Water wars aren’t a future threat — they’ve already begun. In a gripping interview, Nilanthan Niruthan, Director, Centre for Law and Security Studies, Colombo lays out a chilling vision of a world entering a new era of scarcity and conflict, with access to water as the defining fault line.
From America’s legal showdowns over the Colorado River to China’s control of the Mekong and rising tensions across the Nile and Indus basins, the global water crisis is rapidly spilling into geopolitics. “We’re looking at at least a dozen wars and several genocides in the coming decades,” warns Niruthan, who is one of the sharpest young minds covering global geopolitics. “Blood is cheaper than water today.”
Climate change is accelerating the crisis, shrinking rivers, draining aquifers, and vanishing glaciers — but that’s only part of the story. Political choices, aggressive nationalism, and unsustainable agricultural practices are making it worse. Crops that guzzle water are still being promoted in arid zones, while treaties like the Indus Waters Treaty, once hailed as diplomatic breakthroughs, are now fraying under pressure.
Niruthan explains how upstream powers are quietly weaponizing water — not through bombs, but by damming rivers, diverting flows, and rewriting the balance of power. Downstream countries are left to cope with the fallout: droughts, crop failures, mass displacement, and growing unrest.
While countries like Israel and Singapore have made major strides in desalination and water security, most of the Global South lacks the infrastructure, funds, or political will to adapt — setting the stage for humanitarian disasters and cross-border flashpoints.
This isn’t just a crisis of supply, Niruthan argues — it’s a crisis of imagination and cooperation. And without urgent action, the price will be paid in blood.
👉 Watch the full interview to hear Nilanthan Niruthan unpack the geopolitical, environmental, and moral dimensions of the world’s unfolding water wars — and why time is running out.
In a career spanning three decades and counting, Ramananda (Ram to his friends) has been the foreign editor of The Telegraph, Outlook Magazine and the New Indian Express. He helped set up rediff.com’s editorial operations in San Jose and New York, helmed sify.com, and was the founder editor of India.com.
His work has featured in national and international publications like the Al Jazeera Centre for Studies, Global Times and Ashahi Shimbun. But his one constant over all these years, he says, has been the attempt to understand rising India’s place in the world.
He can rustle up a mean salad, his oil-less pepper chicken is to die for, and all it takes is some beer and rhythm and blues to rock his soul.
Talk to him about foreign and strategic affairs, media, South Asia, China, and of course India.
