DUSHANBE: Pakistan on Tuesday called for a binding international legal framework to protect transboundary water rights, warning that existing global mechanisms had failed lower riparian states after the unilateral suspension of the Indus Waters Treaty.

Addressing the plenary session of the 4th High-Level International Conference on Water for Sustainable Development in Dushanbe, Federal Minister for Climate Change and Environmental Coordination Musadik Masood Malik said the current global water governance structure lacked effective enforcement mechanisms against unilateral actions by upper riparian countries.

Referring to the Indus Waters Treaty between Pakistan and India, Malik described it as “until recently, considered the most successful transboundary water treaty in the world,” noting that it had survived wars and decades of tensions between the two nuclear-armed neighbours.

“Last year, it was unilaterally suspended,” Malik told delegates. “The treaty did not collapse. It was revealed. It was revealed that a lower riparian country’s water rights are only as secure as the goodwill of the upper riparian state.”

The minister said Pakistan approached the institution that brokered the treaty after its suspension, but found there was no effective mechanism to compel compliance by a sovereign state.

The remarks come amid heightened regional tensions following the 2025 Pahalgam incident, after which India announced suspension of cooperation measures related to the Indus Waters Treaty framework.

Pakistan has maintained that the treaty is an internationally binding agreement that cannot be unilaterally suspended or held in abeyance.

Malik said vulnerabilities faced by lower riparian states extended beyond South Asia and affected river basins worldwide where power asymmetries shaped water-sharing arrangements.

Calling for reforms ahead of the 2026 United Nations Water Conference, he urged the international community to establish “a binding international covenant on transboundary water rights” with compulsory dispute resolution mechanisms and enforceable consequences for violations.

“We have had enough of committing. It is time to start complying,” he said.

Highlighting the broader global water crisis, Malik said nearly two billion people still lacked access to safe drinking water, while three billion faced water scarcity for at least one month annually.

He said Pakistan remained among the countries most vulnerable to climate change despite contributing less than one percent to global greenhouse gas emissions.

Referring to melting glaciers feeding the Indus River system, recurring floods and droughts, groundwater depletion and soil degradation, the minister warned that water insecurity was intensifying across the region.

Throughout his address, Malik cited the human impact of water scarcity, including women travelling long distances to fetch water, children dying from waterborne diseases and farmers losing ancestral lands to climate-related disasters.

Concluding his remarks, the minister said water must be treated as a fundamental right protected under international law.

“Water is a right. And rights require protection,” Malik said, adding that Pakistan stood ready to support stronger international cooperation on global water governance.

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