World Water Forum: Dissatisfaction with ‘Incomplete’ Final Declaration

Prensa Latina, 22 March 2006

Mexico, Mar 22 (Prensa Latina) The final declaration to be approved by the fourth World Water Forum Wednesday will be incomplete to the extent it does not recognize the human right to that resource, social activist Areli Sandoval said in Mexico City.

“For many governments, including the US, water is just another source of economic profit, hence the reluctance to admit access is a prerogative of every citizen,” she said.

Sandoval, DESC leader (Coordination Space for Organizations on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights) in Mexico, deplored the attempt to ascribe the global unequal access to water to a financial crisis.

DESC is one of the NGOs that last week signed a call for world governments to fortify the human right to water.

The text suggests its adoption by the newly-created UN Human Rights Council with an official commitment to guarantee a supply of drinking water to every human being.

Despite the second UN World Water Development report that noted a billion people lack an adequate supply of drinking water and two more billion do not have not basic plumbing, the WWF Final Document omits declaring this vital liquid a human right.