Lessons on cooperation building to manage water conflicts in the Aral Sea Basin; Technical documents in hydrology: pc-cp series; Vol.: 11; 2003

2.3. Legal Basis 
Water relations need a new interstate and national legal basis, because the rivers in 
the region are now transboundary resources. Independence and the transition to a 
market economy also require new juridical regulations. The Central Asian states 
responded quickly to the need for a new legal basis for water allocation and 
management. On September 12 1991, the water ministers of five countries declared 
that joint water resources management would be established on the basis of equity 
and mutual benefit. To overcome the inherited inter-regional water problems and 
minimize ethnic tensions, the five Central Asian countries signed an interstate water 
agreement on February 18 1992. Under the terms of this agreement about water 
resources management in the Aral Sea Basin, water allocation was to be based on the 
existing use of water resources, and the two river basin authorities should continue to 
perform basin management under the control of the Interstate Commission for Water 
Coordination. All the water resources of the region (surface, underground, and 
drainage) are classified into either transboundary (interstate) resources, which are 
located on the territory of two or more countries, or national ones, located on the 
territory of one country and not interacting with transboundary water courses. 
Each state has the right to manage the national resources on its own territory 
and also part of the transboundary water (within limits agreed with other countries) 
providing it does not damage the resource. The Aral Sea and its deltas have been 
defined as an independent water consumer that has its own water quota. 
Transboundary water is in the common ownership of all the countries and its 
development, protection, and use are to be carried out on the basis of interstate 
agreements by the inter-regional bodies, in response to national requirements and 
regional interests.
20 

---

Existing documents do not ensure proper water use and control. This is due to 
the fact that the existing framework agreements do not cover all the issues of joint 
transboundary water management in Central Asia. Water flows to the Aral Sea are not 
secured, emergency conditions are created, and water use is still inefficient. 
Therefore, legal protocols should be developed to improve joint water use in the Aral 
Sea Basin. 
Specific issues are related to national water laws. The original water law of the 
five countries was based on the principles of Soviet water law, but national legal 
regulations have developed in steadily different ways and directions. The most 
market-oriented legislation is found in the Kyrgyz Republic and Kazakhstan. They 
separated issues related to WUAs from water law, while Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan 
have preserved state regulations that create many obstacles to the implementation of 
market mechanisms. Discrepancies in national legislation create various conflicts with 
international water regulations at the interstate level. For example, a special law of 
the Kyrgyz Republic requires other countries to pay for water that the republic exports 
to them.