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The Water Diplomat - Hydropolitics News and Intelligence

The Water Diplomat seeks to mainstream water news at the intersections between water, peace and security.

We provide free news and intelligence resource produced in collaboration with many partners in the water sector.

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International Water Law and Transboundary Water Cooperation

26 Aug 2024

Supporting Effective Transboundary Governance: A Multilevel Approach

In a publication launched during the 2024 World Water Week, IUCN has compiled the achievements and lessons learned during 15 years of implementation of its Building River Dialogue ...

5 Sep 2024

1st Limpopo Joint Basin Survey marks acceleration in Transboundary Water Cooperation

On the 6th of August, the Limpopo Watercourse Commission (LIMCOM) announced the commencement of the 1st Joint Basin Survey (JBS) for the Limpopo River Basin (LRB). The survey is ex...

21 Aug 2024

UN System Wide Strategy on Water and Sanitation Launched

Following the various commitments made at the 2023 UN Water Conference, stakeholders gathered at the UN High-Level Political Forum in New York on July 16, 2024 at the special “SDG ...

26 Jun 2024

Zimbabwe holds historic national workshop for the accession to UN water conventions

Anational workshop for the accession to global water conventions was held on the 17th and 18th of June 2024 at Rainbow Towers Conference Centre in Zimbabwe as the country inches cl...

1 Jul 2024

Progress in Cooperation on the Senegal-Mauritanian Aquifer Basin

Progress is currently underway to ensure an appropriate legal and institutional format for the joint management of the Senegal-Mauritanian Aquifer Basin (SMAB), a crucial transboun...

5 Jul 2024

Up Close and Personal:

A publication by Dr Kathleen Rugel in the journal Water International has highlighted the importance of face to face interactions in obtaining consensus among a diverse group of wa...

5 Jul 2024

Waters rising in the Northern Aral Sea

In January 2024, Kazakhstan took over the 3-year presidency of the International Fund for Saving the Aral Sea (IFAS), a sea considered lost until a few years ago. As is the case...

Water in Armed Conflict and other situations of violence

3 Sep 2024

Call to Action

Under the banner “Bridging Borders: water for a peaceful and sustainable future”, the 2024 edition of the World Water Week (25 to 29 August) was centred on water cooperation and se...

3 Sep 2024

Oxfam releases report on weaponisation of water in Gaza

On the 18th of July, Oxfam published a new report on the topic of water in situations of armed conflict, entitled “Water War Crimes: How Israel has weaponised water in its military...

28 Jun 2024

Norwegian Refugee Council lists displacements in Burkina Faso as world’s most neglected crisis

On the 3rd of June, the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) published its annual report of the world’s most neglected displacement crises. In the wake of a conflict that has been ragin...

4 Jun 2024

Launch of Global Alliance to Spare Water from Armed Conflict

In his 2023 annual report on the protection of civilians in armed conflict, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres notes that during the year in review, «Conflict ... […] .. trigger...

28 May 2024

Water point in Mauritania refugee camp

According to a UNICEF flash update published in mid-May, there are currently some 180,000 refugees present in the Hodh Ech Chargui region of eastern Mauritania, and this number is ...

2 May 2024

Research report provides interim overview of effects of war on water and health in Gaza

On the 24th of April, the Geneva Water Hub published a report on the effects of war induced damage to water and sewage services on public health in Gaza since the 7th of October 20...

Knowledge Based, Data-Driven Decision Making

6 Sep 2024

TFDD Explorer

On August 27 at Stockholm World Water Week, the Shared Waters Lab Partnership – a collaboration between Oregon State University, the Fletcher School at Tufts University, and IHE-De...

5 Sep 2024

Study into groundwater levels in southwestern Europe demonstrates surprising resilience

A study into multi-decadal groundwater observations published in the journal Nature in July 2024 by an international team of researchers has yielded results that show surprisingly ...

5 Sep 2024

UN Water publishes new SDG 6 country acceleration studies : the case of Cambodia

In the context of UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres' Decade of Action to accelerate progress towards the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030, a SDG ...

28 Jun 2024

GloWAL Network

The first coordination meeting of the Global Water Analysis Laboratory Network (GloWAL) took place in Vienna between the 18th and 20th of June 2024. This network was launched in Ma...

3 Jul 2024

WMO’s 2024 Hydromet Gap Report Highlights Early Warning Needs for Less Developed Countries and Small Island States

On the 18th of June, the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) released its Hydromet Gap Report 2024, highlighting some of the key hydrological knowledge needs of 20 least-develo...

26 Jun 2024

At a time when two billion people globally are experiencing varying degrees of water stress as a result of climate change, but also of the increasing anthropogenic pressures on wat...

26 Jun 2024

Groundwater quality assessment guidelines published

On Monday June 3, 2024, Friends of Groundwater, a group working within the World Water Quality Alliance announced the publication of new guidelines for groundwater water quality as...

16 May 2024

Lessons in future river basin management from the last three decades:

In an article published in the journal Water International, practitioners from the International Network of Basin Organisations and the International Office for Water have reviewed...

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Finance for water cooperation

6 Sep 2024

WaterWorX: The role of Water Operator Partnerships in leveraging finance for SDG 6 objectives

The Twelfth Session of the World Urban Forum (WUF) convened by UN Habitat will be held in Cairo, Egypt from 4-8 November 2024. The return of the WUF to the African continent after ...

28 Aug 2024

Drilling for water Comoros

The Green Climate Fund is contributing U.S. $ 41.9 million towards a project in the Comoros Islands which is designed to increase the climate resilience of water supply for drinkin...

6 Sep 2024

Revolving Fund Transforms Rural Water Supply in Yobe State Nigeria

In rural Nigeria, Action Against Hunger (ACF Nigeria), in partnership with the Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Agency (RUWASSA) has pioneered a Revolving Fund which is transformi...

5 Jul 2024

Interview with Bapon Fakhruddin, Water and Climate Leader, Green Climate Fund

Interview with Bapon Fakhruddin, Green Climate Fund Tobias Schmitz: The Water Resilience for Economic Resilience Initiative argues that in these times of climate change, water ...

27 Jun 2024

Tanzania invests heavily in water infrastructure to meet 2030 targets

In February 2021, the Africa Water Investment Programme (AIP) was adopted at the 34th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of Heads of State and Government of the African Union in Addi...

17 May 2024

World Bank Publication

A new World Bank report released on the 6th of May presents a global overview of spending in the water sector, noting that there is a significant gap between spending needs and act...

6 Jun 2024

Improving agricultural water use efficiency to increase climate resilience in Jordan

The Green Climate Fund (GCF) is supporting a project in Jordan aimed at increasing agricultural water use efficiency as a means to increase climate resilience in vulnerable regions...

3 May 2024

Green Climate Fund invests in increased resilience for rural communities in rural Ethiopia

The Green Climate Fund is currently entering the final phases of a project to increase the drought resilience of rural communities in Ethiopia who are facing risks in their water s...

National and Local News

30 Jul 2024

Source: Adnan Abidi/Reuters

India is currently facing a severe environmental crisis as extreme heatwaves and water scarcity threaten the well-being of millions. This summer, India recorded an all-timehigh tem...

22 Aug 2024

Lesotho advances with sanitation coverage but faces wastewater management challenges

Access to sanitation in Lesotho has improved markedly over the past decade, while there have also been recent challenges in ensuring effective collection and treatment of wastewate...

20 Aug 2024

The Strengths and Weaknesses of Water Governance for Water Security in Finland

In a recent publication in the International Journal of Water Resources Development, researchers have presented the results of their studies into the current water governance syste...

1 Jul 2024

Murray-Darling Basin Authority responds to Stakeholder Consultations

Australia is among the countries in the world that is most affected by climate change, and this has a powerful effect on water resources availability and variability. The Murray-Da...

3 Jul 2024

Pesticide Action Network study highlights widespread PFAS pollution of waterways in Europe

Perfluoroalkyl and Polyfluoroalkyl Substances (PFAS), otherwise referred to as ‘forever chemicals’ are currently present in all European waterways. These are the findings of study ...

13 Jun 2024

Wildfire season in Pantanal wetland on track for record ecosystem damage

By the 9th of June, the number of fires burning in the Pantanal wetland are almost an order of magnitude larger (935% higher) than for the same period last year. Between the 1st of...

6 Jun 2024

Water pump South Sudan

On the 3rd of June, The President of South Sudan, H.E. Salva Kiir Mayardit, signed the country’s Heads of State Initiative Compact on Water and Sanitation to ensure universal acces...

6 Feb 2024

Rand Water Board Executive Killed at Community Event

Teboho Joala, an executive member of South Africa’s Rand Water Board, was shot dead in full view of hundreds of primary school children on the 29th of January. The incident took pl...