Water,as,an,Instrument,of,Peace

时间：2022-09-05 11:15:05 来源：千叶帆本文已影响人

　　FOR a number of years the prob- lems of water have been placed high on the lists of global risks. The basic picture is frighteningly familiar： Today， about two billion people lack access to safe drinking water and most of them live in impoverished， often violent regions of the world. Experts agree that by mid-century， close to four billion people – about 40 percent of the world’s population – will live in water stressed basins. This number is likely to grow when the projected effects of climate change lead to diminished crop yields， while triggering floods and other weather extremes causing further deterioration of water quality. This will surely exacerbate the situation of food security as well as increase displacement of vulnerable groups of people. The ingredients for violent conflict are all there.
　　As seen in some of the contemporary armed conflicts， water resources and infrastructure often become objects of deliberate armed attack or a weapon of war. The experience of armed conflicts in Syria， Iraq， Libya， Yemen and， earlier， Somalia and Darfur all brought great suffering to civilian populations deprived of water in war.
　　Water has to be protected in wars and water projects have to be part of the path to peace. Stable peace in Syria will have to include water management arrangements for the Euphrates as well as a vision of water cooperation for the Mesopotamian region as a whole. Is such a development conceivable？ It should be. Peace agreements of the past， from the peace of Westphalia in 1648 to the post-conflict peace building in the Balkans two decades ago， have time and again confirmed the importance of water cooperation for the sustainability of peace.
　　It is in the time of peace when more must be done to address this issue. Water is a shared resource. States sharing rivers， lakes， and underground aquifers have every reason to cooperate. However， international water cooperation has not progressed sufficiently. There are 286 shared water basins in the world， involving 146 states， but only 84 among these basins have joint water management bodies. The situation of underground aquifers is even more worrisome. There are less than 10 agreements on the trans-boundary cooperation relating to aquifers today. Clearly， much needs to be done in the future.
　　Looking at the existing peaceful trans-boundary water cooperation one can clearly see the advantages of many of the existing models in every region of the world. In Africa， cooperation on the Senegal River， involving Guinea， Senegal， Mali， and Mauritania， has in the four decades of its existence proved beneficial to all four participating countries and has given rise to some of the most sophisticated forms of cooperation and financing of joint water projects. In Europe， the experience gained on the rivers Rhine， Danube， and their tributaries for almost two centuries represents an important element of peaceful cooperation. In the Americas there are many successful trans-boundary water arrangements – both in the North and Central America as well on the Southern Cone. In Asia， the Indus Waters Treaty has been a welcome success in the otherwise strained relations between India and Pakistan. Meanwhile the Lancang-Mekong cooperation has helped the countries of South East Asia while the more recent involvement of China offers new opportunities for expanding benefits for the people of the riparian countries in agriculture， energy generation， environmental protection， and， most fundamentally， eradication of poverty.

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Water,as,an,Instrument,of,Peace

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