Iraq destroys Kuwait desalination plants
During the Gulf War, Iraq destroys much of Kuwait’s desalination capacity during retreat.
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UN considers cutting river flow to Iraq
Discussions are held at the United Nations about using the Atatürk Dam in Turkey to cut off flows of the Euphrates to Iraq.
Hungary and Czechoslovakia dispute over Danube
Hungary abrogates a 1977 treaty with Czechoslovakia concerning construction of the Gabčíkovo–Nagymaros project based on environmental concerns. Slovakia continues construction unilaterally, completes the dam, and diverts the Danube into a canal inside the Slovakian republic. Massive public protest and movement of military to the border ensue; issue taken to the International Court of Justice.
US destroys Iraq water systems
During the Persian Gulf War, Allied Coalition forces damage Baghdad’s modern water supply and sanitation system”intentionally and unintentionally. “Four of seven major pumping stations were destroyed, as were 31 municipal water and sewerage facilities in Baghdad”resulting in sewage pouring into the Tigris. Water purification plants were incapacitated throughout Iraq” (Arbuthnot 2000). Following the damage, the New England Journal of Medicine reports that, during the first eight months of 1991, childhood death in Iraq increases by 47,000 and the country’s infant…
Violence over use of India’s Cauvery River
Violence erupts when Karnataka, India rejects an Interim Order handed down by the Kaveri Waters Tribunal, set up by the Indian Supreme Court. The Tribunal was established in 1990 to settle two decades of dispute between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu over irrigation rights to the Kaveri River.
Iraq, Syria mobilize troops over drought tensions
As upstream dams are filled during a low-flow year on the Euphrates, Iraqis claim that flow reaching its territory is “intolerable” and asks the Arab League to intervene. Syrians claim they are receiving less than half the river’s normal flow and pull out of an Arab League technical committee formed to mediate the conflict. In May Syria closes its airspace to Iraqi flights and both Syrian and Iraq reportedly transfer troops to their mutual border. Saudi Arabia successfully mediates the…
Turkey’s Ataturk Dam a weapon of war?
The flow of the Euphrates is interrupted for a month as Turkey finishes construction of the Atatürk Dam, part of the Grand Anatolia Project. Syria and Iraq protest that Turkey now has a weapon of war. In mid-1990 Turkish president Turgut Özal threatens to restrict water flow to Syria to force it to withdraw support for Kurdish rebels operating in southern Turkey.
Iraq uses water to silence opposition
To quell opposition to his government, Saddam Hussein reportedly poisons and drains the water supplies of southern Shiite Muslims, the Marsh Arabs, or Maʻdān. The marshes of southern Iraq are intentionally targeted. The European Parliament and UN Human Rights Commission deplore use of water as weapon in region.
Yugoslavian army destroys dam
The 65-meter high Peruča Dam on the Cetina River was Yugoslavia’s second-largest hydroelectric facility before the country’s breakup with the Croation War beginning in 1991. On January 28, 1993, Serbian/Yugoslav army forces detonate explosives at the dam in an attempt to wipe out Croatian villages and the port city of Omi’. A successful Croation counter-attack allows military engineers to reach the dam and release water on time to prevent it from bursting, saving an estimated twenty- to thirty-thousand civilians. Credit…
Israel attacks Jordan water works
Israel destroys the Arab diversion works on the Jordan River headwaters. During Arab-Israeli War Israel occupies Golan Heights, with Banias tributary to the Jordan; Israel occupies West Bank.