Growing Water Shortages In Central Asia Threaten Region And Its Neighbors – Analysis




Border of Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan


June 17, 2026
By Paul Goble

The water shortage in the five Central Asian countries continues to worsen. It has now reached the point where the “water surplus” upstream countries of Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan no longer have sufficient water to send more downstream to the three other “water short” countries of Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan (Window on Eurasia, March 3, 2024). That problem and its purported solution—one that drove policies in Soviet times, when Moscow controlled the distribution of water, and still dominates the thinking of many in the region and elsewhere—no longer apply (see EDM, April 9). Climate change, burgeoning population growth, and poor irrigation policies mean that there are no longer any “water surplus” countries in the region (Window on Eurasia, March 3, 2024). This new reality is something the international community is only slowly coming to recognize.

Even as the water crisis undermines the growth and stability of each Central Asian country, it is also increasing tensions among them. Each country is forced to look individually and collectively beyond the region as a whole, sounding ever more warnings that unless they get help and soon, there will be instability in Central Asia and massive refugee flows into these neighboring states (Window on Eurasia, December 6, 2025;RITM Eurasia, June 12).

Unless more comprehensive approaches are adopted, the ever-growing need for water in Central Asian countries and the impossibility of solving this problem on their own will be a major and growing cause of instability and conflict within and among them. Tensions will mount between them again individually and collectively, on the one hand, and Afghanistan, the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and the Russian Federation, on the other. Each of these countries has its own domestic water problems and agendas for using the water crisis in Central Asia to promote its national interests (see EDM, July 11, 2024;Fond Strategicheskoy Kul’tury; Vecherniy Bishkek; Spik.kz, June 8;Stoletie, June 10).

Drought conditions over the last several years have pushed the water crisis in Central Asia to unprecedented dimensions. Even those countries long identified as “water surplus” no longer have enough water to ensure that their major lakes will not disappear as the Aral Sea already has, that critical food crops will supply the growing cities, and that the latter will not begin to empty with their residents fleeing abroad to find water (Window on Eurasia, September 8, 2024, December 6, 2025; see EDM, April 9). This perfect storm is the result of the convergence of three factors, any one of which would be a challenge, but together pose a threat to the region. First, global warming has reduced the flow of water from the mountains where glaciers are melting at unprecedented rates (Window on Eurasia, June 11). Second, still-burgeoning population growth is occurring beyond the capacity of the governments there to cope with (Window on Eurasia, April 18). Third, water distribution systems both in cities and especially in agricultural areas remain both inadequate and wasteful (Window on Eurasia, December 21, 2025).


The countries of Central Asia are increasingly being forced to seek to obtain water from their neighbors. Most importantly, they are being forced to obtain water from the Russian Federation with talk about revisiting earlier plans to divert Siberian river water to Central Asia (seeEDM, April 1, 2025). They are also being forced to seek water from the PRC, some of whose river flows might be diverted to Central Asia (Window on Eurasia, July 31, 2025). Additionally, water is being sought from Afghanistan, where Central Asians are alarmed by a major Kabul water project that will further reduce the flow of water into Central Asia’s riverine system (see EDM, July 11, 2024). To date, progress on these fronts has been limited by two factors.

On the one hand, all three of these countries face mounting domestic water problems and oppose spending massive amounts of money to help others when they themselves need water (Window on Eurasia, June 27, 2025; see EDM, July 3, 2025). On the other hand, the Central Asian countries, instead of adopting a common approach, have adopted contrasting national programs. This is a choice that Moscow, Beijing, and Kabul have been quick to exploit, offering water to those who cooperate on other issues but not doing so for others who refuse (Window on Eurasia, December 6, 2025; RITM Eurasia, June 12).

The resulting impasse in turn has sparked increasingly apocalyptic talk about what will happen if the neighboring countries do not help Central Asia. Not only are there now increasing references to the possibility of economic and social collapse and the rise of extremism, but some in the region and elsewhere are now suggesting that as the countries of Central Asia run out of water, that by itself will force millions of the people there to flee to other countries, including Russia. One Uzbek scholar, Ravshan Nazarov, for example, has gone as far as to suggest that unless Central Asia gets more water from its neighbors and soon, as many as 100 million Central Asians will decamp from their homeland and create what would be the world’s largest refugee problem in the Russian Federation (Vostochniy Ekspress, December 8, 2023).


Especially ominous for many Russians now focusing on this issue is that international bodies such as the World Bank have echoed this apocalyptic vision and warned that steps must be taken now to avert it (Window on Eurasia, April 2, 2023; The World Bank, December 12, 2024). There have been three responses to such suggestions. First, some in Russia, for example, are now warning that Moscow has no choice but to give the Central Asians water lest more Muslims move into the Russian Federation. Second, others are saying that the Kremlin should beef up its military along the borders with Central Asia to prevent such an influx. Third, still others are saying that the water crisis is affecting more than just Central Asia and that Moscow should demand that the international community get involved to solve that rather than bear all the burdens of doing so by acting on its own in Central Asia (Window on Eurasia, December 13, 2023; see EDM, July 3, 2025; Stolitie, June 10). The PRC has a freer hand to act because it has less water at stake and thus has proved more willing to be cooperative (Window on Eurasia, July 31, 2025;Vecherniy Bishkek, June 8). Afghanistan has been willing to talk but has not scaled back its own water projects the way Central Asians would like, to their increasing annoyance and the two other countries as well (seeEDM, July 11, 2024; Fond Strategicheskoy Kul’tury, June 8).

There are few signs that Central Asia’s water problems will be resolved anytime soon (RITM Eurasia, June 12). As a result, the water problem in Central Asia is likely to explode, possibly as early as this fall, when harvests there fail. If that happens, this will affect not only the five Central Asian states and their three neighbors but the international community as a whole.

This article was published at The Jamestown Foundation

About Paul Goble
Paul Goble is a longtime specialist on ethnic and religious questions in Eurasia. Most recently, he was director of research and publications at the Azerbaijan Diplomatic Academy. Earlier, he served as vice dean for the social sciences and humanities at Audentes University in Tallinn and a senior research associate at the EuroCollege of the University of Tartu in Estonia. He has served in various capacities in the U.S. State Department, the Central Intelligence Agency and the International Broadcasting Bureau as well as at the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Mr. Goble maintains the Window on Eurasia blog and can be contacted directly at paul.goble@gmail.com .