YEREVAN, Armenia — Throughout the past year or two, the American University of Armenia (AUA) Acopian Center for the Environment has taken on the task of understanding regional water resources and their environmental, social, political, and economic sustainability implications. The following is a brief account by Alen Gasparian Amirkhanian, director of the AUA Acopian Center, on what the Center has done throughout this time and his views on the prospects for regional cooperation.
Building Epistemic Bridges on Water in the Kura-Araks Basin
By Alen Gasparian Amirkhanian
The main water basin of the South Caucasus, the Kura-Araks Basin, is under real threat from climate change, poor water use practices, and an acute lack of transboundary cooperation. To varying degrees, all five Kura-Araks Basin countries — Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Iran, and Türkiye — will be impacted, threatening the Basin’s economic, social, and environmental prospects.
Water diplomacy and its potential benefits have not been adequately pursued over the 30+ years since the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The reasons for this are many and include the territorial conflicts in the region; lack of diplomatic relations between Armenia and two of its neighboring countries; and lack of political will on the part of Basin countries to think about a cooperative, integrated water resource management, taking into account regional interests.
Notwithstanding, there has been bilateral cooperation between countries, e.g., Azerbaijan and Georgia, Azerbaijan and Iran, Armenia and Türkiye, and Armenia and Iran. There is also an emerging transboundary water cooperation prospect between Armenia and Georgia. None, however, has yet emerged between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
It is surprising for some to hear that one of the global best practices in bilateral agreement implementation is the one between Armenia and Türkiye. According to the agreement, both countries jointly monitor water quantities in the Akhuryan (Arpacay) and Araks (Aras) rivers. Turkish and Armenian engineers meet regularly, measure quantities, and agree on the estimates with both sides officially accepting the results. The rivers’ water is then split in half between the two countries. This system has been in place since the early days of the Soviet Union and has worked regardless of the political ups and downs between the two countries.
As laudable as the success of this joint monitoring is, it focuses only on water quantity. No assessment of water quality is made. Moreover, per their agreement, Armenia and Türkiye split the water available at the border, leaving it fully open for both countries to build dams and reservoirs upstream preventing water from flowing to the border. The agreement has no provision to ward against this.
In general, the bilateral agreements in the Basin are not designed to meet the climate, water overuse, and water pollution challenges the region faces, and certainly not in a regionally integrated manner. Without dialogue, diplomacy, and agreements in this area, transboundary water may become yet another destabilizing factor in the region. While the lion’s share of the burden for initiating and sustaining such a regional dialogue is on the governments of the Basin countries, non-state actors (businesses, civil society, universities, etc.) also have a role to play. Academics, in particular, have a critical responsibility in this regard. They should offer the research basis and dialogue platforms in and between their countries, openly and critically exploring ideas and solutions.
Over the past two years, the AUA Acopian Center has taken on the challenge of preparing itself to meaningfully engage in regional dialogue on water issues. In early 2024, the Center completed a Political Economy Analysis of Armenia’s Water Sector for the USAID Improved Water Management Program currently being implemented in Armenia by Deloitte Consulting. More recently, the Center also commenced another study for the same USAID program, conducting a high-level policy impact assessment of Armenia joining two international water conventions. Armenia is already a signatory to the Water and Health Protocol of one of these conventions (the so-called “Water Convention”), though the Protocol has not yet been ratified by Armenia’s National Assembly. The study will look at the benefits and risks of Armenia joining either or both of the international conventions on water.
A challenge for academic institutions in Armenia researching transboundary and regional water issues in the South Caucasus is that there are few regional scientific networks and social infrastructures that can support such research. There has also been little academic attention paid to the Kura-Araks Basin. Reviewing the academic literature on water governance and transboundary water relations, it is glaringly obvious that little is written, and voices from Armenia, in particular, are missing. This is a significant gap.
I have participated in several regional academic and civil-society dialogues over the past two years on water and climate vulnerability discussions, supported by the EU4Dialogue and United States government programs, joining colleagues from all countries in the South Caucasus, as well as some events in which participants from all five Basin countries were present.
One of these initiatives, spearheaded by Dr. Farhad Mukhtarov, assistant professor of governance and public policy at the International Institute of Social Studies (ISS) of the Erasmus University Rotterdam at the Hague, was “Advancing EU Water Diplomacy in the South Caucasus.” More than 12 academics and practitioners from all five countries of the Kura-Araks Basin gathered in Tbilisi, Georgia from April 3-5, 2024 to discuss transboundary water relations and water diplomacy in the Basin.
This gathering led to the establishment of the South Caucasus Water Academics Network (SWAN), which consists of water management experts from the Basin countries and water experts from partner institutions in Finland, the Netherlands, Turkiye, and the U.S. The network is expected to grow over time.
A follow-up online meeting took place on May 2 to discuss the major outcomes of the inaugural workshop in Tbilisi and prepare for new events and activities. SWAN members will gather regularly to discuss joint activities, such as writing grant proposals together, co-supervising student projects and theses, and conducting joint research, advocacy, and awareness raising. Two follow-up events already took place in June in the Hague, supported by USAID’s South Caucasus Regional Water Management (SCRWM) program.
The first of these was a workshop, titled “The Water–Conflict Nexus and Diplomacy: The Case of the South Caucasus,” which was hosted at ISS on June 18, 2024. The experts in the workshop included Shahana Bilalova (from Azerbaijan, completing her Ph.D. in Germany and starting her post-doc in the Netherlands); Dr. Lasha Nakashidze (from Georgia, with USAID SCRWM); Dr. Jeanene Mitchell (from the U.S. with USAID SCRWM); Bota Sharipova (from Kazakhstan, currently completing her Ph.D. in the Netherlands and working at IHE Delft Institute for Water Education); and myself.
The conversation focused on water governance and diplomacy, linking regional insights to global security and cooperation. During part two of the event, a simulation-based discussion on reflexive practice was held with participants from the South Caucasus and the water sector in the Netherlands. The session was chaired by Dr. Mukhtarov.
The second event was a conference panel on June 21 titled “Third-Party Engagement in Water Diplomacy and Governance: The Case of the South Caucasus.” Part of the Third International Conference on Environmental Peacebuilding in the Hague, the panel discussed the issues in the South Caucasus in the global context of water diplomacy, governance, and peacebuilding. The panel attempted to link the broader contemporary discussions and scholarship around third-party-driven water governance and diplomacy and the challenges in the region of the South Caucasus.
Presentations covered expert opinions on donor-funded projects and third-party water diplomacy efforts from the vantage points of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia. Amirkhanian presented on Water Governance and Diplomacy in the Kura-Araks Transboundary River Basin: Understanding the Challenge. Dr. Nakashidze, presenter, USAID South Caucasus Regional Water Management Program, Georgia, spoke on Political Economy Insights on Regional Cooperation and Environmental Diplomacy. Dr. Mukhtarov presented on Third-Party Actors in Water Diplomacy and Governance in the South Caucasus: A Critical Review. Dr. Mitchell, of the USAID South Caucasus Regional Water Management Program, presented on Confidence-Building in the South Caucasus through Environmental Dialogue Initiatives. The panel was co-chaired by Drs. Mukhtarov and Mitchell.
The AUA Acopian Center will continue to deepen academic ties regionally. We are already looking into joint grant proposals, where more Center researchers will be involved in regional cooperation. We are also working on co-supervising student projects and producing joint publications — in sum, building epistemic bridges. The younger generation of academics and professionals from all the Basin countries must be guided to become part of building these bridges, essential for improved social and economic connectivity in the Kura-Araks Basin. It will be a long journey, wrought with complexities. But what is the alternative?
The AUA Acopian Center for the Environment, a research center of the American University of Armenia (AUA), promotes the protection and restoration of the natural environment through research, education, and community outreach. The AUA Acopian Center’s focus areas include sustainable natural resource management, biodiversity protection and conservation, greening the built environment, sustainable energy, as well as information technology and the environment. Visit http://ace.aua.am.
