Turkish official calls for settling water disputes with Damascus, Baghdad

A Turkish official stressed on Sunday, on the sideline of the world forum on water currently being held in the Hague, the need of reaching an agreement between Turkey and its neighbors in the south, Syria and Iraq, with the aim of sharing the waters of the Tigris and the Euphrates rivers.

The director of the Turkish water projects, Dogan al-Tinblik, said in a statement to the AFP on the sidelines of the forum which has been taking place since Friday and will continue for six days with 3,000 participants that, "An agreement should be reached. It is not possible to separate between the Tigris and the Euphrates," the two rivers which meet and constitute a water passage of a 100 km length in "Shat al-Arab" (the Arab Coast), southern Iraq.

The senior Turkish official said, "Turkey had proposed a plan of three phases: first, to define the agricultural lands in each of the three countries, then to evaluate water resources, including the water flow, dams and channels for irrigation and then to partition the waters," according to debated measures.

Turkey, however, refuses to give water shares demanded by Syria, due to seasonal and climatic changes.