Hydro-Diplomacy

This article analyzes key factors affecting transboundary water cooperation in the Brahmaputra River basin at multiple scales. The analysis of multi-track diplomacy reaffirms the potential of actor-inclusive approaches, arguing for a need to go beyond purely focusing on formal legal norms and consider the possibilities of cultural norms of informal processes of cooperation. Various ‘windows of opportunity’ exist in the current phase of the Brahmaputra basin’s development, leading to exploration of a Zone of Possible Effective Cooperation, arising from the effort to scale up multi-track initiatives as well as broader geopolitical​- economic changes happening across and beyond the basin.

ABSTRACT

After completion of the water pipeline project to Cyprus in 2017,  bulk water transfer projects to the Middle East has drown some more attention than before.Although implementation of the Red-Dead Sea Project hasn’t progressed well,  the Project has been considered as an alternative  for  bulk water transfer in the region
About 32 years ago in 1986 ,late Turkish President Turgut Özal had proposed a “Peace Water Pipeline Project” for the Midddle East water problems. The Project has drawn considerable attention and caused both negative and positive reactions.Political Feasibility and financing of the project had been argued more than it’s technical feasibility.
Preliminary studies on the project were initiated in 1986 .The ultimate aim of the Project was much beyond of the supplying  some water to the countries. The Project proposal mainly  aimed to create a process of confidence building and a cooperation environment on water that will help to contrubute to the stability and security of the region
During past  32 years after the Peace Water Pipeline Project proposed  ,  water demand has increased ,while the water management has been worse under the political and climatological effects in the region.
As many areas in the Middle East, Jordan is struggling with scarcity of rainfall, diminishing of water resources and increase in population . It is not ceratin yet if  the current water management  strategies and the suggested Red Sea- Dead Sea project will be enough to solve this problem.Therefore among the other new water resources alternatives , Turkey’s  Peace Pipeline Project proposal can be worthwile to be considered  again with different lenght and  route . 
The Original Project would divert  the water from Seyhan and Ceyhan Rivers ,both national rivers of Turkey ,to the Arab Countries in the Middle East. Daily water transfer capacity of the Project was 6 MCM  that is only a small part of mean  total daily flows of the rivers after Turkey’s use .

The water would deliver through the peace pipeline is not intented to replace,but rather supplement current water supplies in the countries served.The Project had an estimated cost of US $ 20 billion about three decades ago.
In this article ,focusing on Jordan water problems, what risks and challenges associated in the region  any alternative water transfer option  and regional innovative hydro diplomacy  is investigated.


Keywords: Peace Pipeline Project,Middle East,

The Partition of India divided the largest contiguous gravity flow irrigation system on the planet, creating a new riparian relationship between India and Pakistan over the Indus Basin. Whilst the Indus Waters Treaty of 1960 has been successful in defining the rights of the riparians over the rivers of the Indus Basin for the past six decades, new challenges such as climate change and unsustainable groundwater mining are raising water- and food-security concerns that the Treaty was neither intended to nor envisioned to deal with. Emerging regional developments, such as China’s One Belt One Road Project and the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor also challenge the fundamental regional security framework. In this paper, the emerging challenges of the Indus Basin are set against these new challenges as well as the past application of the Treaty. The review of the application of the Treaty reveals that while India and Pakistan make rights-based claims on the Treaty, they are willing to accept needs-based decisions, possibly opening new areas of consensus in trans-boundary water management. In examining this ageing Treaty’s limitations against these development, new transboundary water management challenges, and opportunities, emerge.

Transboundary river basins of the World provide vital resources for nearly half of the world’s population. This assessment shows existing and increasing risks in the majority of these basins. But there are still many controversies about ideal policies to balance water allocation or sharing benefit. Therefore, it is still an important issue that transforming potential tensions into partnerships for regional development in potential water conflicted regions. The UN Security Council recently turned its attention to the relationship between water risks and conflict within and between countries4. The pressure on the resource is increasing, many transboundary streams are still left without frameworks for joint management. Climate variability also adds a new, complicating, dimension to these dynamics.
Past experiences showed that there is a significant paradigm shift need in transboundary rivers management from classical hydro diplomacy to an innovative one.
In this article, we aim to clarify that why we need a new strategy with new language to share, new approaches, methods, new mechanisms and innovative tools to apply? To put innovative water diplomacy into action.
Keywords: Water,Diplomacy,Innovation

SUMMARY

In 2011, Together with  Ambassador (R) and Hydropolitical Academy  founding Member M. Nuri Yildirim we made a technical trip to Central Asia .In this trip 2 hours after we left Kızılorda city to reach Aral Sea , we began to witness the great damage caused to the environment by drying a lake along the dirt road. As the water was drawn from the sea, it also took away the ecological balance. Because of the strong winds in the region, salt and drugs in the vicinity of the lake spread very alarmingly, this problem was felt in the capital of Uzbekistan, Tashkent, which is 500 km away.In this article I'm looking for an answer to the question of whether the Aral  Sea will go back or not.

Keywords : Aral Sea, Environmental Disater,

An investigation was carried out to test the reliability of various commonly used sediment transport models against data from selected large alluvial rivers of Bangladesh. Another purpose of conducting the evaluation was to test the viability of a new sediment transport equation proposed by the first author. Hydrological and morphological data were collected from various organizations for the Brahmaputra, Ganges, Gorai, Surma, and Teesta rivers covering a number of years. These data were utilized to estimate the sediment load in these rivers at selected stations using the well-known sediment discharge formulae  proposed by Engelund-Hansen, Ackers-White, Van Rijn, Yang, Shen-Hung and Hossain. The performance of of the selected sediment discharge formulae was tested on the basis of acuuracy of of predicting the observed sediment dischsrge within a certain discrepancy ratio. The evaluation revealed that Hossain's equation is not only comparable with equations widely used for sediment transport functions, but in many cases, superior in terms of achievement for prediction of sediment load against data for large alluvial rivers.