Egyptian diplomat: the right to water is fundamental human right

CAIRO - 28 September 2019: The right to water is a fundamental human right that is no less important than other rights like the right to life, which is an essential right for all human beings that is enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Egypt’s Ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva Alaa Yousef said.

According to a press release by the Foreign Ministry, in an address before a session of the International Council on Human Rights on Friday, he also said that the unsustainable exploitation of water resources in a way that deprives others of benefiting from them is an act that is inadmissible, especially while the whole world is facing a growing water scarcity problem.

The diplomat called for conducting a thorough assessment of the environmental, social and economic impacts of huge development projects which some countries build on international rivers traveling within their territory so as to avoid harming the rights of other countries that share these rivers with them and whose peoples depend on them as their main source of fresh water.

He warned that the damaging effects on the climate and ecosystems, that mega projects which some countries carry out on the watercourses of transboundary rivers should never be ignored.