Iulia Trombitcaia
Environmental Affairs Officer, United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE)

"The majority of the States which are currently Parties to the Water Convention had already joined the Convention prior to the past decade. In the past 10 years the focus has been on implementation. Transboundary water agreements were concluded for many rivers and basins that lacked them (e.g. the 2010 agreement between the Russian Federation and Azerbaijan on the Samur River). In other cases, second generation agreements were negotiated to broaden existing cooperation (e.g. the 2012 agreement between the Republic of Moldova and Ukraine on the Dniester River, or the 2010 transboundary water agreement between the Russian Federation and Kazakhstan). The programme of work under the Water Convention has matured to include many new areas, for example the work on quantifying the benefits of transboundary water cooperation and the assessment of the water-energy-food-ecosystems nexus. The Convention also strengthened implementation of integrated water resources management at the national level through a programme of National Policy Dialogues.

The Convention is an important forum for States and other stakeholders involved in transboundary water cooperation. In recent years, with the global opening of the Convention for participation by all United Nations Member States, numerous non-UNECE countries participated in and contributed to the activities under the Convention. So the meetings under the Convention now have much broader participation with a larger spectrum of experience presented and stronger opportunities for the exchange of knowledge and for networking than was previously the case.

The main achievement has been the impact on the ground where the Convention provided the legal framework for developing transboundary water cooperation. In many cases, the Convention’s institutions facilitated concrete legal, technical and practical assistance to establish transboundary water agreements and joint institutions. The major successes of the Convention include the advancement of the integrated approach to transboundary water management, based on the basin (catchment area) approach. The Convention actively promoted cooperation on both surface and groundwaters. Among the successes, I would also mention the Convention’s work on adaptation of water management to climate change. Although climate change is not even mentioned in its text, the Convention provides the framework for Parties to address jointly this challenge from the policy point of view and to share their experiences in this area.

When countries negotiated the Convention in the early 1990s, they asked United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) to provide the secretariat. The secretariat serves the Parties: it acts upon decisions of the Meeting of the Parties and under the guidance of the Bureau. The Parties, together with various partners, draw up and implement the programme of work. The secretariat helps them in these efforts.

In 2013, the amendments opening the Water Convention to participation of countries from all over the world entered into force. The amendments will soon become operational and that will enable countries from outside the UNECE region to become Parties to the Convention. The global opening represents a great opportunity for the Convention to increase its contribution to international water law and the promotion of transboundary water cooperation at the global scale. The global opening also means a number of challenges – the Convention would need to prove its relevance to the various conditions worldwide and its responsiveness to address emerging issues. As a global instrument, the Convention is also expected to support the reaching of the post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals.

Better implementation can be achieved through targeted assistance in those basins which are facing difficulties in developing cooperation. In this regard, it is important that the Convention as a framework is used not only by countries and the secretariat but also by intergovernmental organizations, NGOs and other actors in their efforts to promote cooperation in specific basins. Also, better understanding of the importance of transboundary water cooperation by decision makers at all levels would contribute to better implementation. In this regard, the recognition of the role of transboundary cooperation for integrated water resources management in the future Sustainable Development Goals would be an important breakthrough.

The Convention requires Parties to solve all disputes about its interpretation and application in a peaceful way. If a dispute arises, Parties must seek a solution "through negotiation or any other means of dispute settlement acceptable to them". "Other means" are not spelled out in the Convention’s text; however, they include mediation, inquiry, conciliation, good offices, arbitration, recourse to regional organizations and judicial settlement. In addition, the Convention suggests Parties to opt in for compulsory arbitration in accordance with the procedure provided for in its text and for adjudication in the International Court of Justice. So the most common forms of ADR – negotiation, conciliation, mediation, arbitration – are included as dispute settlement mechanisms in the Convention.

In 2012, during the sixth session of the Meeting of the Parties in Rome, Parties established an Implementation Committee. The Committee is a non-adversarial and non-judicial body aimed to assist Parties in preventing and settling disputes and differences connected with implementation of the Convention. The Committee is equipped with a range of procedures and can, in fact, provide mediation, inquiry and conciliation, as well as facilitate legal, technical and other assistance for better implementation of the Convention. Members of the Committee include both legal and technical experts with high reputation and solid professional experience.

The Convention’s Implementation Committee has a great potential to expand the use of ADR for the prevention and settlement of differences and disputes under the Convention. The Committee has recently started its work and we hope that it will be a successful mechanism to prevent and resolve water-related disputes! "