WATER, A NEW CAUSE FOR WAR?

Turkey aims to use water for peace. Greek Cypriots can quench their thirst with Turkish water. After the TRNC, “anybody” (meaning in fact Israel) can get water from Turkey following lengthy bargaining behind the scenes. The supply of Manavgat water to the Middle East starts any day. Syria has to go beyond lip service to solve its terrorist sheltering problem before expecting any cooperation with Turkey on the water question.

Turkey is about to begin supplying water to “anybody” who is interested in buying Turkish fresh water from Manavgat after years of investments and negotiations to solve a thorny diplomatic question – choosing between Israel and the Arabs.

This question has now become easier to handle following the Camp David developments, yet an Arab country, Libya, from whose cooperation Turkey has benefitted greatly in the 70s and 80s, is strongly objecting. The $9 billion contracting business Turkish companies carried out in Libya in the past two decades was a godsend for the Turkish economy in its transition into the free market system. It also provided the opportunity and experience for giant Turkish contracting companies to emerge in Turkey and the world. Today these companies are laying the foundations of a very promising economic alliance between Turkey and the Russian Federation which has now replaced Libya.

Turkish contractors’ experience in Libya paves the way for investments in Russia 

The difference between Libya and Russia for Turkish contractors is that the former was merely contracting services provided to another country in exchange for much needed hard currency. These services in Russia today are more than contracting services. Since 1990 they have turned into Turkish investments in Russia. The investment is made by Turkish contractors in the form of services and machinery rather than cash dollar investments. As a result, huge, billion dollar modern office blocks have mushroomed in Moscow and other Russian cities in a short time as joint properties of Turkish companies, mostly ENKA, and Moscow Municipality which provided the land and licences. There is a cordial friendship between the Mayor of Moscow, who may well succeed Yeltsin, and Şarık Tara. These modern office blocks are rented to foreign companies, primarily Americans, and the income comes to Turkey in dollars. According to the official figures of the Foreign Trade Department, Turkey receives $2 billion a year from this source. Of the 300 Turkish contracting companies in Russia 36 are the big ones doing business in dollars and handling 75% of the $4 billion contracting business currently in that country, in addition to the $6 billion which has already been completed. The other small contractors work for Rubles and they may be affected by the Russian devaluation.

The Turkish Contractors Union is now carrying out a questionnaire of how these companies are affected by the Russian crisis. State Minister Güneş Taner’s initial on the spot findings in Moscow are that there is no panic in Russia either among the local people or the over 50,000 Turks there. It is still too early to know the details of the arrangements he is making in Moscow with the new Russian rulers led by PM Chernomyrdin, but conditions seem to be very suitable for these two natural partners to cooperate.

Turkey’s know-how and resources of the free market system and Russia’s science, technology, industry and especially raw materials for energy are simply complementary. The chain of Ramstore supermarkets there plus frontier trade is an advantage for Turkish businessmen who, in turn, provide the Russian people with high quality consumer goods of the market economy, while Russian oil and especially natural gas provide Turkey with a most needed energy, without necessarily using the dollar. The elimination of the dollar, for its part, eliminates or at least reduces the ill effects of multinational speculators like Soros, without falling into the setbacks of a barter system. Time will show, however, if it is a shrewd cooperation with huge mutual benefits for the future or if there are yet unforeseen setbacks and disadvantages.

Turkish water in world markets

This Turkish-Russian economic cooperation is not only mutually beneficial economically, but it also provides Turkey with the freedom of action in its foreign policy moves. A case in point is Turkey’s finally coming out into world markets with its fresh water supplies, after decades of hesitation and wasting time with the fear of an Arab boycott or other considerations.

In the near future, the first samples of 180 million m³ /year of fresh water from the Manavgat River in Antalya will be offered to potential buyers in the Middle East. It will be two kinds, both for drinking and irrigation and the price of the water may vary accordingly.

Lengthy bargaining over this water was carried out with Israel in the past decades. Turkey preferred to make its own investments in order to be free to market the water under its own terms and prices, while Israel tried to get long-term (40-50 years) monopolies similar to the ones the Americans got from Canada.

Benefitting from Canadian experience and advice, Ankara chose the longer, but surer way of having all the trump cards by making the investment itself. At one point, Israel used as a trump card the new and cheap solar energy technologies to extract drinking water from the sea. Ankara carried out detailed experiments into this possibility and came to the conclusion that it was not possible to have plenty of drinking water through desalination methods and that Israel was using it as a factor to knock down prices. Now that Turkish-Israeli relations are blossoming a fair deal may be worked out about the price and terms of the water supply. (Issue No: 37-38)

Trial water supplies to Cyprus have begun

Meanwhile, the water needs of the Turkish Cypriots because of the salinization of the underground water on the island induced Ankara to roll up its sleeves and take the final step for putting to good use the Turkish fresh water running into the Mediterranean in vain.

With the arrangement made with a Norwegian company for the purchase of huge plastic retainers towed by tugs, the first party of 10,000 m³ fresh water arrived in the TRNC (Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus) during President Demirel’s first State visit to the island on July 24^th. This 10,000 m³ capacity plastic tanker has since been shuttling between Anamur and Northern Cyprus, but it was not enough to carry the target amount of 4.5 million m³ fresh water to the island by the end of this year. A second plastic tanker of 20,000 m³ has already arrived from Norway and was put into service on August 24^th. Three others of 30,000 m³ capacity each are on their way to Turkey as from September. Thanks to these giant retainers 7 million m³ of fresh water will be shipped to Cyprus every year as from 1999. In addition to this drinking water, a pipeline will carry irrigation water to the TRNC before long.

This water supply to the Turkish Cypriots is not commercial. No profits are expected. It is just a humanitarian activity at cost price. This year several foreign tourists left the Greek part of Cyprus due to lack of water. President Denktaş has already offered the Greek Cypriots cooperation for this strategic item of the future. This move was to prove Turkey’s intention to use water for peace, and not war as the former UN Secretary-General Butros Ghali once spoke of.

Today there is a widespread belief among Arab rulers that in future wars will not break out over land disputes, but for water. This is especially the case in the Middle East and North Africa where water supplies are very scarce. It is one-twentieth of the American water supplies on per capita basis. By offering it to the Greek Cypriots the Turkish side has shown that water can be a factor to work out peace on the island as from the new year.

Ankara turns down Damascus about water talks

Last week Syria appealed to Turkey to conduct the tripartite water talks for the Euphrates and Tigris waters. These talks by Turkey, Syria and Iraq have not been held for the last six years. They were first held on January 19^th and 20^th, 1993 at Ankara’s initiative. But the Iraqi-Syrian tension prevented it from continuing on a tripartite basis. That is why the talks continued with Syria between May 17^th and 20^th, 1993 and with Iraq on June 21^st, 1993, both on a bilateral basis. Ankara’s efforts to work out a reasonable consensus with its two southern neighbours remained abortive.

Both Damascus and Baghdad did their best, with remarkable success, to prevent international financing and technology arriving in Turkey for the dams on the Euphrates and Tigris, instead of cooperating on Turkey’s very rational and mutually beneficial water project. This caused considerable delays in Turkey’s completion of GAP, but Turkish labour, technology and financing eventually made enormous achievements in building the Keban, Karakaya and Atatürk dams. Other dams both on the Euphrates and Tigris are under development, again totally by the Turks.

Under these conditions, the Syrian offer for a tripartite conference came up last week, but Ankara turned it down by stressing that there was nothing to talk about as long as Syria continues to shelter and support the PKK terrorists. Also, Iraq’s threat to apply to the International Court of Justice over these “international waters” was dismissed by Turkey as unfounded.

Last week’s initiatives by Damascus and Baghdad came at a time when Ankara’s impatience of the continuing Syrian support of the PKK was voiced in a semi-official way by Ambassador Şükrü Elekdağ who called for every action short of war against Syria. (Issue No:33). This impatience was due to the fact that it is now better understood that the PKK terrorism will never come to an end as long as neighbouring countries breed mosquitoes in their marshes and send them to Turkey. Radio Damascus said after the successful Turkish landing in Cyprus in 1974 that Turkey had spoken in the language the imperialists understood. As Turkey’s patience is now running out it may speak the language President Assad understands. And refraining from talks on water issues is one of the first steps in that direction.

Ankara does not regard the Euphrates and Tigris as international waters, but describes them as “transboundary waters”. Consequently, international rules about international waters do not apply to them in Turkey’s eyes, especially the 1966 Helsinki Rules of the ILA (International Law Association) on The Uses of the Waters of International Waters and the 1986 Complementary Rules Applicable to International Water Resources by ILA.

The only way out of this problem is a 3-stage action plan Turkey offered to Syria and Iraq at the 1993 talks. For the continuation of these talks the atmosphere has to be ready and this means Syria deporting chief terrorist Öcalan and his band. uras@ada.net.tr, August 27^th, 1998