Turkey’s seizing water causes draught in northeast Syria regions
MANBAJ, Syria (North Press) – The water situation of the dam has been so bad and closest to drought, as Turkey continues to seize the water of the Euphrates River, Hammoud Hamadin, official at Tishrin Dam, northern Syria, said on Thursday.
The lake of Tishrin Dam has been more like a stream after it had exhausted its entire reservoir, Hamadin added.
He warned of a “humanitarian disaster” with the summer coming, as a result of the drinking water cuts, food insecurity in the areas along the banks of the river, the inability to irrigate crops, and the power cut-off.
The official at Tishrin Dam pointed out that “international and humanitarian organizations and UN institutions have not responded to our demands; to push Turkey to re-pump water, which threatens about seven million people with drought and thirst.”
The water storage level in the Lake of Tishrin Dam was 325 m³, but it has decreased to 321 m³, according to Hamadin.
Tishrin Dam is located 20 km southeast of the city of Manbij, northern Syria, and is the second largest hydroelectric station in Syria after the Euphrates Dam in Tabqa.
The nominal level of the Euphrates Dam Lake is 304 m³, and it is now 298.90 m³, which means a decrease of five meters over an area 80 km².
For more than three months, Turkey has limited the flow of the Euphrates into Syria, depriving large numbers of people of usable water. Turkey reduced the flow of water from the Euphrates River into northeast Syria’s dam gradually, reducing the amount of water received to unprecedented lows.
Turkey keeps water in six dams, the largest of which is Ataturk Dam, the second largest in the Middle East, with a storage capacity of 48 billion m³, violating the international agreement they signed with Syria in 1987 which stated that Syria’s share of water coming from Turkey is 500 m³ per second.
The water flow to the Euphrates River is now limited to less than 200 cubic meters, according to the General Administration of Dams in Northeastern Syria.