Damascus seeks to prevent Europe from financing US $1.6 billion Turkish dam

Well-informed diplomatic sources in Damascus said that Damascus held official contacts with Britain and other European countries over news reports that European private and governmental institutions intend to participate in financing a new Turkish dam at a cost of US $1.6 billion on the Tigris, whose waters are shared by Syria, Iraq and Turkey, after the World Bank refused to take part in its financing because the said dam "violates the UN laws concerning international waters in under disputes territories."

Syrian Information Minister Muhammad Salman has called upon Turkey to "seriously deal" with the question of waters and to "revive the mechanism of negotiations," on which the two countries had agreed in 1992 during the visit of Turkish President Suleiman Demirel to Syria, when he was then prime minister.

The well-informed sources in Damascus explained that contacts between the Syrian and British Foreign Ministries were held in light of information recently published by the British daily the Guardian which stated that London "will finance the Elzoug dam project on the Tigris, 40 miles from the borders with Syria and Iraq with the objective of setting up an electricity generation station and to irrigate lands in the Southern East of al-Anadoul."

The British daily then said that the dam will drown 67 Kurdish villages and displace 20,000 Turkish Kurds.