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

Addendum to Section 2.3.2 
Regulation of water relations in the region requires agreement of the following 
unresolved matters: 
● 
the status of organizations within the International Fund for Saving the Aral Sea 
● 
institutional strengthening of ICWC organizations 
● 
formation of regional, national, and basin information systems and exchange of 
information 
● 
water use from transboundary rivers 
● 
planning of mutual actions on the transboundary rivers 
● 
water quality and the creation of ecological sustainability in the rivers. 
The status of organizations was agreed by the Board of IFAS in 1997 and confirmed 
by the heads of state on April 9 1999. Two subsequent agreements have gone 
through a long process of negotiations. The final draft of an agreement on information 
exchange was approved at the thirtieth ICWC meeting in 2001 and submitted to IFAS 
for consideration. After long discussion of an agreement on water use (the fifth 
version prepared and discussed between states) it was decided to prepare separate 
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agreements for each basin: a draft on the Syr-Darya river has been already prepared, 
while the one for the Amu-Darya river is only at a preliminary stage. 
Basin countries need to arrange common and separate hydrometeorological and 
hydrogeological services to ensure water monitoring and forecasting, as well as free 
access to this information in real time. The costs of supporting and developing such a 
network can be distributed between countries in proportion to the water volume used 
or the ecological impact of their use of water. 
Achieving a consensus among the states in the creation of a strong regional legal 
framework is a long-term process and requires the full involvement of national 
representatives, designated by the respective governments, and the participation of 
NGOs in preparation, negotiation, and submissions to decision makers. To achieve this 
goal the ICWC at its twenty-ninth and thirtieth meetings in 2001 organized working 
groups, empowered by the countries to develop the above-mentioned agreements, 
while the IFAS Executive Committee is to approve a list of national experts appointed 
by respective governments to work on legal documents. This working group, with the