Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ishaq Dar on Thursday warned that India was pursuing what he described as a strategy of 'hydro-hegemony', saying that at least 17 projects, including reservoir and river diversion schemes, were designed to alter the Indus river system drastically.
In April last year, following a deadly attack on tourists in the Indian-occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK), India unilaterally suspended the Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) after accusing Pakistan of backing the attackers — a charge Islamabad categorically denied. The treaty has since remained at the centre of renewed tensions between the two neighbours over the sharing of transboundary water resources.
Addressing the Brussels Conference on 'Transboundary Water Resources: A Weaponised Global Common', Dar said India's actions went beyond rhetoric and posed a challenge to the IWT framework.
'It is important to underscore that our concerns are not merely based on Indian statements,' he said. 'India has followed up its belligerent statements with illegal actions; these include projects to create reservoirs such as Sawalkot, Kirthai, Kwar etc; the expansion of existing structures such as Baglihar and Salal; and, most alarmingly, diversion projects on the Indus, Chenab and Ravi rivers.'
'In total, at least 17 such projects that will drastically alter the river system as a whole, giving India the tools for 'hydro-hegemony' that it so desires,' he added.
The deputy prime minister said the conference was timely as it brought together experts to discuss climate change, water resource management and the political dimensions of transboundary water governance.
'Shared resources require cooperative management through agreed frameworks; otherwise, competing interests can turn them into sources of conflict and weaponisation, as increasingly seen today,' he said, adding that peaceful coexistence depended on respect for treaties, agreements and multilateral frameworks.
Referring to the Indus Waters Treaty signed between Pakistan and India in 1960, Dar said Pakistan had consistently upheld the principles of the UN Charter and remained committed to resolving disputes through the treaty's legal framework.
'The treaty envisages the peaceful resolution of disputes within its own framework,' he said, noting that it had survived three major conflicts and several other challenges over the decades.
FM Dar said Pakistan had previously raised concerns over certain Indian actions under the treaty but had always pursued available legal mechanisms. 'We sought settlement through international mechanisms and respected decisions even when they fell short of our expectations,' he said.
Criticising India's unilateral suspension of the treaty, Dar said abandoning established legal frameworks could not be considered a responsible course of action. 'Responsible states act within established legal frameworks rather than abandoning them,' he said. 'And yet, today, we find ourselves confronted with precisely such a challenge.'
The foreign minister said rivers were not merely waterways but lifelines carrying historical, cultural and economic significance. 'The stated policy of our eastern neighbour to intentionally deprive 240 million people of their rightful access to water represents a catastrophe in the making, of unparalleled magnitude.'
He stressed that water should never be used as a means of coercion. 'It is a shared resource, a common responsibility, and ultimately a prerequisite for human dignity and sustainable development. The future of transboundary water governance must therefore be anchored in cooperation and respect for international law.'
Dar said the issue should not be viewed solely through the lens of South Asia, arguing that respect for treaties formed the foundation of the international order. 'The sanctity of treaties is the bedrock of the international order,' he said.
Reiterating Pakistan's position, the foreign minister said the country remained committed to resolving disputes peacefully. 'Pakistan remains committed to resolving all issues through dialogue, diplomacy, and the mechanisms provided under international law,' he said. 'Our position is guided not by confrontation, but by the conviction that lasting solutions can only emerge through cooperation and respect for mutually agreed obligations.'
Linking the issue to climate change, Dar said Pakistan was confronting the water challenge at a time when it ranked among the world's most climate-vulnerable countries, despite contributing less than one per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions.
'This is a moment that calls for enhanced international cooperation and collaboration on water-related issues,' he said.
Dar urged participants to draw lessons from the Indus Waters Treaty while examining experiences from other regions. 'Let us reaffirm today that shared waters should unite nations rather than divide them, and that cooperation, not coercion, must remain the guiding principle of transboundary water governance,' he concluded.
