Turkey offers to build a dam, pipe water to Cyprus and give Greek Cyprus any water left over - Yeah, Yeah

Southern (Greek Cyprus) has severe problems with water - exacerbated with the influx of tourists in the summer and the need for crop irrigation in the early spring.

A plan to ship water in tankers from Greece has fallen apart in a shambolic and predictable chaos and restrictions on dometsic users have been widely ignored, so pools are filled, cars, dogs ,washed and extra tanks installed.

Now there is a fairly unbeleivable story that (currying favour in a fit if Eu-ism) Turkey will collect water in a dam and ship it in a submersible 80+ km pipeline to the parched island.

It will take 3 years to build the Alakopru Dam on Dragon Creek in Anamur town of the Mediterranean province of Mersin (a project first mooted in 1998) with the declared aim of pumping 75 million cubic meters of water yearly to the island, 15 of which will be used as drinking water and the rest for irrigation.

The Turkish State Minister Kursad Tuzmen said project design works would be finalized next year. "This project will be implemented to help TRNC (Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus) fight drought and carry out irrigated farming," Tuzmen was quoted as saying by the state-run Anatolian Agency.

The annual capacity of this uncosted and only partially planned pipeline is said to be more than the amount needed by the Northern Cyprus. Since the planning phase, it has been suggested that the surplus could be offered to the southern Greek Cypriot area as a goodwill gesture to speed up the peace process.

See The Cyprus Problem

1,619 persons who disappeared are still missing. These persons, 993 soldiers and 626 civilians, amongst them 112 women and 26 children under the age of 16, have been missing since the Turkish invasion of Cyprus in 1974 and as a direct consequence of it. Most of these persons were arrested by Turkish soldiers and were known to be alive in the occupied area or in detention in Turkey long after the cessation of hostilities. Despite the adoption of a number of United Nations resolutions and the establishment of a Committee on Missing Persons in 1981, the fate of the 1,619 missing persons has not yet been ascertained because of obstacles put forward by the Turkish side and because of lack of any cooperation on its part.

See : Friday, March 28, 2008 Cyprus - inaction, a building boom, lack of investment ... droughts, lead to predictable water shortages / rationing see also Monday, November 05, 2007 Cyprus remembers theft by Turks of Christian relics from ocupied churches in Christmas Stamps.

If this projects even starts, never mind completes Lord Patel will show his arse in Woolworths window... who have incidentally rejected an offer from madman Malcolm Walker of Iceland - the shares closed 6.65 pence a share on Friday = market value of £97 million. They sold 4 stores in June to waitrose for £22.5 Mn . Shares Closed Monday 7.36 p up 0.71 p = +10.68%