Unilateral Declarations

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The Canary in the Coal Mine: Sawalkot Dam and the Indus Waters Treaty

October 20, 2025

Introduction Six months after New Delhi unilaterally put the 1960 Indus Waters Treaty (IWT) ‘in abeyance’, India has fast-tracked the construction of the Sawalkot hydropower project on the Chenab river without conducting an effective Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA). The Environment Ministry (India) granted final approval of the project, having been informed by the Home Ministry (India) that the project is of ‘strategic significance…and swift construction is essential for leveraging the Chenab river’s potential’. Experts and local residents claim that the dam is likely to have catastrophic ecological effects across the Indus basin, as well as submerging villages home to nearly 6,000 residents in Indian-Administered Jammu and Kashmir (J&K). Fears are particularly heightened since the previous summer saw disastrous heatwaves and floods in India, Pakistan, and Kashmir. The rushed approval for the largest hydropower project in J&K is the first concrete effect of the IWT being put ‘in abeyance’ since New Delhi was prohibited from constructing such ‘storage dams’ on the…

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Indus Waters Treaty Suspension: A First Case for the Paris Agreement’s Compliance Committee?

June 18, 2025

On 23 April 2025 India announced that it was “suspending” its participation in the Indus Waters Treaty (“IWT”); a move that Pakistan contends could imperil the predictable river-flow regime that supplies about 90 % of its irrigated agriculture and roughly one-third of its hydropower capacity. While commentary has focused on whether such a suspension…

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Belgium’s return of Lumumba’s tooth: A new moment for anti-colonial struggles?

August 17, 2022

June 2022 was marked by a critical event in South-North relations: Belgium returning a tooth to Congo. As trivial as it may sound, the return of the gold-crowned tooth ends a quarrel of 62 years between the former colonial and colonized peoples regarding the murder of the anti-colonial leader Patrice Lumumba. More than that, the declaration that accompanied…

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Brexit, the Northern Irish Backstop, and Fundamental Change of Circumstances

March 18, 2019

If, dear readers, you have any doubts that the parliamentary politics of Brexit have emerged from the fever dream of some demented game theorist, I would just ask you to take a very quick look at the events of last week. In their second meaningful vote on Theresa May's Brexit deal, British MPs voted it down by…

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Negotiating Brexit in the Shadow of the Law of Treaties

March 12, 2019

It is an extraordinary day in British politics today, with the Prime Minister’s ‘enhanced’ Brexit deal to be voted on in Parliament later this evening. The outcome of today’s vote, and the votes that may follow later in the week, is of course anyone’s guess (although the WA will likely be voted down). I have now read through…

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