ISLAMABAD: Federal Information Minister Attaullah Tarar has warned that India’s decision to hold the Indus Waters Treaty in abeyance could have implications for global transboundary water governance, urging the international community to take note of the “wider precedent”.
“We cannot allow India to weaponise water because it is the basic right of the 240 million people of Pakistan,” Mr Tarar said, highlighting that the controversial Indian move could have serious implications for other countries sharing water under similar frameworks.
The federal minister expressed these views at the launch of a report on the issue of Indus Water Treaty, organised by the Institute of Strategic Studies, Islamabad, on Wednesday.
While the 1960 IWT allocates the eastern rivers of Ravi, Beas and Sutlej to India and the western rivers of Indus, Jhelum and Chenab to Pakistan, New Delhi violated the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties by unilaterally putting the water-sharing accord in abeyance.
Information minister says India’s unilateral action on Indus treaty threatens global water governance
He said when the treaty was signed, the signatories “did not envisage that there would come a time a few decades down the line when conditions in India would deteriorate so much that they would be legally ignorant, morally bankrupt and devoid of ethics”.
Mr Tarar held that the IWT was legally binding upon both parties. “It contains stipulations that this legal instrument cannot be unilaterally revoked, rescinded, or altered,” he said.
He said the treaty could not be “unilaterally altered, revoked, rescinded or held in abeyance, for that matter, but even if there is a dispute, both the parties have to adhere to the terms and conditions of the treaty”.
He said the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) also “upheld Pakistan’s stance, giving legitimacy and strength to the argument that there cannot be a unilateral attempt to change the status of this treaty”.
In its August order, the PCA had backed Pakistan’s stance, declaring that the IWT between the two countries remained fully in force, as India had no justification for ending or suspending the agreement.
Mr Tarar said Pakistan effectively engaged the international community and presented a legal and diplomatic point of view as a nation-state that respected the rights of others. He also recalled Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s address at the recent UNGA session. “PM Shehbaz said the IWT is the lifeblood of our people and our region, and any attempt to usurp this right be treated as an act of war,” he recalled.
He said Pakistan’s position on the IWT remained “absolutely clear”, adding that the treaty was an “instrument of peace and stability for the region”, while India’s actions were “highly condemnable” and unjustifiable at a “legal, diplomatic, and moral level”.
Published in Dawn, October 1st, 2026
