and conservationists, with the later prevailing after three years of court appeals and adjudication. The result was a conservation project of about 120 acres (0.49 km2) at the source of the river called the Tel Dan Reserve.

Huleh marshes In 1951 the tensions in the area were raised when, in the lake Huleh area (10 km from Banias), Israel initiated a project to drain the marsh land to bring 15,000 acres (61 km2) into cultivation. The project caused a conflict of interests between the Israeli government and the Palestinian Arab villages in the area and drew Syrian complaints to the United Nations. On 30 march in a meeting chaired by David Ben-Gurion the Israeli government decided to assert Israeli sovereignty over the DMZs, consequently 800 inhabitants of the villages were forcibly evacuated from the DMZ. From 1951 Israel refused to attend the meetings of the Israel/Syria Mixed Armistice Commission. This refusal on the part of Israel not only constituted a flagrant violation of the General Armistice Agreement, but also contributed to an increase of tension in the area. The Security Council itself strongly condemned the attitude of Israel, in its resolution of 18 May 1951, as being "inconsistent with the objectives and intent of the Armistice Agreement" Under UN auspices and with encouragement from the Eisenhower administration 9 meetings took place between 15 January and 27 January 1953, to regularise administration of the 3 DMZs. At the eighth meeting Syria offered to adjust the armistice lines, and cede to Israel's 70% of the DMZ, in exchange for a return to the pre 1946 International border in the Jordan basin area, with Banias water resources returning uncontested to Syrian sovereignty. On 26 April, the Israeli cabinet met to consider the Syrian suggestions; with head of Israel’s Water Planning Authority, Simha Blass, in attendance. Blass noted that while the land to be ceded to Syria was not suitable for cultivation, the Syrian map did not suit Israel’s water development plan. Blass explained that the movement of the International boundary in the area of Banias would affect Israel’s water rights. The Israeli cabinet rejected the Syrian proposals but decided to continue the negotiations by making changes to the accord and placing conditions on the Syrian proposals. The Israeli conditions took into account Blass’s position over water rights and Syria rejected the Israeli counteroffer. On 4 June 1953 Jordan and Syria concluded a bilateral plan to store surface water at Maqarin (completed in 2006 as Al Wehdah Dam, ), so as to be able to utilise the water resources of the Yarmouk river in the Yarmouk-Jordan valley plan, funded through the

Technical Cooperation Agency of the United States of America, the UNRWA and Jordan. Part of the Hula marshes were re-flooded in 1994 due to the negative effects from the original drainage plan.

Regional projects Lowdermilk McDonald plan Israeli National Water Carrier project In September 1953, Israel unilaterally started a water diversion project within the Jordan River basin to divert water from the Jordan River at Jacob's Ford (B'not Yacov) to help irrigate the coastal Sharon Plain and eventually the Negev desert. The diversion project consisted of a nine-mile (14 km) channel midway between the Huleh Marshes and Lake Galilee (Lake Tiberias) in the central DMZ to be rapidly constructed. Syria claimed that it would dry up 12,000 acres (49 km2) of Syrian land. The UNTSO Chief of Staff Major General Vagn Bennike of Denmark noted that the project was denying water to two Palestinian water mills, was drying up Palestinian farm land and was a substantial military benefit to Israel against Syria. The US cut off aid to Israel. The Israeli response was to increase work. UN Security Council Resolution 100 “deemed it desirable” for Israel to suspend work started on 2 September “pending urgent examination of the question by the Council”. Israel finally backed off by moving the intake out of the DMZ and for the next three years the US kept its economic sanctions by threatening to end aid channelled to Israel by the Foreign Operations Administration and insisting on tying the aid with Israel's behaviour. The Security Council ultimately rejected Syrian claims that the work was a violation of the Armistice Agreements and drainage works were resumed and the work was completed in 1957. This caused shelling from Syria and friction with the Eisenhower Administration; the diversion was moved to the southwest to Eshed Kinrot into the Israeli National Water Carrier project, designed by Tahal and constructed by Mekorot.

Jordan Valley Unified Water Plan 1955 US ambassador Eric Johnston negotiated the Jordan Valley Unified Water Plan. The plan was for the unified development of the Jordan Valley water resources based on an earlier plan commissioned by United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). Modeled upon the Tennessee Valley Authority development plan, it was approved by technical water committees of all the regional riparian countries - Israel, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. Though the plan was un-ratified by Israel and rejected by the Arab Higher Committee, Jordan undertook to abide by their

allocations under the plan. Israel, after the US linked the Johnston plan to aid, also agreed to accept the allocation provisions. Source Lebanon Syria Jordan Israel Hasbani 35 Banias 20 Jordan (main stream) 22 100 ** Yarmouk 90 377* 25 Total 35 132 477 25 except for the above withdrwals *the waters of the Yarmouk River will be available for the unconditional use of the Kingdom of the [sic] Jordan ** and the waters of the Jordan River will be for unconditional use of Israel.

The East Ghor canal formed part of a larger project - the Greater Yarmouk project which envisioned two storage dams on the Yarmouk, and a West Ghor Canal, on the West Bank of the Jordan. These projects were never built, due to Israel's occupation of the West Bank of the Jordan River during the Six-Day War. After the Six-Day War, The PLO operated from bases within Jordan, and launched several attacks on Israeli settlements in the Jordan valley, including attacks on water facilities. Israel responded with raids in Jordan, in an attempt to force King Hussein of Jordan to rein in the PLO. The canal was the target of at least 4 of these raids, and was virtually knocked out of commission. The United states intervened to resolve the conflict, and the canal was repaired after Hussien undertook to stop PLO activity in the area.

Headwater Diversion Plan First summit of Arab Heads of State was convened in Cairo between January 13–17, 1964, called by Nasser the Egyptian president, to discuss a common policy to confront Israel's national water carrier project which was nearing completion. The second Arab League summit conference voted on a plan which would have circumvent and frustrated it. The Arab and North African states chose to divert the Jordan headwaters rather than the use of direct military intervention. The heads of State of the Arab League considered two options: 1. The diversion of the Hasbani to the Litani combined with the diversion of the Banias to the Yarmouk, 2. The diversion of both the Hasbani and the Banias to the Yarmouk. The Arab league plan selected was for the Hasbani and Banias waters to be diverted to Mukhaiba and stored. After the 2nd Arab summit conference in Cairo of January 1964 (with the backing of all 13 Arab League members), Syria in a joint project with Lebanon and Jordan, started the development of the water resources of Banias for a canal along the slopes of the Golan

toward the Yarmouk River. While Lebanon was to construct a canal form the Hasbani River to Banias and complete the scheme. The project was to divert 20 to 30 million cubic metres of water from the river Jordan tributaries to Syria and Jordan for the development of Syria and Jordan. The Syrian construction of the Banias to Yarmouk canal got under way in 1965. Once completed, the diversion of the flow would have transported the water into a dam at Mukhaiba for use by Jordan and Syria before the waters of the Banias Stream entered Israel and the Sea of Galilee. Lebanon also started a canal to divert the waters of the Hasbani, whose source is in Lebanon, into the Banias. The Hasbani and Banias diversion works would have had the effect of reducing the capacity of Israel's carrier by about 35% and Israel's overall water supply by about 11%. Israel declared that it would regard such diversion as an infringement of its sovereign rights. The Finance of the project was through contributions by Saudi Arabia and Egypt. This led to military intervention from Israel, first with tank and artillery fire and then, as the Syrians shifted the works further southwards, with airstrikes.

Six-Day War On June 10, 1967, the last day of the Six-Day War, Golani Brigade forces quickly invaded the village of Banias where a caliphate era Syrian fort stood. Eshkol's priority on the Syrian front was control of the water sources.

Subsequent developments In 1980 Syria unilaterally started a programme of dam building along the Yarmouk. The southern slopes of Mount Hermon (Jebel esh-Sheikh) as well as the Golan Heights, were unilaterally annexed by Israel in 1981. 1988 The Syrian/Jordanian agreement on development of the Yarmouk is blocked when Israel as a riparian right holder refuses to ratify the plan and the World Bank withholds funding. Israel's augments its Johnson plan allocation of 25,000,000 m³/yr by a further 45,000,000–75,000,000 m³/yr. The water agreement forms a part of the broader political treaty which was signed between Israel and Jordan in 1994. The nature and significance of the wider 1994 treaty meant that the water aspect was forced to cede importance and priority in negotiations, giving way to areas such as borders and security in terms of armed force, which were perceived by decision-makers as being the most integral issues to the settlement. Main points from the water sharing in the Jordan/Israel Peace treaty. Jordan being a country that borders on the Jordan has riparian rights to water from the Jordan basin and upper Jordan tributaries. Due to the water diversion projects the flow to the river Jordan has been reduced from 1,300 million–1,500 million cubic metres to 250 million–300 million cubic metres. Where the water quality has been further reduced as

the flow of the river Jordan is made of run-off from agricultural irrigation and saline springs. Israel's subsequent developments have been mainly aimed at enlarging the main distribution system of Israel, run-off interception, reclamation of waste-water, and increasing the operational efficiency of water distribution networks. Over the year, the irrigated area within Israel has increased from 28,000 ha in 1948 to some 220,000 ha in 1997. Problems can be seen to have emerged in 1999, when the treaty’s limitations were revealed by events concerning water shortages in the Jordan basin. A reduced supply of water to Israel due to drought meant that, in turn, Israel which is responsible for providing water to Jordan, decreased its water provisions to the country, provoking a diplomatic disagreement between the two and bringing the water component of the treaty back into question. Israel's complaints that the reduction in water from the tributaries to the river Jordan caused by the Jordan/Syrian dam look to go unheeded due to the conflict of interest between Israel and her neighbours.

Chapter- 8

Colorado River Compact

The Colorado River Compact is a 1922 agreement among seven U.S. states in the basin of the Colorado River in the American Southwest governing the allocation of the water rights to the river's water among the parties of the interstate compact. The agreement was signed at a meeting at Bishop's Lodge, near Santa Fe, New Mexico, by representatives of the seven states the Colorado passes through on the way to Mexico.

Law of the River The Colorado River is managed and operated under numerous compacts, federal laws, court decisions and decrees, contracts, and regulatory guidelines collectively known as "The Law of the River."

Provisions The compact divides the river basin into two areas, the Upper Division (comprising Colorado, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming) and the Lower Division (Nevada, Arizona and California). The compact requires the Upper Basin states not to deplete the flow of the river below 75,000,000 acre feet (9.3×1010 m3) during any period of ten consecutive years. Based on historical rainfall patterns, the amount specified in the compact was assumed to allow a roughly equal division of water between the two regions. The states within each basin were required to divide their 7,500,000-acre (30,400 km2) foot per year (289 m³/s) share allotment among themselves. The compact enabled the widespread irrigation of the Southwest, as well as the subsequent development of state and federal water works projects under the United States Bureau of Reclamation. Such projects included the Hoover Dam and Lake Powell. The current specific annual allotments in the Lower Basin were established in 1928 as part of the Boulder Canyon Project. They are: Upper Basin, 7.5 million acre·ft/year (293 m³/s) total Colorado 51.75% 3.88 million acre·ft/year (152 m³/s) Utah 23.00% 1.73 million acre·ft/year (68 m³/s) Wyoming 14.00% 1.05 million acre·ft/year (41 m³/s)

New Mexico 11.25% 0.84 million acre·ft/year (33 m³/s) Arizona 0.70% 0.05 million acre·ft/year (2.0 m³/s) Lower Basin, 7.5 million acre·ft/year (293 m³/s) total California 58.70% 4.40 million acre·ft/year (172 m³/s) Arizona 37.30% 2.80 million acre·ft/year (109 m³/s) Nevada 4.00% 0.30 million acre·ft/year (12 m³/s) In addition to this, 1,500,000-acre-foot (1.85×109 m3)/year of Colorado River water is allocated to Mexico, pursuant to the treaty relating to the use of waters of the Colorado and Tijuana rivers and of the Rio Grande, signed February 3, 1944, and its supplementary protocol signed November 14, 1944. Also, the lower basin can get an additional 1,100,000-acre-foot (1.36×109 m3)/year.

History The compact was the fruit of several years of negotiations among the states. The seven states had previously formed the League of the Southwest in 1917 to promote development along the river. In 1921, Congress authorized the states to enter into a compact for allocation of the river resources. The agreement was approved by Congress in 1922, the same year it was signed. As part of the compact, the name of the river was standardized along its length. Previously the portion of the river upstream from its confluence with the Green River had been known locally as the "Grand River". The change was opposed by many local residents in Utah and Colorado, and the new name was enforced locally by acts of the state legislatures in both states in the early 1920s. The agreement was controversial even at the time, however. Arizona, for example, was dissatisfied with the lower basin allotment and refused to ratify the agreement until 1944 . The specific allotments were disputed by Arizona until the United States Supreme Court upheld the amount in the 1963 decision in Arizona v. California. The agreement ended many years of dispute, clearing the way for the Central Arizona Project, authorized by Congress in 1968.

Future developments and issues Since the development of the Colorado River Compact, California has been using the surplus water that has been left over from other states; however with increasing population growth in the Southwest there is concern that this surplus soon will not exist for California’s use. In 2001, Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt signed an interim agreement, determining how water surplus from the Colorado River will be allocated between the states and creating a fifteen year period to allow California time to put conservation methods in place to reduce the state’s water usage and dependence on Colorado River water.

There is also concern regarding Nevada’s increasing population and the state’s water usage. Nevada, with the smallest water allocation in the lower river basin, may find in the near future that the water supplied by the Colorado River will not meet the state’s growing needs . However in 2008 Southern Nevada Water Authority General Manager Pat Mulroy said that she does not support a water reallocation; because all of the states in the river basin have experienced growth she says that it is unlikely that Nevada’s allocation would increase, and it could even decrease. Instead Nevada, like California, may have to work on conservation methods as well as finding other water sources to support the state’s growing population.

Colorado River Compact and the environment Development was the prime concern of the Colorado River Compact, when signed in 1922. Unfortunately this does not take environmental issues into consideration. Using and reusing the river water as well as frequent damming results in an unfavorable environment for native fish species. Dams block fish passage, reduce silt deposition, and change water temperatures, all negatively impacting the natural ecosystem. The high water usage has also caused the river delta, located in Mexico, to significantly deteriorate. Once a lush and green area from the high amounts of silt deposit, the plentiful ecosystem has now all but disappeared. In order to begin to reduce the damage more water will need to be appropriated to Mexico .

Criticism and renegotiation In recent years, the compact has become the focus of even sharper criticism, in the wake of a protracted decrease in rainfall in the region. Specifically, the amount of water allocated was based on an expectation that the river's average flow was 16.4 million acre feet per year (641 m³/s). Subsequent tree ring studies, however, have concluded that the long-term average water flow of the Colorado is significantly less. Estimates have included 13.2 million acre feet per year (516 m³/s) , 13.5 million acre feet per year (528 m3/s) , and 14.3 million acre feet per year (559 m3/s) . Many analysts have concluded that the compact was negotiated in a period of abnormally high rainfall, and that the recent drought in the region is in fact a return to historically typical patterns. The decrease in rainfall has led to widespread dropping of reservoir levels in the region, in particular at Lake Powell, created by the Glen Canyon Dam in 1963, where the exposure of longinundated canyons has prompted calls for the deliberate permanent extinction of the reservoir. In December, 2007, a set of interim guidelines on how to allocate Colorado River water in the event of shortages was signed by the Secretary of the Interior . The guidelines are described as interim because they extend through 2026, and are intended to allow the system operators to gain experience with low-reservoir conditions, while the effect of climate change on the Colorado River's flow undergoes further evaluation. The agreement specifies three levels of shortage conditions, depending on the level of Lake Mead. When the surface elevation at Lake Mead is below 1,075 feet (relative to mean sea

level) but above 1,050 feet (320 m), the Lower Basin states will receive 7.167 million acre feet per year (4.4 million acre feet to California, 2,480,000 acre feet (3.06×109 m3) to Arizona, and 0.287 million acre feet to Nevada). When the surface elevation of Lake Mead is below 1,050 feet (320 m) but above 1,025 feet (312 m), 7,083,000 acre feet (8.737×109 m3) per year will be delivered to the Lower Basin states, 4,400,000 acre feet (5.43×109 m3) for California, 2,400,000 acre feet (2.96×109 m3) for Arizona, and 283,000 acre feet (349,000,000 m3) for Nevada. The most severe shortage considered in the interim guidelines is when the level of Lake Mead drops below 1,025 feet (312 m), in which event 7,000,000 acre feet (8.6×109 m3) per year will be delivered to the Lower Basin states (4.4 million acre feet to California, 2,320,000 acre feet (2.86×109 m3) to Arizona, and 280,000 acre feet (350,000,000 m3) to Nevada). On August 15, 2008, Arizona Senator John McCain called for the compact to be renegotiated . Due to the Senator's position as the Republican Party nominee in the 2008 U.S. Presidential Election and Colorado's swing state status, criticism of the compact may have gained national significance .

Chapter- 9

Water Politics in the Nile Basin

East Africa and the Nile basin

The Nile River is subject to political interactions. It is the world's longest river flowing 6,700 kilometers through ten countries in northeastern Africa – Rwanda, Burundi, Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Sudan and Egypt with varying climates. Considering the basin area of the Nile, Sudan has the largest size (1.9 million km²) whereas, of the four major tributaries to the Nile, three originate from Ethiopia - the Blue Nile, Sobat and Atbara. The modern history of hydropolitics in the Nile basin is very complex and has had wide ramifications both for regional and global developments.

Geography The following table illustrates the water availablity in each country within the Nile basin, and researchers' estimates of decrease in water availability to these countries, due largely to an increase in the countries' populations. While the Nile and its tributaries are vital sources of water throughout the basin, the dependence of basin countries on the river varies dramatically. Egypt and Sudan, to name two examples, are almost completely dependent on the Nile system. By contrast, the Nile is a vanishingly small part of the water resources of DR Congo, most of which lies within the drainage basin of the Congo River—a river with more than 10 times the average discharge of the Nile. GNP Population Population Population per below the Country 1995 2025 capita poverty line (millions) (millions) 1996 (1US$/day) (US $) (PPP) (%) Burundi 6.4 13.5 170 DRC 43.9 104.6 160 Egypt 62.9 97.3 1,090 7.6 Ethiopia 55.1 126.9 100 33.8 Eritrea ? ? ? ? Kenya 28.3 63.4 320 50.2 Rwanda 8 15.8 190 45.7 Sudan 28.1 58.4 Tanzania 29.7 62.9 170 16.4 Uganda 21.3 48.1 300 50

Per capita Per capita water water availability availability 1990 (m³) 2025 (m³) 655 359,803 1,123 2,207 ? 636 897 4,792 2,924 3,759

269 139,309 630 842 ? 235 306 1,993 1,025 1,437

Water as a source of conflict Ancient Egypt claims it has a natural historical right on the Nile River, and principles of its acquired rights have been a focal point of negotiations with other upstream states. The fact that this right exists means that any perceived reduction of the Nile water supply to

Egypt is tampering with its national security and thus could trigger potential conflict. There have been occasions when Egypt has threatened to go to war over Nile water. Sudan also has hydraulic potential and has created four dams in the last century. This has resulted in the development so far of 18,000 km² of irrigated land, making Sudan the second most extensive user of the Nile, after Egypt. While Egypt is highly dependent on the Nile, there are factors that prevent the necessity of conflict over the distribution of the Nile's water supply. For example, Egypt no longer has such an agriculturally-dependent economy. Further, Egypt is already dependent on virtual water imports, and we can see that pursuing this as an alternative may prove an efficient way of avoiding water conflict. On the other hand, consider the riparian state of Ethiopia, whose tributaries supply about 86 percent of the waters of the Nile, conflict could arise from the fact that Ethiopia has limited hydraulic power and only uses about one percent of the Nile. Egypt has historically threatened war on Ethiopia and Tanzania over the Nile river. Egypt gave arms to Somali separatist rebels in Ethiopia during and since the Somalia invasion of Ethiopia in the 1970s. With this in mind, some academics argue that it is the fact that other riparian states simply do not have the resources to enter into conflict that conflict has not yet occurred. Governments, over the years, have put agreements and treaties into place so that conflict can be controlled.

Egypt and the Nile Egyptian civilization has sustained itself utilizing water management and agriculture for some 5,000 years in the Nile River valley. The Egyptians practiced basin irrigation, a form of water management adapted to the natural rise and fall of the Nile River. Since around 3000 B.C., the Egyptians constructed earthen banks to form flood basins of various sizes that were regulated by sluices to redirect floodwater into the basin where it would sit until the soil was saturated, the water was then drained, and crops planted. This method of agriculture did not deplete the soil of nutrients or cause salinization problems experienced by modern agricultural methods. In 1869, the Suez Canal was opened linking the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, creating an international transportation route and linking the resources of Egypt to international trade.

Egyptian Colonization In 1875 the Conservative government of Benjamin Disraeli bought the indebted Egyptian ruler Ismail's 44% shareholding in the Suez Canal for £4 million to secure control of this strategic waterway, a channel for shipping between the United Kingdom and India since its opening six years earlier under Emperor Napoleon III. Joint Anglo-French financial control over Egypt ended in outright British occupation in 1882. In 1898, the British reconquered Sudan, cleared vegetation along the Nile River and created alternative drainage paths to divert water and improve flow.

Conflict management

Colonial Treaties Affecting Nile Water Use Colonial treaties have resulted in inequitable rights to the use of Nile water between the countries of the Nile Basin. 

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April 15, 1891 – Article III of the Anglo-Italian Protocol. Article III states that "the Italian government engages not to construct on the Atbara River, in view of irrigation, any work which might sensibly modify its flow into the Nile". May 15, 1902 – Article III of the Treaty between Great Britain and Ethiopia. Article three states “His Majesty the Emperor Menilik II, King of Kings of Ethiopia, engages himself towards the Government of His Britannic Majesty not to construct or allow to be constructed any work across the Blue Nile, Lake Tana, or the Sobat, which would arrest the flow of their waters except in agreement with His Britannic Majesty’s Government and the Government of Sudan" This agreement has become one of the most contested agreements over the use of the Nile waters. The aim of this treaty was to establish the border between Ethiopia and the Sudan. One of its articles, number III, related to the use of Nile water. The English version, as reviewed by Britain and later by the Sudan, read: "His Majesty the Emperor Menilik II, King of Kings of Ethiopia, engages himself towards the Government of His Britannic Majesty not to construct or allow to be constructed any work across the Blue Bile, Lake Tana, or the Sobat, which would arrest the flow of their waters except in agreement with His Britannic Majesty’s Government and the Government of Sudan" (Okidi, 1994:324; Tilahun, 1979). The Amharic version, however, gave a different meaning and understanding to Ethiopia (Abebe: 1994) and "was never ratified by this country" May 9, 1906 – Article III of the Agreement between Britain and the Government of the Independent State of the Congo. Article III states "The Government of the independent state of the Congo undertakes not to construct, or allow to be constructed, any work over or near the Semliki or Isango river which would diminish the volume of water entering Lake Albert except in agreement with the Sudanese Government". Belgium signed this agreement on behalf of the Congo despite the agreement favoring only the downstream users of the Nile waters and restricting the people of the Congo from accessing their part of the Nile. December 13, 1906 – Article 4(a) of the Tripartite Treaty (Britain-France-Italy). Article 4(a) states “To act together... to safeguard; ... the interests of Great Britain and Egypt in the Nile Basin, more especially as regards the regulation of the waters of that river and its tributaries (due consideration being paid to local interests) without prejudice to Italian interests". This treaty, in effect, denied Ethiopia its sovereign right over the use of its own water. Ethiopia has rejected the treaty their military and political power was not sufficient to regain its use of the Nile water. The 1925 exchange of notes between Britain and Italy concerning Lake Tana which states "...Italy recognizes the prior hydraulic rights of Egypt and the Sudan... not to construct on the head waters of the Blue Nile and the White Nile (the Sobat) and their tributaries and effluents any work which might sensibly

modify their flow into the main river." Ethiopia opposed the agreement and notified both parties of its objections: "To the Italian government: The fact that you have come to an agreement, and the fact that you have thought it necessary to give us a joint notification of that agreement, make it clear that your intention is to exert pressure, and this in our view, at once raises a previous question. This question which calls for preliminary examination, must therefore be laid before the League of Nations." "To the British government: The British Government has already entered into negotiations with the Ethiopian Government in regard to its proposal, and we had imagined that, whether that proposal was carried into effect or not, the negotiations would have been concluded with us; we would never have suspected that the British Government would come to an agreement with another Government regarding our Lake." When an explanation was required from the British and the Italian governments by the League of Nations, they denied challenging Ethiopia’s sovereignty over Lake Tana (Tilahun, 1970:90). Not withstanding, however there was no explicit mechanism enforcing the agreement. A reliable and self-enforcing mechanism that can protect the property rights of each stakeholder is essential if the principle of economically and ecologically sustainable international water development is to be applied. 

May 7, 1929 – The Agreement between Egypt and Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. This agreement included: o Egypt and Sudan utilize 48 and 4 billion cubic meters of the Nile flow per year, respectively; o The flow of the Nile during January 20 to July 15 (dry season) would be reserved for Egypt; o Egypt reserves the right to monitor the Nile flow in the upstream countries; o Egypt assumed the right to undertake Nile river related projects without the consent of upper riparian states. o Egypt assumed the right to veto any construction projects that would affect her interests adversely.

In effect, this agreement gave Egypt complete control over the Nile during the dry season when water is most needed for agricultural irrigation. It also severely limits the amount of water allotted Sudan and provides no water to any of the other riparian states. 

The 1959 Nile agreement between the Sudan and Egypt for full control utilization of the Nile waters. This agreement included: o The controversy on the quantity of average annual Nile flow was settled and agreed to be about 84 billion cubic meters measured at Aswan High Dam, in Egypt.

o

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The agreement allowed the entire average annual flow of the Nile to be shared among the Sudan and Egypt at 18.5 and 55.5 billion cubic meters, respectively. Annual water loss due to evaporation and other factors were agreed to be about 10 billion cubic meters. This quantity would be deducted from the Nile yield before share was assigned to Egypt and Sudan. Sudan, in agreement with Egypt, would construct projects that would enhance the Nile flow by preventing evaporation losses in the Sudd swamps of the White Nile located in the southern Sudan. The cost and benefit of same to be divided equally between them. If claim would come from the remaining riparian countries over the Nile water resource, both the Sudan and Egypt shall, together, handle the claims. If the claim prevails and the Nile water has to be shared with another riparian state, that allocated amount would be deducted from the Sudan’s and Egypt’s and allocations/shares in equal parts of Nile volume measured at Aswan. The agreement granted Egypt the right to construct the Aswan High Dam that can store the entire annual Nile River flow of a year. It granted the Sudan to construct the Rosaries Dam on the Blue Nile and, to develop other irrigation and hydroelectric power generation until it fully utilizes its Nile share. A Permanent Joint Technical Commission to be established to secure the technical cooperation between them.

Nile Basin Initiative The Nile Basin Initiative (NBI) is a partnership among the Nile Riparian states that “seeks to develop the river in a cooperative manner, share substantial socioeconomic benefits, and promote regional peace and security”. It was formally launched in February, 1999 by the water ministers of 9 countries that share the river - Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Burundi, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

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1966 Helsinki Rules – Adopted by the International Law Association at the 52nd conference held in Helsinki in August 1966, the rules govern use of waters of an international drainage basin except as may be provided otherwise by convention, agreement or binding custom among the basin States. 1995 SADC Shared Watercourse System Protocol - Protocol on shared watercourse systems in the Southern African development community (SADC) region signed at Johannesburg, 28 August 1995 recognized the following principals: o BEARING in mind the Helsinki Rules on uses of the waters of International Rivers and the work of the International Law Commission on the non-navigational uses of international watercourses;

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RECOGNISING the relevant provisions of Agenda 21 of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, the concepts of environmentally sound management, sustainable development and equitable utilization of shared watercourse systems in the SADC Region; CONSIDERING the existing and emerging socio-economic development programs in the SADC region and their impact on the environment; DESIROUS of developing close co-operation for judicious and coordinated utilization of the resources of the shared watercourse systems in the SADC region; CONVINCED of the need for coordinated and environmentally sound development of the resources of shared watercourse systems in the SADC region in order to support sustainable socio-economic development; RECOGNISING that there are as yet no regional conventions regulating common utilization and management of the resources of shared watercourse systems in the SADC region; MINDFUL of the existence of other Agreements in the SADC region regarding the Common utilization of certain watercourses.

1997 United Nations Convention on the Law of Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses.

Effects of Treaties and Policies on Nile Basin Water Use During the colonial period, Britain effectively controlled the Nile through its military presence in Africa. Since Sudanese independence, Sudan has renegotiated with Egypt over the use of the Nile waters. The 1959 agreement between Sudan and Egypt allocated the entire average annual flow of the Nile to be shared among the Sudan and Egypt at 18.5 and 55.5 billion cubic meters respectfully, but ignored the rights to water of the remaining eight Nile countries. Ethiopia contributes 80% of the total Nile flow, but by the 1959 agreement is entitled to none of its resources. However, the agreement between Egypt and Sudan is not binding on Ethiopia as it was never a party to it. Since the early 1990s, Ethiopia has successfully countered Egyptian and Sudanese resistance to water development projects in Ethiopia to increase irrigation and hydroelectric potential.

Prospects of cooperation in the Nile Basin Egypt continues to be the primary user of Nile water. According to Swain and Fadel, political instability and poverty in the other nine riparian countries has limited their ability to move toward socioeconomic development of the Nile. According to Lemma, the greatest question facing the Nile riparian states is: Will the Nile Basin Initiative help them overcome the unjust and unequal distribution of Nile water resources?

Other issues in hydropolitics Pollution of the Nile River

While most of the river’s water quality is within acceptable levels, there are several hot spots mostly found in the irrigation canals and drainages. Sources of pollutants are from agricultural, industrial, and household waste. There are 36 industries that discharge their pollution sources directly into the Nile, and 41 into irrigation canals. These types of industries are: chemical, electrical, engineering, fertilizers, food, metal, mining, oil and soap, pulp and paper, refractory, textile and wood. There are over 90 agricultural drains that discharge into the Nile that also include industrial wastewater. The water exceeds the European Community Standards of fecal contamination and there is a high salinization and saline intrusion in the delta. Salinization happens when there’s a build up of salts in the soil. The soil can’t retain water which prevents anything from growing. Saline intrusion is when the ground is saturated with saltwater. The northeast Nile Delta region has a high incident rate of pancreatic cancer that is believed to be from high levels of heavy metals and organchlorine pesticides found in the soil and water. Exposure to cadmium is most commonly known through smoking, though it is believed that in this region, the exposure is from contact through the heavy metals and pesticides found in the soil and water. Schistosomiasis (a disease caused by parasitic worms) has been found in irrigation canals along with benthic cyanobacteria forming mats.

Irrigation Canals Agriculture is the largest consumer of water in Egypt using about 85% of available water. Drainage water from the agricultural fields contains pollutants such as pesticide residues, toxic organic and inorganic pollutants, salts and treated and untreated domestic wastewater. In the East - Delta drains - Faraskour, Serw and Hadous, samples of the water contained high levels of hookworms and other intestinal helminth eggs. In villages where the only available water is from irrigation canals, women use the water for domestic purposes and also dump the used water back into the drainages. In some areas, low water levels don’t reach the waterways, so farmers build illegal waterwheels to get the water up the canals to irrigate their land. Lack of drainage canals and the enforcement by officials to address these problems contribute to pollution of land and water. Villagers drinking polluted water have been affected with kidney and liver diseases. Animal manure, dredged sediments from drains and sludge for fertilizer are leached and the contaminants are a major source of pollution. Agricultural drainage water reuse is used by farmers legally and illegally. Improper irrigation and lack of education on effective irrigation methods and crop production contributes to crop failure and polluting of canals. In areas where there is no formal operational structure for pumping water of individual diesel pumps, the tail-end users usually are not getting enough water to maintain crops.

Government and Farmers There are twenty-five agencies, under seven ministries that are involved in maintaining water quality, yet their communication and data sharing between agencies is underdeveloped. Water user associations which are non-governmental associations of farmers who organize an irrigation process of all agricultural land, maintain diesel pumps and deal with conflicts between farmers and water management. They have been around since 1988, but have lacked structure and the inclusion of women. Women are seen as

contributors to pollution of irrigation canals since they wash clothes, dishes and animals in the drainages. The lack of planning and corruption within governmental departments, the neglecting of concerns and disbursement of low-quality land to the poor, and the improper education of safe handling methods and improper irrigation and crop management for men and women, all contribute to poor water quality. Though money is a major factor in improving these areas, in the case of erasing corruption and improving interdepartmental communication, stricter rules and enforcement of them is something that can be done immediately. Increasing Water User Associations (WUAs) and establishing a communication chain between these associations and government departments is recommended. Appointing field supervisors for designated areas to oversee WUAs and educate farmers on irrigation methods (like drip irrigation that applies water to the root zone which can reduce water use by 30 to 60 percent), effective water distribution during crop cycle, crop rotation and soil management. Field supervisors can also monitor water levels, check on the maintenance of pumps and report on drainage structures. The World Bank has financed the agricultural drainage program in Egypt since 1970. This program equips agricultural land with subsurface drains. These drains are made of plastic pipes produced in government-owned plants in the Nile Valley and Delta. Landholders pay for the installation of drains on a 20 year interest-free annual installments. Subsurface drainage has shown to improve soil conditions and crop yield. Educating farmers on the functioning of these subsurface drainages are needed to prevent a disruption of water supply to all connected fields. Since these drainages can’t be seen on the surface, if a farmer closes a drain to keep more water in his field it will prevent water from reaching users beyond.

Solutions Since agricultural lands are not charged for water, but are for irrigation and drainage improvements, WUAs should be responsible for payment as it would produce a group responsibility of all members. Monitoring of water and soil quality should be left to the WUAs and reported to field supervisors which then report to the Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation (MWRI) office. Since the effort to produce clean water will take time, steps that can be taken as short term results are: Tapping into shallow wells for drinking water obtained from fields and unlined canals; since the soil acts as a filter it can remove contaminants. Consulting with farmers when designing irrigation systems for optimal performance should be taken into consideration. (IWMI, 2006) Informing the public of safe handling of food methods, the use of manure and mulching crop residue, less evasive tillage and rotating crops that don’t need the same nutrients to improve the soils ability to hold water, and switching to short duration crops to decrease water consumption is advised. Proper application of reused drainage water during a crops growth cycle is optimal. In Giza, they have the largest governorate discharge of agricultural, industrial and domestic sewage that goes directly into the Nile through three drains without treatment. A solution is to construct three wastewater treatment plants with “activated sludge” and “high capacity”. “Activated sludge” is the cheapest technology that reduces E. coli and biological oxygen demand (BOD) concentrations and switching the Abu-Rawash treatment plant from primary to activated sludge. Public and industrial awareness should also be promoted to reduce illegal dumping. Public

awareness can help achieve efficient water usage and cleaner water. Increased monitoring of discharged areas and enforcing fines of illegal dumping should be integrated in already established government offices. Monitoring of these enforcements should be done by an outside source like the World Bank since they have provided Egypt with financing for improvements of water usage. If the World Bank finds the government has not enforced the established fines, then they can add exceptions to their loan agreements that would create incentives for enforcement of fines.

Criticisms Some scholars downplay the geopolitical importance of water. Jan Selby and Thomas Gnyra, for instance, argue that whilst oil has been a principal cause of regional economic growth, adequate water supply has been a product. Selby claims the 'water wars' is also weak in terms of failed forecasts, and that conflict in the last century was more often due to oil than water. (The 1990-1991 Gulf War is an example of this.) Others argue that there are more important foreign policy concerns than water, which relate to ideological, economic and strategic relations with neighbouring states (and with outside powers), and access to 'goods' such as foreign aid and investment, oil revenues and remittances, illegal economies and military hardware make water conflict a marginal concern.

Chapter- 10

Indus Waters Treaty

The Indus Waters Treaty is a water-sharing treaty between the Republic of India and Islamic Republic Of Pakistan, brokered by the World Bank (then the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development). The treaty was signed in Karachi on September 19, 1960 by Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru and President of Pakistan Mohammad Ayub Khan. The treaty was a result of Pakistani fear that since the source rivers of the Indus basin were in India, it could potentially create droughts and famines in Pakistan, especially at times of war. However, India did not revoke the treaty during any of three later Indo-Pakistani Wars.

Provisions The Indus System of Rivers comprises three Western Rivers the Indus, the Jhelum and Chenab and three Eastern Rivers - the Sutlej, the Beas and the Ravi; and with minor exceptions, the treaty gives India exclusive use of all of the waters of the Eastern Rivers and their tributaries before the point where the rivers enter Pakistan. Similarly, Pakistan has exclusive use of the Western Rivers. Pakistan also received one-time financial compensation for the loss of water from the Eastern rivers. The countries agree to exchange data and co-operate in matters related to the treaty. For this purpose, treaty creates the Permanent Indus Commission, with a commissioner appointed by each country.

History and Background The waters of the Indus basin begin in the Himalayan mountains in the state of Jammu and Kashmir. They flow from the hills through the arid states of Punjab and Sindh, converging in Pakistan and emptying into the Arabian Sea south of Karachi. Where once there was only a narrow strip of irrigated land along these rivers, developments over the last century have created a large network of canals and storage facilities that provide water for more than 26 million acres (110,000 km2) - the largest irrigated area of any one river system in the world. The partition of British India created a conflict over the plentiful waters of the Indus basin. The newly formed states were at odds over how to share and manage what was

essentially a cohesive and unitary network of irrigation. Furthermore, the geography of partition was such that the source rivers of the Indus basin were in India. Pakistan felt its livelihood threatened by the prospect of Indian control over the tributaries that fed water into the Pakistani portion of the basin. Where India certainly had its own ambitions for the profitable development of the basin, Pakistan felt acutely threatened by a conflict over the main source of water for its cultivable land. During the first years of partition the waters of the Indus were apportioned by the InterDominion Accord of May 4, 1948. This accord required India to release sufficient waters to the Pakistani regions of the basin in return for annual payments from the government of Pakistan. The accord was meant to meet immediate requirements and was followed by negotiations for a more permanent solution. Neither side, however, was willing to compromise their respective positions and negotiations reached a stalemate. From the Indian point of view, there was nothing that Pakistan could do to prevent India from any of the schemes to divert the flow of water in the rivers. Pakistan’s position was dismal and India could do whatever it wanted. Pakistan wanted to take the matter to the International Court of Justice but India refused, arguing that the conflict required a bilateral resolution. By 1951, the two sides were no longer meeting and the situation seemed intractable. The Pakistani press was calling for more drastic action and the deadlock contributed to hostility with India. As one anonymous Indian official said at the time, "India and Pakistan can go on shouting on Kashmir for all time to come, but an early settlement on the Indus waters is essential for maintenance of peace in the sub-continent" (Gulati 16). Despite the unwillingness to compromise, both nations were anxious to find a solution, fully aware that the Indus conflict could lead to overt hostilities if unresolved.

World Bank involvement In this same year, David Lilienthal, formerly the chairman of the Tennessee Valley Authority and of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, visited the region to write a series of articles for Colliers magazine. Lilienthal had a keen interest in the subcontinent and was welcomed by the highest levels of both Indian and Pakistani governments. Although his visit was sponsored by Colliers, Lilienthal was briefed by State Department and executive branch officials, who hoped he could help bridge the gap between India and the United States and also gauge hostilities on the subcontinent. During the course of his visit, it became clear to Lilienthal that tensions between India and Pakistan were acute, but also unable to be erased with one sweeping gesture. In his journal he wrote: "India and Pakistan were on the verge of war over Kashmir. There seemed to be no possibility of negotiating this issue until tensions abated. One way to reduce hostility . . . would be to concentrate on other important issues where cooperation was possible. Progress in these areas would promote a sense of community between the two nations which might, in time, lead to a Kashmir settlement. Accordingly, I proposed that India and Pakistan work out a program jointly to develop and jointly to operate the Indus Basin river system, upon which both nations were dependent for irrigation water. With

new dams and irrigation canals, the Indus and its tributaries could be made to yield the additional water each country needed for increased food production. " Lilienthal's idea was well received by officials at the World Bank, and, subsequently, by the Indian and Pakistani governments. Eugene R. Black, then president of the World Bank told Lilienthal that his proposal "makes good sense all round". Black wrote that the Bank was interested in the economic progress of the two countries and had been concerned that the Indus dispute could only be a serious handicap to this development. India's previous objections to third party arbitration were remedied by the Bank's insistence that it would not adjudicate the conflict, but, instead, work as a conduit for agreement. Black also made a distinction between the "functional" and "political" aspects of the Indus dispute. In his correspondence with Indian and Pakistan leaders, Black asserted that the Indus dispute could most realistically be solved if the functional aspects of disagreement were negotiated apart from political considerations. He envisioned a group that tackled the question of how best to utilize the waters of the Indus Basin - leaving aside questions of historic rights or allocations. Black proposed a Working Party made up of Indian, Pakistani and World Bank engineers. The World Bank delegation would act as a consultative group, charged with offering suggestions and speeding dialogue. In his opening statement to the Working Party, Black spoke of why he was optimistic about the group's success: One aspect of Mr. Lilienthal's proposal appealed to me from the first. I mean his insistence that the Indus problem is an engineering problem and should be dealt with by engineers. One of the strengths of the engineering profession is that, all over the world, engineers speak the same language and approach problems with common standards of judgment. (Gulhati 110) Black's hopes for a quick resolution to the Indus dispute were premature. While the Bank had expected that the two sides would come to an agreement on the allocation of waters, neither India nor Pakistan seemed willing to compromise their positions. While Pakistan insisted on its historical right to waters of all the Indus tributaries,and that half of West Punjab was under threat of desertification the Indian side argued that the previous distribution of waters should not set future allocation. Instead, the Indian side set up a new basis of distribution, with the waters of the Western tributaries going to Pakistan and the Eastern tributaries to India. The substantive technical discussions that Black had hoped for were stymied by the political considerations he had expected to avoid. The World Bank soon became frustrated with this lack of progress. What had originally been envisioned as a technical dispute that would quickly untangle itself became an intractable mess. India and Pakistan were unable to agree on the technical aspects of allocation, let alone the implementation of any agreed upon distribution of waters. Finally, in 1954, after nearly two years of negotiation, the World bank offered its own proposal, stepping beyond the limited role it had apportioned for itself and forcing the two sides to consider concrete plans for the future of the basin. The proposal offered

India the three eastern tributaries of the basin and Pakistan the three western tributaries. Canals and storage dams were to be constructed to divert waters from the western rivers and replace the eastern river supply lost by Pakistan. While the Indian side was amenable to the World Bank proposal, Pakistan found it unacceptable. The World Bank allocated the eastern rivers to India and the western rivers to Pakistan. This new distribution did not account for the historical usage of the Indus basin,or the fact that West Punjab's Eastern districts could turn into desert, and repudiated Pakistan's negotiating position. Where India had stood for a new system of allocation, Pakistan felt that its share of waters should be based on pre-partition distribution. The World Bank proposal was more in line with the Indian plan and this angered the Pakistani delegation. They threatened to withdraw from the Working Party and negotiations verged on collapse. But neither side could afford the dissolution of talks. The Pakistani press met rumors of and end to negotiation with talk of increased hostilities; the government was ill-prepared to forego talks for a violent conflict with India and was forced to reconsider its position. India was also eager to settle the Indus issue; large development projects were put on hold by negotiations and Indian leaders were eager to divert water for irrigation. In December 1954, the two sides returned to the negotiating table. The World Bank proposal was transformed from a basis of settlement to a basis for negotiation and the talks continued, stop and go, for the next six years. One of the last stumbling blocks to an agreement concerned financing for the construction of canals and storage facilities that would transfer water from the eastern Indian rivers to Pakistan. This transfer was necessary to make up for the water Pakistan was giving up by ceding its rights to the eastern tributaries. The World Bank initially planned for India to pay for these works, but India refused. The Bank responded with a plan for external financing supplied mainly by the United States and the United Kingdom. This solution cleared the remaining stumbling blocks to agreement and the Treaty was signed by the Prime Ministers of both countries in 1960.

Treaty Provisions The agreement set up a commission to adjudicate any future disputes arising over the allocation of waters. The Permanent Indus Commission has survived two wars and provides an on-going mechanism for consultation and conflict resolution through inspection, exchange of data, and visits. The Commission is required to meet regularly to discuss potential disputes as well as cooperative arrangements for the development of the basin. Either party must notify the other of plans to construct any engineering works which would affect the other party and to provide data about such works. In cases of disagreement, a neutral expert is called in for mediation and arbitration. While neither side has initiated projects that could cause the kind of conflict that the Commission was created to resolve, the annual inspections and exchange of data continue, unperturbed by tensions on the subcontinent.

The Indus Waters Treaty is the longest agreement that has been faithfully implemented and upheld by both India and Pakistan.

Objections According to Kashmiri Separatists, Indus water treaty has deprived J & K state to use its own water resources and became one of the reasons for the alienation of people and has severely affected the economic development in the state. The state incurs losses estimated at Rs 6500 crore annually by the dint of Indus Water Treaty. There are losses in agricultural sector as well as in the generation of hydro-electric power which has otherwise an estimated potential of 20,000 MW.