Degree of Master of

Dissolution of the USSR

After the collapse of the USSR and proclamation of the Soviet republics’ sovereignty, the geopolitical situation in Central Asia absolutely changed. As the result, the Syrdarya and the Amudarya River Basins were divided between new formed co-basin countries and the river became transboundary (Libert, Orolbaev et al. 2008). Furthermore, the new Central Asian countries began to launch completely independent management systems for water and energy consumption (Muminov and Poplavskiy 2006).

CEU eTD Collection
After declaring the sovereignty, new republics, i.e. Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan signed their first regional agreement. “Agreement on Cooperation in Joint Management, Use and Protection of Interstate Sources of Water Resources” was signed in February 1992. The 1992 Agreement stated the status quo of the Soviet water allocation arrangements between the countries until new modalities for water cooperation could be agreed upon. The Interstate Commission for Water Coordination (ICWC) was launched to implement the Agreement and other various water issues related to management of the Amudarya and Syrdarya River Basins (Weinthal 2006).
It is notable that the 1992 Agreement, however, did not condition the provision of the energy supplies to Kyrgyzstan for its use over the winter, when the energy needs there are highest. As Kyrgyzstan has become short of the previously delivered winter supplies of energy from Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, it began to rely on their only readily available source of energy, i.e. hydropower (Libert, Orolbaev et al. 2008). In order to generate electricity, Kyrgyzstan actively started using its hydropower stations which are discharging large amounts of the water during the winter (Weinthal 2006).
In particular, Toktogul Reservoir², being a key element in the Syrdarya flow regulation, became the major source of the power generation after the dissolution of the USSR (Chembarisov and Shamsiev 2007). In other words, Kyrgyzstan transferred Toktogul Reservoir to power-focused regime based on huge amounts of water releases from the reservoir during non-growing period (up to 8 km³ instead of 3 km³) (Nurbaev and Gorelkin 2004).
As a result, the transition of the Toktogul reservoir to a distinctly different regime changed the water availability situation in the Syrdarya river basin. The maximum electricity generation was observed during the winter time whereas during the growing period the water releases were actually decreased that allowed accumulating water in the reservoir. Thus, downstream countries, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan faced the water shortage for irrigation purposes (Shamsiev and Chembarisov 2007).
Besides, we should mention that winter flooding became a regular threat in the lower reaches of the Syrdarya in Kazakhstan as well as common in the Aydar-Arnasay depression in Uzbekistan as the result of spillover from the Chardara reservoir³, situated in the border between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan.
Among the main negative consequences of the Toktogul regime deformation the present research is mainly focused on flooding of the Chardara reservoir and followed by water releases to the Aydar-Arnasay lakes system. Nowadays, regional cooperation between Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan in terms of the Toktogul operation is a determinative point for the future development of the AALS.

2.