Catastrophic decline of Euphrates River water level

CAIRO – 6 May 2021: Since the beginning of May, catastrophic scenes of tremendous decline in water level of Euphrates, the longest river of Western Asia, became a meme on social media platforms.

 

Under hashtag #الفرات_ينحسر (the Euphrates declines), Syrians posted photos of the water level of the river, showing how parts in along the river inside the Syrian lands dried up.

 

 

#الفرات_ينحسر #نهر_الفرات#نهر_الفرات_ينحسر pic.twitter.com/mlk6xeybBP

— Rukeya Muslim (@RukeyaMuslim) May 5, 2021

 

The Euphrates runs from Turkey to Syria and then to Iraq until it joins the Tigris in Shatt Al Arab in Iraq.

 

The Syrian regime accused Turkey of depriving Syrians of their water share of the Euphrates river, saying electricity production at the Euphrates Dam stopped and water level in Lake Al-Assad, the Syrian state-owned news agency SANA reported on Wednesday.

 

Over the past ten days, Turkey reduced the water flow to Syria from 500 to 200 cubic meters per second, suspending electricity production at the Euphrates Dam and led to a decrease in the irrigation ad drinking water, besides a remarkable depletion of Lake Assad, SANA said.

 

Hundreds of thousands of civilians living in the Euphrates Basin in the city of Al Jazeera are vulnerable to and humanitarian catastrophe.

 

Autonomous Administration of Northeastern Syria, which controlled by Kurds, announced that the water level at Lake Assad declined by three meters, Syrian news online Enab Baladi reported on May 3.

 

As per 1987 Protocol on Economic Cooperation between Syrian and Turkey, the annual 16 billion cubic meters of Euphrates River (500 m3/s) should to be released at the Syrian-Turkish border for five years. In 1990, Syria and Iraq signed an accord per which 42% and 58% were allocated to both countries, respectively.