The report of the Global High Level on Water and Peace - A Matter of Survival - was launched in Geneva on 14 September 2017 and presented to the United Nations on 18 September by Danilo Turk, Chairman of the Global High Level Panel.

Didier Burkhalter, Swiss Foreign Minister, hosted the launch in Geneva. HRH Prince Hassan bin Talal of Jordan and Christine Beerli, Vice President of ICRC, delivered keynote addresses.

The Global High Level Panel met four times in Europe, Africa, Central America and the Middle East and consulted a large number of experts from around the world over two years. Geneva Water Hub provided the Secretariat of the Panel and the Strategic Foresight Group supported the initiative with policy ideas, research and organisational matters.

Key recommendations of the report include:

Recommendations to the UN Security Council to recognise water as “a vital asset of humanity”, encourage water supply ceasefires, support humanitarian organisations in their work for repairing water installations during conflicts, deploy military water specialists to rehabilitate and rebuild water systems in war zones, among other proposals

Recommendations to the UN Members States to strengthen adherence to international water law

Recommendations to improve exchange of data between riparian countries on quality and quantity of water flows

Recommendations to riparian countries sharing watercourses to undertake Joint Investment Plans and strengthen trans-boundary cooperation, create new instruments for funding with the help of multilateral organisations such as Blue Fund, extend ESG principles to cover the Blue Peace framework

Recommendations to set up new institutions of hydro-diplomacy, including Global Observatory for Water and Peace.

Prior to the launch of the report in Geneva, a curtain raiser session was held at the Bled Strategic Forum in Slovenia, where implementation of some of the recommendations was discussed. It was chaired by Sundeep Waslekar, President of SFG, and the panellists included

Danilo Turk, former President of Slovenia and Chair of the Global High Level Panel on Water and Peace

Kabine Komara, former Prime Minister of Guinea and former High Commissioner of Senegal River Basin Organisation

Pio Wennubst, Assistant Director General of Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation

Kairat Sarybay, Kazakhstan’s Ambassador to OSCE

Aaron Wolf, Professor at Oregon State University.

Download the Report of the Global High Level Panel on Water and Peace

https://www.genevawaterhub.org/sites/default/files/atoms/files/A_Matter_of_Survival_FINAL.pdf

See video of Water and Peace session at the Bled Strategic Forum

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKWkshXBvAk&list=PLTRKg61Dab1h0OGr3tOtlI3ntaArNHtbA&index=24