Iraq warns of “Turkish plan” regarding water in Syria and Iraq
ERBIL, Iraq (North Press) – “Turkey is trying, from time to time, to weaponize water to implement its plans in the two countries of the Euphrates course in particular,” head of the Iraqi Parliamentary Committee of Agriculture, Water and Marshlands, Salam al-Shammari, said on Tuesday.
Al-Shammari warned of a decrease in the water levels of the Euphrates River in Iraq during the coming period.
“What was announced by one of the officials of the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria about the unprecedented drop in the water of the Euphrates River to more than five meters, is a serious matter and warns that the same thing will happen in Iraq,” he added.
Again, al-Shammari called on the government to “expedite the signing of an agreement with Turkey on Iraq’s share of the water of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, and to prevent Turkey from using the matter as a pressure card to implement its goals.”
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.