Washington, July 11 (IANS) Although the international debate on Pakistan’s growing water insecurity has largely centred on India’s upstream position, that narrative overlooks a deeper and more longstanding reality. Despite inheriting one of the world’s largest contiguous irrigation systems, decades of inadequate domestic planning, chronic underinvestment and weak water governance have steadily undermined Pakistan’s long-term water security.
“When India placed the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) in abeyance following the April 22, 2025, terrorist attack in Pahalgam, much of the international commentary portrayed the decision as the weaponisation of water. That interpretation, however, mistakes the consequence for the cause. The Indus Waters Treaty was never merely a legal instrument allocating the waters of six rivers between two nuclear-armed neighbours. It was an ambitious political compact built on a far more valuable commodity than water itself: trust,” Dimitra Staikou, a Greek journalist and lawyer, wrote in ‘Pressenza – International Press Agency’.
According to the expert, India’s actions in the years that followed underscored the exceptional nature of the political commitment towards the treaty. She noted that despite repeated wars, military confrontations by Pakistan and its sponsorship of major terrorist attacks against India that reshaped bilateral ties, New Delhi continued to implement the treaty without suspending or violating it.
“The agreement remained intact through the wars of 1965 and 1971, the 1999 Kargil conflict, the 2001 terrorist attack on the Indian Parliament, the 2008 Mumbai attacks, the Uri and Pulwama attacks, and numerous other periods of heightened tension. Few international agreements have demonstrated comparable resilience under such sustained geopolitical pressure. The Indus Waters Treaty became widely celebrated precisely because it appeared capable of surviving where virtually every other aspect of India-Pakistan relations had failed,” Satikou detailed.
She stated that India’s move to place the treaty in abeyance following the April 2025 Pahalgam terror attack marked the culmination of a prolonged strategic reassessment, rather than a sudden departure from six decades of policy.
“Whether one agrees with that interpretation or not, the issue now extends beyond the allocation of river waters. It raises a broader question about the relationship between international law and interstate conduct: can an agreement negotiated in an era of goodwill continue to operate unchanged when the political conditions that sustained it have been fundamentally transformed?” Staikou asked.
She argued that discourse surrounding the Indus Waters Treaty should extend beyond the simplistic narrative of “weaponising water”.
Highlighting Pakistan’s repeated breaches of bilateral trust, Staikou said, “The more consequential question is whether any international agreement can remain indefinitely insulated from the broader conduct of the states that are party to it. For sixty-five years, the Treaty endured because both India and Pakistan, despite wars, crises and deep political differences, recognised that preserving one channel of cooperation served a larger strategic purpose. Today, that premise is under unprecedented strain.”
–IANS
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