Turkey and the talks on the Syrian track

The Turkish daily Milleyet said on Tuesday that Syrian-Israeli talks were resumed on Monday with a concentration on issues of borders, security, and normalization of bilateral relations, and the paper considered these issues as closely linked to Turkish interests in the region.

The paper added that Turkey is closely following the developments pertaining to the use of water sources in the region and Syria's new military strategies, the future of the Israeli-Turkish relations and the possibility of improvement in the relations between Washington and Damascus.

The Turkish paper added that the agreement, which will put an end to hostility between Syria and Israel, will concentrate on the use of water sources in the region as it is expected that Turkey will be urged to give some of its rights in the water sources in the region and hence Ankara will be persistent on solving problems resulted from water shortage in the region by selling waters.

The paper indicated that during the Syrian-Turkish talks in 1996 Turkey felt unrest as water sources were used as an issue during negotiations between Syria and Israel, saying, "It is expected now that Syria and Israel will first settle their problems and then debate the question of water with Turkey."

The paper continued that Turkey is currently providing Syria with more than 700 cubic meters per second through the Euphrates river, a figure which is much more than the 500 cubic meter of water called for in the agreement signed between Syria and Turkey in 1987.

The Turkish paper said there are expectations that a new agreement between the two countries will set 700 cubic meters of waters per second as an average amount of water Turkey will be committed to provide to Syria.