Iraq’s strategic environment and geopolitics

Transboundary water as a geopolitical factor, beyond service delivery

By Ali Zuweid · 19 October 2026 · 10 min read

English translation published 19 October 2026. Read the Arabic original.

In a statement issued on 16 October 2026, Türkiye’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs placed water alongside the Development Road, energy, infrastructure and security among the areas in which it expected cooperation with Iraq to accelerate. The statement contains no new water commitment or specified flow, but it shows that water is being discussed within a broad political and economic relationship. Turkish foreign ministry statement For Iraq, this raises a practical question: how can water’s prominence in diplomatic meetings become a reliable supply on which a farmer, a treatment plant and a city can depend, even when rainfall falls or relations become strained?

The problem is not a choice between negotiating with upstream countries and reforming domestic management. Iraq needs both, but each produces a different result. A distribution network can be repaired without increasing inflows across the border; an additional release can also lose part of its benefit through poor timing, pollution or the absence of a fair allocation rule. In my view, strategic assessment must follow the entire sequence, from a decision outside the border to a service within it, and identify which part of the damage is connected to each decision. Otherwise, responsibility becomes an exchange of accusations that advances neither negotiation nor reform.

Water volume does not describe the whole risk

On 20 January 2026, the United Nations in Iraq published a note reporting that water reserves had fallen to approximately four billion cubic metres before the flooding episode it discussed. This is an estimate for a period preceding publication, not a measurement of reserves in October. Water scarcity and climate risks note The succession of scarcity and flooding shows why water security cannot be reduced to the presence of water over a whole year. Institutions must manage the differences between what arrives, what they can store and what is needed when it can be used.

I therefore propose examining water dependence through three connected dimensions: available volume, arrival time and quality at the point of use. Two situations may have the same annual inflow but different agricultural losses if water arrives after a sensitive stage of crop growth. Flows may rise without improving drinking-water services if pollution continues after the water enters Iraq. These are analytical examples, not findings from a new national measurement exercise. Their purpose is to identify the data a decision requires, rather than judge an agreement by a single aggregate figure.

This also changes the meaning of bargaining power for a downstream state. Its ability to control what happens beyond its borders is limited, but it can reduce surprise through monitoring and forecasting, documenting harm, and negotiating advance notification and an operating plan subject to review. Shared data do not remove conflicting interests; they narrow disagreement over what actually happened. Before asking another party to explain a particular decline, Iraq should distinguish the effects of rainfall, storage and different uses as far as possible, while stating the limits of its knowledge. A claim that exceeds its evidence can weaken a legitimate Iraqi demand.

Law provides a framework, not a ready-made release schedule

Iraq joined the 1992 Convention on the Protection and Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes in March 2023. The step provided an institutional framework for cooperation and the exchange of experience; it did not itself create a new numerical allocation for Iraq. Accession announcement The Convention’s secretariat explains that obligations arising under it do not automatically extend to relations with a non-party, while customary international law remains relevant. Explanation of the scope of obligations The legal basis of each relationship must therefore be established rather than assuming that Iraq’s membership binds all its neighbours to the same text.

The 1997 UN Watercourses Convention brings together equitable and reasonable use, appropriate measures to prevent significant harm, cooperation and data exchange. Relevant considerations include states’ needs, dependent populations and available alternatives, rather than a country’s location on a river alone. Articles 5–9 of the Convention My reading of these principles is that Iraq’s negotiating case needs evidence of need and harm, alongside an implementable proposed solution. Repeating the language of water rights is insufficient without identifying the right grounded in a particular treaty, the legal rule invoked, or the available dispute-resolution procedure.

This requires distinguishing between the kinds of documents being signed. Türkiye’s foreign ministry records the signing, on 2 November 2025, of a mechanism for financing projects under the water cooperation agreement with Iraq, describing its purpose as rehabilitating and developing Iraqi water infrastructure. Official bilateral relations record Signing a mechanism to finance projects is not evidence of a commitment to release a specified volume in a specified season. Infrastructure rehabilitation may be valuable in its own right, but it requires assessment separately from water-sharing arrangements so that an agreement is not credited with provisions its text does not contain.

Linking issues can expand opportunities for agreement when both parties identify benefits they can deliver and verify. It also creates a risk if an urgent need for water leads to a long-term economic commitment whose cost is unclear, or if all technical cooperation becomes contingent on a dispute elsewhere in the relationship. I propose keeping warning, measurement and vital-needs protections as stable as possible, while defining investment commitments through distinct projects, costs and responsibilities. This would allow Iraq to cooperate while retaining the ability to establish what it has received and what it has undertaken to provide.

What can the Rio Grande experience teach?

In November 2024, the United States and Mexico adopted Minute 331 through the International Boundary and Water Commission. It introduced tools for making water deliveries earlier within the five-year cycle under the 1944 treaty, including some time-limited pilot measures. The Commission’s announcement of Minute 331 Adoption does not establish that shortages or disputes ended. What it establishes is that an existing treaty did not remove the need to develop timing and implementation arrangements as scarcity intensified.

The experience differs from the Tigris and Euphrates basins in its parties, rules and institutional history. Its allocations and cycles cannot therefore serve as a numerical template for Iraq. Its organisational principle can, however, be tested: agreement on a distant aggregate is insufficient if arrival times remain uncertain. Users need periodically updated inflow expectations and must know when plans will be revised and who will explain deviations. Such flexibility requires defined rules so that exceptional circumstances do not become a permanent justification for suspending commitments.

As a negotiating proposal, a drought protocol could specify public indicators for identifying a dry year, a timetable for exchanging measurements, and consultation procedures when forecasts change. It should explain how shortages are shared, how vital needs are protected and what is subject to joint verification. Importing a ready-made percentage from another river would overlook differences in climate, storage and uses. In my view, success should be measured by fewer surprises and avoidable losses, rather than the number of committee meetings alone.

External capacity also depends on sound domestic accounting

One potential mistake is to assume that purchasing modern irrigation technology automatically saves water across the whole basin. The Food and Agriculture Organization explains that lower withdrawals at a field can coincide with reduced return flows previously available to another user; it presents an example in which consumption rises following a switch to drip irrigation. FAO: Real Water Savings in Agriculture This is not an argument against irrigation modernisation. It is a reason to measure net consumption, return flows and crop productivity, instead of equating the number of devices distributed with the volume saved.

If technical improvement enables the cultivated area to expand without controlling total use, the programme’s intended result may change. I therefore propose linking support for modernisation to verifiable water-use accounting at project and basin levels, while protecting farmers’ incomes during the transition. Greater domestic efficiency does not mean abandoning a legally grounded external claim; it prevents that claim from becoming confused with financing avoidable waste. It also helps government compare the cost of obtaining additional water with the cost of recovering benefits lost from available resources.

The Iraqi Constitution provides a basis for connecting the two levels. Article 110 assigns policymaking for water originating outside Iraq to the exclusive federal powers, while Article 114 treats the formulation and regulation of internal water-resource policy as a shared competence. Articles 110 and 114 Federal negotiators consequently need consistent data from domestic institutions, and local administrations need allocation plans they can rely on. The text does not resolve every implementation dispute, but it helps explain why a successful negotiating mission is insufficient if Iraqi institutions continue to work from contradictory estimates.

I propose that the ministries of water resources and foreign affairs prepare a regularly updated negotiating dossier, with participation by agricultural, environmental and health institutions, the Kurdistan Regional Government and relevant governorates within their respective responsibilities. It should combine inflow and quality measurements, seasonal needs, the effects of shortage scenarios, and alternatives with their costs. An aggregate periodic statement could be published while protecting sensitive data and enabling results to be reviewed. This is a proposed measure, not a description of an established, fully functioning system. Its value lies in connecting the diplomatic case to information usable in adjusting domestic policy.

The immediate implementation priority is to select a clearly defined pilot area for monitoring and allocation and demonstrate improvement before extending claims of water savings. Plans should be revised when expected inflows do not materialise, and the basis for choosing between uses should be disclosed while protecting vital needs and the right to challenge decisions. This connects to the question of the Shatt al-Arab and Iraq’s maritime access, where water quality and the functions of a place intersect. Water crossing the border serves more than one purpose, and each decision must account for its effect on the next user.

Iraq will remain a downstream state even if it improves every instrument available to it. It can nevertheless change how much uncertainty it bears, the precision of its demands, and its ability to protect people when inflows fall. That is the geopolitical effect that can be measured: a more predictable external relationship and a state capable of turning the water it receives into fair, dependable benefits. Neither a cooperation statement nor an equipment purchase will establish that this has happened. The evidence will appear in the season when information, water and decisions arrive before scarcity becomes an irreversible loss.

Ali Zuweid — Researcher in strategic affairs and national security