Kajaki Water Dam in Kajaki, Afghanistan in Helmand Province on June 4, 2018 in Kajaki, Afghanistan. (Photo: Orbital Horizon/Copernicus Sentinel Data 2018/Gallo Images/Getty Images)
Orbital horizon | Copernicus Sentinel 2018 data | Gallo Images | Getty’s paintings
Iran and Afghanistan are going head to head for control of the supply of a key resource that’s dwindling by the day: water.
Violence along the border between the two tumultuous countries has erupted in recent weeks, fueled by a dispute over water flowing from Afghanistan’s Helmand River to Iran. Tehran says the Taliban government in Afghanistan is deliberately depriving Iran of sufficient water resources to bolster its own; but the Taliban say there is just not enough water to begin with, due to falling rainfall and river levels.
Iranian and Afghan border guards clashed on May 27, exchanging heavy gunfire that left two Iranian guards and one Taliban soldier dead and wounding several others. Each side blame the other for scary the fighting that has brought the region’s water problems back into the highlight.
The danger of destabilization in Iran
The situation threatens to destabilize an already poor and waterless a part of Iran, where there have been major protests against the authorities lately.
“The water dispute with Afghanistan is just not something Iran can take evenly,” Torbjorn Soltvedt, principal Middle East and North Africa analyst at Verisk Maplecroft, told CNBC. “Iran’s water resources are under severe pressure, and water scarcity has been the explanation for large-scale civil unrest lately.”
A Taliban fighter stands guard at the entrance gate of the Afghan-Iranian border bridge in Zaranj, February 18, 2022.
Wakil Kohsar | AFP | Getty’s paintings
In the summer of 2021, protests began in the western province of Khuzestan in Iran over water shortages and resulting power outages due to the depletion of hydropower plants. Dubbed the “Rising of the Thirsty”, the demonstrations quickly spread to several cities around Iran, including the capital Tehran, and sparked heavy government crackdowns that resulted in each police and civilian casualties.
Battling US sanctions, a severely weakened economy and ongoing anti-government protest movements, Iran is already under considerable pressure. “As authorities proceed to struggle to contain nationwide protests,” Soltvedt said, “the water security crisis in eastern Iran will come at a very bad time.”
Dangerous frontier
The 580-mile border between Afghanistan and Iran is porous and rife with crime, mostly coming from the Afghan side into Iran. Afghanistan has been stricken by instability and war, in addition to governments, for a long time The Taliban government derives much of its revenue from illegal trade.
“The Iranian Afghan border has all the time been the most vulnerable,” said Kamal Alam, a non-resident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center. It hosts “a spread of problems including drug smuggling, human trafficking and terrorism” – but at the same time it’s an especially necessary source of water, Alam said.
On this photo taken on February 17, 2022, Afghan migrants drive pickup trucks across a desert road towards the Afghan-Iranian border in Nimruz.
Wakil Kohsar | AFP | Getty’s paintings
Water tensions between the two countries date back. In the Fifties, Afghanistan built two large dams that restricted the flow of water from the Helmand River into Iran. This angered Tehran and threatened relations, eventually leading to a treaty in 1973 that allocated Iran 850 million cubic meters of Helmand water per 12 months.
Nevertheless, subsequent revolutions, invasions, wars and dramatic changes of presidency in each countries meant that the treaty was never fully implemented.
“Since the 1973 water treaty, the two have come close to war several times as various Afghan governments have used Iran’s vulnerability to water as leverage on bilateral issues,” Alam said.
Climate change and growing threats
Scientists have long warned that climate change increases the risk of wars and refugee crises as countries fight for the natural resources they need to live.
“Disagreements about water allotments for the Helmand River are hard to overcome as no country can deliver more water to the region,” said Ryan Bohl, senior Middle East and North Africa analyst at Rane. “It’s already an especially dry area, but issues like climate change and over-farming are making things worse.”
“In a way,” he said, “that is the classic driver of conflict, the competition for scarce resources that neither side can live without.”
A general view of Kajaki Dam in Kajaki, northeast of Helmand Province, Afghanistan on March 21, 2021.
Wakil Kohsar | AFP | Getty’s paintings
In mid-May, a Taliban press release expressed Afghanistan’s support for the 1973 treaty, but said: “As Afghanistan and the region have been experiencing drought lately and the water level has fallen … the provinces of the country suffer from drought and water is scarce. In such a situation, we consider Iran’s frequent demand for water and inappropriate statements in the media to be harmful.”
In response, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi told Afghan leaders to take his words “very seriously”, saying: “I warn the rulers of Afghanistan to give rights to the people in [the Iranian border regions of] Sistan and Balochistan immediately.” The Taliban commander responded by saying there was no water for Iran and warning: “Don’t attack us. We are usually not afraid.”
Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi in Havana, Cuba, June 15, 2023.
Yamil Lage | AFP | Getty’s paintings
Tehran then issued an announcement stressing that it doesn’t recognize the Taliban as the governing body of Afghanistan. The back-and-forth has only added to tensions, with some fearful that May’s border shootout might be an indication of worse to come.
Rane’s Bohl expects the problem to fester, as “water scarcity is a really complex problem that requires extensive and expensive infrastructure investments, neither of which heavily sanctioned Iran or Afghanistan can fix,” he said.
He expects the tightening between the two to proceed, in addition to continued water supply cuts to Afghanistan – bad news for an already desperately impoverished country.
This “could hurt Afghanistan’s agricultural production over time and hurt its already weak economy and worsen food shortages,” Bohl said.