Iraqi Academic Association in UK held a two day meeting 2-3 July 2016 in
London UK. The subject of the meeting was “Defending Iraq’s Water”
I could not attend the meeting so I sent them the letter hereunder.
Sirs,
I was an adviser to two successive governments in Iraqi Kurdistan (2010-15)
during which time I repeatedly raised my concerns over the seriously decreasing
water levels in the Tigris and Euphrates. It is well known that Iran dammed or
diverted 23 rivers, streams and creeks that entered Iraq along its border from
the North to the Shat Al Arab. This had a disastrous effect on all agriculture
along the eastern side of Iraq, particularly fruit orchards, not to mention
water supplies to villages and towns and the salinity of the Shat Al Arab
waters.
I am sorry to say that my words fell on deaf ears and no politician In
Baghdad or Erbil raised the issue with Iran, while Iran is happy to sell Iraq
the products of Iranian agriculture and thereby have a control over Iraq's food
security.
To intensify the growing problem of Iraq's water supplies the Turks are
building numerous dams across the Tigris and Euphrates, matters which I have
raised on my blog, www.iraqswaters.com/.The latest dam they
are building is the Ilisu dam across the Tigris which will be equivalent in
size to the Rennaissance dam that the Ethiopians are constructing across the Blue
Nile river. These dams will both hold back around 8 - 10 billion cubic metres
of water and while the Ethiopian dam is some 50 Km from the Sudanese border the
Turkish dam is the same distance away from the Iraqi border.
The difference between these two dams is that the Ethiopian enterprise
has caused uproar in Egypt and threats to bomb the dam as it will threaten
their vital water supply. However there has been no reaction in Iraq other that
some petitions from non government organisations in Baghdad which have been
ignored. Officially, in Iraq, the responsibility for water, lies with the
Minister for Foreign Affairs. Following the fall of Saddam the ministerial post
was held by Hoshiar Zibari for almost 11 years but I have never met him, even
in my capacity of KRG adviser for food security and water, nor have I heard of
him talking about water. His successor was Mr Ibrahim Jaffari who, on
television, revealed his ignorance on the sources of the waters entering Iraq!
Although I was a KRG adviser I had to privately arrange to take part in
meetings, arranged by the Blue Peace organisation, which took place in the
House of Lords, London, and at the head offices of the Zamman newspaper in
Istanbul. That newspaper has now been closed down by Erdogan. In both meetings
I had newspaper cuttings, in Arabic and English, plus photographs showing dried
up river beds. I raised the issue, which I think you need to consider in your
meeting, that Turkey had offered to sell 1.6 million hectares of agricultural
land (equivalent to 6.4 million Donums) in south east Turkey to the Gulf
States. This land would be supplied by the waters that Turkey would remove from
their dams on the Tigris and Euphrates and thereby depriving Iraq, and Syria to
a degree, of the water their agriculture and people depended on. Both these
meeting were attended by a large number of Turks, including ex-Ministers and
people at director level. All of these people reiterated the slogan that Turkey
has used for the last three decades 'Water is a commodity that can be sold.'
These are very dangerous words, especially for Iraq but also for all human
life, and violate human rights. I produced evidence that Erdogan's Minister of
Finance, Mohamed Shamshek, and his Minister of Agriculture, Mehdi Ecare, had
been shuttling back and fore between Ankara and the Gulf States to broker a
deal. This was reported in the Gulf newspapers and on the internet yet there
was no response from Iraq. During the Istanbul meeting the Turkish Director
General for Water questioned the validity of my data and suggesting that I was
exaggerating the figures. He stated, in front of all those present, that I
could not be trusted as the figure of 1.6 million hectares was wrong because
Turkey had only been offering 1.2 million hectares to the Gulf States! His
statement resulted in laughter from his audience which included editors from
the Iraqi newspapers, New Sabah, New Kurdistan, Sabah and Meda and it was
reported in Iraq.
These encounters led to me being excluded from further meetings to avoid
embarrassing the Turkish contingent while my full reports to the Prime Minister
in Erbil were left to gather dust.
While nothing is done Iraq’s water supplies are drying up and the water
table of the land is dropping. The fertile crescent is fast diminishing
and the time will come when dry river beds are all that is left of the great
rivers of Iraq.
Please keep me informed and I do not mind if my letter was read in your
meeting.
Wishing you all the best and a successful meeting.
