| Gabriel Eckstein | Miriam Lowi | Talal Abu Ghazaleh |
by Gabriel E. Eckstein
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by Miriam R. Lowi
There
are three major, outstanding disputes over the distribution and management
of transboundary waters in the Middle East. They concern: 1) the Euphrates
River basin among Iraq, Syria, and Turkey; 2) the Jordan River basin among
Israel, Jordan, Syria and the Palestinians; and 3) West Bank groundwater
between Israel and the Palestinians. In the three cases, aridity and semi-aridity
characterizes the climate and hydrology of the region, hence undisturbed
access to water is essential for continued survival. In the three cases,
as well, political tensions among the concerned riparians aggravate the
water disputes.
Let me begin by briefly outlining the nature of the problem in each of
the cases and the stakes involved in failing to resolve the disputes. Next,
I will highlight the minimum conditions that must be met before a water
dispute can be resolved in a protracted conflict setting. Finally, I will
describe some of the institutional mechanisms that could be effective in
promoting a mutually satisfactory solution. In doing so, I note what seems
to have worked in similar situations in the past, and what seemed to work
for some time under the auspices of the water resources working group of
the multilateral track of the middle East peace process.
In the Euphrates basin, the central problem can be described thus: the
river rises in Turkey and flows southward into Syria and then into Iraq.
The two downstream riparians are highly dependent upon the river flow for
agricultural development, while Turkey upstream has become increasingly
dependent upon the river since the mid-1960s by virtue of the GAP (Southeast
Anatolia Development) project, a massive water management scheme that includes
dam-building and diversions 1. In the absence of a basin-wide
agreement that stipulates who gets what from the river, when and how, Turkey,
as the upstream riparian and the strongest state in the basin, is able
to requisition what it wants from the river system; Syria and Iraq must
suffer the consequences. On a number of occasions, in fact, the flow entering
the two countries was reduced considerably, and although Syria and Iraq
complained vociferously about this, Turkey was not contractually bound
to behave otherwise. Moreover, relations in the basin are such that Syria
and Iraq, who have the most to lose from the status quo, are engaged in
a protracted conflict: there is virtually no official interaction between
the two regimes, hence a bilateral alliance vis-à-vis Turkey is
out of the question in the prevailing political environment. It is also
fair to say that the international community has not shown much concern
about this conflict and its resolution; there have not been significant
efforts at third party mediation.
In the
case of the Jordan basin, the river system rises in four tributaries: the
Yarmouk in Syria, the Banias in Israeli-occupied Syria, the Hasbani in
Israeli-occupied Lebanon, and the Dan in Israel. The Banias, Hasbani and
Dan meet in northern Israel to form the Upper Jordan River the flows into
Lake Tiberias and then the Lower Jordan; the Yarmouk flows in a southwesterly
direction, forming the border between Jordan and Syria, then Jordan and
Israel, before flowing into the Lower Jordan that forms the boundary between
Jordan and the West Bank, and then Jordan and Israel. By virtue of both
the 1967 war and the establishment of the "security zone" in South Lebanon
in the early 1980s, Israel has become the upstream riparian on the Upper
Jordan and the Palestinians, as downstream riparians vis-à-vis both
Israel and Syria, have remained in the worst possible positions in the
basin. Moreover, Jordan's dependence on the river system is great; apart
from a few wadis 2,there are no other important sources of fresh
water available to Jordan. On three occasions, efforts
were made to resolve the water dispute in the Jordan River basin and establish
an "international regime" that would oversee the distribution and management
of the water among the riparians. In 1953-55, 1976-81, and 1987-90, the
United States government was engaged in trying to secure an agreement:
among all four riparians on the first occasion, among all except for Lebanon
on the second, and between Israel and Jordan on the third. In the three
attempts, outcomes fell short of the objectives; it was clear that in the
absence of a political settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict, the parties
were not going to come to an agreement 3.
It is
important to note that by virtue of the Middle East peace process that
was initiated in 1991 the status quo in the Jordan basin is in flux. Indeed,
until B. Netanyahu came to power in Israel, a water resources working group
was meeting regularly, under the auspices of the multilateral track, and
a peace treaty was signed between Israel and Jordan in 1994. While that
treaty lays out an agreement on sharing and managing water resources, it
is not a basin-wide agreement: not only are Syria, Lebanon and the Palestinians
not signatories of the document, there is absolutely no mention of them.
Nonetheless, continued progress in the peace process holds out hope that
a basin-wide agreement may eventually be reached.
The
situation with regard to the groundwater sources of the West Bank is equally
complex. About one-half of Israel's annual supply of groundwater and one-quarter
of its total renewable supply of fresh water originate in two subterranean
basins in the West Bank. Those waters flow naturally across the "Green
Line" (the 1949 Armistice Demarcation Line) into Israel. Moreover, by virtue
of its occupation of the West Bank, Israel has been controlling water use
in the territory. The result has been that approximately eighty percent
of West Bank water is exploited in Israel and by Israeli settlers in the
territory, leaving only twenty percent for the Palestinian population.
No doubt, negotiations on the final status of the occupied territories,
if that stage is arrived at, would have to consider arrangements for the
distribution and management of this precious resource.
ENDNOTES
1. See John Kolars and William A. Mitchell, The Euphrates River and the Southeast Anatolia Development Project (Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1991).
2.Wadi refers to a valley, river, gully, or riverbed that remains dry except during the rainy season.
3. See Miriam R. Lowi, Water and Power: The Politics of a Scarce Resource in the Jordan River Basin (Cambridge University Press, 1993/95).
4. See Stephen Lonergan and David Brooks, Watershed: the Role of Fresh Water in the Israeli- Palestinian Conflict (Ottawa: International Development Research Centre, 1994); Miriam R. Lowi, "Bridging the Divide: Transboundary Resource Disputes and Their Resolution," in Contested Ground: Security and Conflict in the New Environmental Politics, eds. Daniel Deudney and Richard Matthew (Albany: State University of New York Press, forthcoming).
5. For further
elaboration of this argument and for evidence from both the Indus and the
Jordan River basins see, Lowi, Water and Power.
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I'm always reminded by a quotation from Shakespeare's Hamlet when he says
the greatest lesson in life is to realize that fools are sometimes right
and I come here as a fool today because I am not an expert on that subject
and I think Dr. Maksoud invited me to demonstrate that fools are sometimes
right. I would like to start as a fool by saying I disagree with
what has been almost a unanimous agreement in the discussions yesterday.
I heard a lot about the importance of political will in the resolution
of water crises. I don't believe at all that political will is the
solution. In fact, it is the problem. The Americans, the American
speakers particularly, can afford the luxury of making such a statement
because when political will is supported by political power, yes, that
statement becomes a very pleasant thing to say but coming from a part of
the world where political will has always been used against rights and
what's right and what should prevail, I regret to say that we shouldn't
leave the solution of water problems to political will. We have two
good examples. Turkey and Israel, where political will means the
will of power and the dictation of what they think is to happen although
I'm sure deep inside Israel knows, so does Turkey, what they consider to
be right is not right. It's just because they have the muscle and
they can afford to impose it on the region. Obviously, that goes
for many other areas of the world so therefore to want to claim that it
is unfortunate that this agreement, very long awaited, the convention on
water courses has been finally voted for in the UN Assembly, but it is
the wrong place to vote it because that again is an organization where
political will is being used against market system. It should have
gone to the WTO where another important product - oil - just like water,
has been omitted from the agenda of the world trading system and that is
a subject in which I'm an expert. I cannot claim expertise on the
subject of water, but as an expert on the World Trade Organization and
the world trading system, I say we have a very serious deficiency in the
world order by excluding the two most important commodities - oil and water
from the multilateral trading system, intentionally, I claim. It
is not an accident and it's not an oversight obviously. Therefore,
I claim that the only solution to the problems of water is to involve the
marketplace mechanism into that product because it is just a commodity
and it is a much more valuable commodity. In one of the studies the total
output of the Litani River alone is equivalent to the total product oil
production of all the OPEC countries. The total production of OPEC
countries in a year is equivalent to the value of water that runs out of
the Litani on the assumption that one liter of water equals one dollar.
That is very indicative that we have a vary valuable market product that
has to be put to the mechanism of the marketplace and that has to be controlled
by an organization that has teeth and that applies the principles of most
favored nation which is not the case of the UN. It's the only organization
that we know of today - world global organization- that says most favored
nation principle should apply, the national treatment should apply and
the market access should apply and those rules of the world marketplace
as governed by the world trade organizations are what is needed to put
some discipline into the water and I will reserve some further comments
on the subject at the end of the speech. Just wanted to provoke you and
to say that I disagree with you and I'm very happy and I make no apology.
Thank you.
I
think it's very shameful that the world is starting now to talk about water
when it has become a very serious human problem. The amount of development
and investment in other fields like information technology and communication.
If it was put to the water resources that we are in would have been much
different. I think it is also unfortunate that the US is neither
and importer nor an exporter of water because otherwise it would have pressed
for a multilateral agreement on water like it is pressing now for electronic
commerce which is dealt with in cyberspace and cyberspace has become all
more important no than the everyday water because it is an issue which
is of importance to the USA which I fully understand. But who owns
the water? That question has never been addressed before and I think our
distinguished speakers have touched on this and I think we need to look
at the basic question of who owns the water - government, user, private
investor, citizens- who owns the water? I think that's a question
that has to be defined and Mr. Bisson and Mr. Duff tried very successfully
to put a private sector approach to the ownership of water not just the
propriety of the state and what rules apply to water? We have also
anther question. Professor Elver very truly said that the problem of water
is not that of shortage or crises, it's a problem of agreement on the sharing
of the water, but what rule? What discipline? We do not yet have a discipline.
WTO is an organization of discipline. The UN is not especially when
it comes to commodities and products and we have also heard from our distinguished
speakers that water is an economic product so it should be governed by
the World Trading Economic Discipline. We lack a discipline that would
control. We have it in oil, not a multilateral agreement, but a discipline
that would control oil - a trading discipline that controls the production
and marketing of oil. Water is, in my mind, just a product like oil
and it should be subjected to the same rules of the game. Now privatization.
I think we have a problem here too because how can you expect the private
sector to become a partner and to become interested if the rules of market
economy do not apply. If you continue to say that this is a product
of strategic importance - government owned, government controlled - we
have a problem. We have to define the business aspect of this product.
It can become a private product if there's cooperation and if there are
rules laid between the private and public sector as Mr. Dell'Atti has explained
that there's a possibility of cooperation between the two if you define
the rules of the game. As an accountant, I've always learned that
if you can't measure it, you can't manage it. This is the problem
with water. There's no measurement. There are no rules that
apply to the measurement of the value of this commodity. We always
look at it as the Turks do and as the Israelis do, as a political commodity
and not as an economic one. Political commodity is what we heard
now is how useful it is to the people in the southern part of Iraq, but
that is a political and social dimension but the economic value of that
product is always ignored and is always given a second place. I think
that we need a global discipline. I think that place for it is the
WTO and that can be done with protection. I am an NGO. I think like
an NGO and I'm not ignoring the social dimension but I say the social dimension
will be protected better by a discipline that treats this commodity as
an economic one and that handles it the same way we're handling equally
important commodities, like wheat which is controlled under the WTO.
Medicine is. We have agreements which regulate and control the ownership
of the rights of pharmaceuticals which are just as important for human
life. I don't agree that we should continue to look at this commodity
as a political one because that serves the countries that have the power
to use it and to implement their interests through arm-twisting than through
a global discipline.
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