For Afghanistan and the downstream states, the concern is that the Qoshtepa Canal, which is unlined like earlier Soviet canals in Central Asia, could result in disastrous soil salinization and alkalinization, as well as increased sedimentation of the river water. The earlier canals caused large-scale soil salinization as the groundwater levels exfiltrated to the surface through saline soil. The water pushed the salt to the surface and became salinized itself. Salinization in the region has significantly reduced the benefits of water for irrigation and drinking and is ongoing; despite efforts to reduce soil salinization in Central Asia, a study shows that it increased by about 7 percent from 1990 to 2018. In Afghanistan, salinization and alkalinization could turn fertile agricultural land or rangeland into saline land where vegetation can hardly grow due to salt accumulation on the surface. A related risk is that during dry periods, accumulated fine salt particles can be blown by wind to other regions, further harming agricultural productivity in the region. The technical challenges to building an efficient canal are many and large.

Conclusions and Recommendations

While the incoming Trump administration faces many foreign policy and national security challenges across multiple regions, a failure to engage in Afghanistan and Central Asia on water security increases the likelihood of regional instability, conflict, governance failures, and global terrorist groups using the territory to undermine broader U.S. interests. Given the rapid acceleration of glaciers melting across Central Asia, this may be the last chance to prevent ongoing environmental, economic, social, and regional security challenges from reaching genuinely catastrophic proportions. It is crucial for regional prosperity and security that the Qoshtepa Canal be constructed in a far more modern and efficient manner than it is now. In addition, Afghanistan and its key downstream neighbors, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, need to reach a multilateral water-sharing agreement. To this end, the following recommendations are in order:

1) The United States should use the opportunity presented by this critical project to engage the interim authorities of Afghanistan. This is essential to ensure the construction of a well-engineered canal that maximizes efficient water use in Afghanistan. If the United States supports the project in principle, or at least does not seek to block it, there is a higher likelihood that the multilateral development banks—like the World Bank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, and the Asian Development Bank—will support the project financially, technically, and diplomatically.

2) The United States should work with multilateral development institutions to ensure that they or other responsible actors provide the interim authorities of Afghanistan technical assistance, including consultancy services, not only for the construction of the canal itself but also for the construction of the much broader irrigation system that it will support. Afghanistan lacks enough technically trained personnel to handle the complex construction of the canal and establish a modern national water management system. 

3) The United States should convene its allies and partners to support diplomacy around regional water-sharing, including Afghanistan. At a minimum, the parties to such an agreement should include Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. There are numerous such transboundary agreements adjudicating water sharing in many river basins around the world, and their experience can help frame this new agreement.

4) Washington should also work with its allies, partners, and multilateral institutions to provide downstream states, specifically Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, with additional investment and technical assistance to improve their own irrigation systems using Amu Darya waters. International assistance is now supporting their transition to move away from raising mostly very water-intensive crops, but far more resources and effort are required. This assistance must also address regional water pricing, which is critical to promote less water use per capita. The promise of significantly increased financial and technical support also provides incentives for Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan to reach a water-sharing agreement with Afghanistan.

Some may reasonably question why Afghanistan, as an upstream state, would desire to sign water-sharing agreements with downstream neighbors that could constrain its use of water. It is also reasonable to question why the Taliban—or Turkmenistan or Uzbekistan, for that matter—would be willing to trust foreigners’ assistance, which would necessarily be of long duration—that is, for at least a decade. Corruption will also present a huge challenge for any donor institutions seeking to implement plans for a project of this scale. Fortunately, multilateral development banks have extensive experience working in very difficult governance structures. Conditionality and transparency will be critical at every step.

Afghans have rightly earned a reputation for being fiercely independent amidst a group of neighboring states that have at different times sought to constrain, if not eliminate, Afghan sovereignty. It would be foolhardy indeed not to acknowledge that the steps proposed above face tremendous headwinds. It is also necessary to keep in mind the domestic political context in Afghanistan and the canal’s implementation as an independent project of the Afghan state under the rule of the Taliban. Nevertheless, there are domestic officials known to the authors of this report who recognize the technical difficulties of going it alone. In our view, leaders in Kabul and Central Asia will ultimately act in a pragmatic fashion in the face of a genuinely growing crisis in their midst. Afghanistan has never indicated it is against such assistance with the canal.

In fact, there is already a promising development on the international cooperation front. On October 29, 2024, TOLO news published an article summarizing an interview with Ismatullah Irgashev, Uzbekistan’s Special Representative for Afghanistan, who revealed the two countries had established a bilateral joint commission on issues around the Qoshtepa Canal. He noted that two meetings had already taken place, and a third is expected early in the New Year. Irgashev also said,

It’s important to note that Afghanistan and the Afghan people have the right to make use of the Amu Darya’s waters as a primary matter. In this regard, there are no concerns or challenges. The key issue is how much water should be drawn from the Amu Darya. Here, the interests of all countries using the Amu Darya’s water resources must be taken into account, and a third issue is that the water level in the Amu Darya varies each year. This means that in one year, the water level may rise, while in another, it may decrease.

These bilateral talks mark a promising diplomatic step, but it will be imperative for them to be multilateralized soon to discuss a regional water-sharing agreement. These talks will be lengthy, complicated, and controversial, but they are essential.

It is also reasonable to have doubts about the other half of the equation—the willingness of Washington to support a project that could help the Taliban economically and, thus, politically. Whether Washington likes it or not, however, the Taliban are the de facto authorities in Afghanistan, and there is little likelihood of this changing in the foreseeable future. To their credit, they have actually begun to carry out the largest development project in the history of Afghanistan, one that could potentially bring great benefits to millions of people. Very different Afghan governments over the past fifty years have supported some form of the Qoshtepa Canal project. This is hardly a capricious endeavor pursued by some delusional dictator on a whim. Water security is now the greatest challenge for regional governments across Central Asia, and it does not take great imagination to see the downside risks for regional security and even global security if growing water security challenges for the region are not addressed comprehensively and with U.S. support.

These recommendations for the incoming Trump administration constitute a piece of a broader regional development strategy with global implications. Afghanistan and its Central Asian neighbors border three of Washington’s most challenging global actors: China, Russia, and Iran. There is no question that Central Asian states seek broader and more diversified U.S. engagement in the region to hedge against the overweening influence of Beijing, Moscow, and Tehran. Supporting the construction of the Qoshtepa Canal, a regional water-sharing agreement, and more sustainable water-use practices should be an integral piece of Washington’s strategy to contain the increased influence of China, Russia, and Iran with Afghanistan and its Central Asian neighbors and promote prosperity and peace in the region.

Andrew Kuchins is a Senior Fellow at the Center for the National Interest and an Adjunct Professor at the Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies. He previously served as president of the American University of Central Asia and held senior positions at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

Elvira Aidarkhanova is a Research Associate at the Center for the National Interest. She has contributed to various research initiatives in international relations and held communications roles in Kazakhstan’s private and public sectors and think tanks in the United States. She holds a Master of Arts in Human Science and an MBA and is currently a PhD candidate in International Relations.

Najibullah Sadid is a senior researcher on water resources, environment, and climate change based in Germany. He has a master’s degree and a PhD in water resource management from the Institute for Modelling Hydraulic and Environmental Systems (IWS), University of Stuttgart. He has worked as a researcher for the University of Stuttgart from 2013 to 2019 and for the Federal Waterways Engineering and Research Institute from 2019 to 2023. He is currently an advisor for climate change and flood protection to the State Office for Environment in the Federal State Rhineland-Palatinate in Germany.