"If the wars of the twentieth century were fought over oil, the twenty-first century will be the subject of contention as the water."
In the Middle East, along the Nile, across Africa, Asia, India, Latin America and even in the United States are being currently more than 50 conflicts among states for its water-related causes.
The Indian scientist Vandana Shiva spoke about it in his book: "Water Wars."
Many of the conflicts centered on resources, such as water, are hidden, they are disguised: who controls the power prefers to pass the water wars or the hoarding of commodities such as oil, gold, diamonds ... as if they were ethnic, tribal, religious conflicts for security against terrorism ...!
The most "emblematic" of these conflicts is the one between Israelis and Palestinians, a conflict based on their possession of natural resources: land and water.
Certainly the "water war" in this case is the consequence and not the cause of the dispute between Israel and Palestine.
In fact, Israel receives two-thirds of its water from territories conquered by the "Six Day War" in 1967.
The Israeli settlements in these occupied territories have been located so as to control the sources of water: the result is that there is Palestinian, the average consumption of 150 cubic meters per capita per year, while that of Israeli settlers up to 800 mc.
It is not a coincidence that in Israel the water under the Ministry of Agriculture, in Palestine by the Israeli Ministry of Defense.
In May 2005 in Ramallah, Palestine, was held an international conference on the theme of the right to water.
The legal philosopher Danilo Zolo, present at the conference, he explained that the problem of water:
"The Israeli aggression on the Palestinian people's right to use its water resources is one of the most effective instruments of political oppression and social discrimination.
Values such as life, social security, health is seriously threatened by Israel's withdrawal from Palestinian water resources and the heavy restrictions imposed on the Palestinian population.
The restrictions have been decided by military orders that have banned Palestinians from building or owning a water system without a permission of the Israeli military.
Have also been set quota sampling, were expropriated from Palestinian wells and springs absent., While the water billing penalizes the Palestinian population, whose standard of living is much lower than that of Israeli citizens. Overall 85% of Palestinian water is now used by the Israelis.
The conflict over water is only one aspect, though among the most important, the struggle for the liberation of Palestine.
Does not solve the water problem if not solved, together, to the establishment of a Palestinian state, its full independence. "
For many years, there remains a great tension between Turkey - on the one hand - and Iran, Iraq and Syria - on the other - with regard to the basins of the Tigris and Euphrates, in the land we know as the "Mesopotamia," the cradle of of civilization ...
The basins of the Tigris and Euphrates
A trigger it was Turkey's decision to promote "the Great ProgettoAnatolico", building a system of dams to boost irrigation and electricity generation.
This project puts Turkey in the hands of a great power: to "turn off the taps" while in fact hostage Iraq and Syria not to intervene on the Kurdish issue.
In addition, the sending of the army in those areas, with the excuse of protecting sites, is used to control militarily the lands inhabited by the Kurds their own.
The dams, have always been one of the most symbolic of the technological domination of man over nature.
Not only are they a source of conflict between states, but also within the same state.
Worldwide, there are currently 19,000 dams over 30 meters high, 45,000 if you consider a height of up to 15 meters.
But the nature and history have also demonstrated, sometimes dramatically, the fragility and limitations of these great works, so that the dams are now classified as "major technological risks", like a nuclear power plant or industry dangerous chemical.
As you highlight aspects of "grandeur" of such works, the financial costs are usually unspoken, social and ecological.
For this they were born in these years the movement of opposition to the construction of major projects:
India managed to stop the implementation of the project of the Narmada valley, funded by the World Bank, which provides 30 large dams, 135 medium and 3,000 small dams along the Narmada River and its tributaries.
In India, the construction of large dams has already led to the transfer of about 50 million people.
(The movements of opposition to the construction of "large dams", were able to block the construction of the dam).
In China, even 10 million residents were forced to evacuate for a single dam in the Three Gorges of the Yangtze valley.
According to the Italian geographer Teresa Isenburg the Three Gorges Project is a gigantic unparalleled: the dam will have a height of 185 meters, the length of two kilometers and create a water basin of 64,000 square kilometers, almost three times the Piedmont.
Pharaonic really work! ( It was inaugurated on May 20, 2006)
The World Commission on Dams has recognized that too often "was an unacceptable price paid by the people evacuated from the communities who live in the valley by the specter of dams, by taxpayers and by the natural environment. Arundhati Roy, Indian writer of international renown , complained that this situation:
"Large dams are for the development of a nation what nuclear bombs are to its military arsenal.
Both are weapons of mass destruction.
Both are tools that governments use to control their own people.
Both are emblems of human intelligence that has overtaken their survival instinct.
Both are malignant indications of a civilization that has turned against itself.
Represent the breaking of the bond between human beings and the planet they inhabit.
Disrupt the logic that connects eggs to hens, milk to cows, water to rivers, air to life and the earth into existence "
In fact, large dams help the multinationals in both the construction phase and in the operational phase and, finally, in the enjoyment of the benefits, because the drastic modernization of local agriculture sent to hell for millions of small farmers who are still working with traditional methods, making them desperate rush in suburban areas where they live in misery.
The agricultural products thus obtained is exported, while subsistence farming is wiped out, and the lives of millions of people in a short time become the "screw loose".
Vandana Shiva in the introduction to his book Water Wars, stigmatized with words of fire, this global system of exploitation:
"The forcible removal of resources to the population is a form of terrorism - terrorism business.
The 50 million Indians displaced from their homes flooded by the dams during the last forty years are also victims of terrorism - have suffered the terror of technology and destructive development.
Destroy the resource and forest basins and aquifers is a form of terrorism. Deny the poor access to water privatizzandone distribution or polluting wells and rivers is also this terrorism.
The terrorists are not only those who take refuge in the caves of Afghanistan; some are hiding in the halls of the boards of multinational companies, behind the free market rules imposed by the World Trade Organization, which deny millions of people the right to a sustainable livelihood.
Greed and the appropriation of the planet's precious resources that belong to others are at the root of conflicts and the root of terrorism.
The lifestyle of 20% of the world population uses 80% of the planet's resources effectively expropriate the remaining 80% of its fair share of resources and will eventually destroy the planet.
We can not survive as a species if greed is privileged and if the economy of the greedy sets the rules on how to live and die "
Source: staged reading of Ercole and Fabrizio De Giovanni Ongaro "H2ORO"
In China, even 10 million residents were forced to evacuate for a single dam in the Three Gorges of the Yangtze valley.
According to the Italian geographer Teresa Isenburg the Three Gorges Project is a gigantic unparalleled: the dam will have a height of 185 meters, the length of two kilometers and create a water basin of 64,000 square kilometers, almost three times the Piedmont.
Pharaonic really work! ( It was inaugurated on May 20, 2006)
The World Commission on Dams has recognized that too often "was an unacceptable price paid by the people evacuated from the communities who live in the valley by the specter of dams, by taxpayers and by the natural environment. Arundhati Roy, Indian writer of international renown , complained that this situation:
"Large dams are for the development of a nation what nuclear bombs are to its military arsenal.
Both are weapons of mass destruction.
Both are tools that governments use to control their own people.
Both are emblems of human intelligence that has overtaken their survival instinct.
Both are malignant indications of a civilization that has turned against itself.
Represent the breaking of the bond between human beings and the planet they inhabit.
Disrupt the logic that connects eggs to hens, milk to cows, water to rivers, air to life and the earth into existence "
In fact, large dams help the multinationals in both the construction phase and in the operational phase and, finally, in the enjoyment of the benefits, because the drastic modernization of local agriculture sent to hell for millions of small farmers who are still working with traditional methods, making them desperate rush in suburban areas where they live in misery.
The agricultural products thus obtained is exported, while subsistence farming is wiped out, and the lives of millions of people in a short time become the "screw loose".
Vandana Shiva in the introduction to his book Water Wars, stigmatized with words of fire, this global system of exploitation:
"The forcible removal of resources to the population is a form of terrorism - terrorism business.
The 50 million Indians displaced from their homes flooded by the dams during the last forty years are also victims of terrorism - have suffered the terror of technology and destructive development.
Destroy the resource and forest basins and aquifers is a form of terrorism. Deny the poor access to water privatizzandone distribution or polluting wells and rivers is also this terrorism.
The terrorists are not only those who take refuge in the caves of Afghanistan; some are hiding in the halls of the boards of multinational companies, behind the free market rules imposed by the World Trade Organization, which deny millions of people the right to a sustainable livelihood.
Greed and the appropriation of the planet's precious resources that belong to others are at the root of conflicts and the root of terrorism.
The lifestyle of 20% of the world population uses 80% of the planet's resources effectively expropriate the remaining 80% of its fair share of resources and will eventually destroy the planet.
We can not survive as a species if greed is privileged and if the economy of the greedy sets the rules on how to live and die "
Source: staged reading of Ercole and Fabrizio De Giovanni Ongaro "H2ORO"
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