Iraqi children swim with water buffaloes in the Euphrates River in Najaf, 160 km (100 miles) south of Baghdad, yesterday.

BAGHDAD (AFP) – Turkey has increased the flow of water in the Euphrates River by opening sluices upstream after Iraq complained that its farmers faced an imminent crisis, Iraq’s water resources minister said yesterday.

Turkey has increased the volume of water running through the Euphrates by 130 cubic meters (4,550 cubic feet) per second to 360 (12,600), although the extra flow will bring only limited relief to farmers, Abdul Latif Jamal Rasheed said in a statement. “This quantity of water will give us limited improvement in the water coming from the border and will help provide some water for this summer’s crop, especially planting rice,” Rasheed said.

In recent months, Iraq has made repeated requests of Turkey that it increase the flow of water down the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, as a chronic shortage of water for irrigation threatens this year’s harvest.

The minister said that, even with the additional water, there would still only be enough to provide irrigation for half as much rice as Iraq grew last year.

Iraq says Turkey’s construction of a series of dams on the rivers’ higher reaches has sharply reduced the flow and compounded the problems caused by a nearly decade-long drought.

The flow of water on the Euphrates, which runs through Syria before reaching Iraq, is now running at a fraction of its 2000 level of 950 cubic meters (33,250 cubic feet) per second.

The controversy over the sharing of the mighty rivers at the root of Mesopotamia – the area’s ancient name, meaning “between the rivers” in Greek – is almost as old as the country itself. But the current dispute comes at an especially sensitive time, when Iraq is keen to rekindle diplomatic relations with its more powerful neighbors.