The Italian government and former Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev are pressing the United Nations to take measures to ensure that global access to water is a human right.

Italy’s deputy minister for foreign affairs Patrizia Sentinelli, is leading a campaign asking the UN to take water away from trade rules by adopting "a binding rule to identify concrete and gradual steps towards a covenant global access to water" by the end of 2008, reports IPS. The initiative follows a recent resolution in the Italian Parliament in support of universal access to safe drinking water and hygiene services, which holds that environmental protection and access to water are two aspects of the same problem.

In 2004, Green Cross International, led by its chairman Mikhail Gorbachev, launched a campaign on the adoption and ratification of a Global Treaty on the Right to Water by the UN and its member states. Gorbachev has written to 40 governments to seek support for the Treaty, and so far nearly 20 have responded to offer their backing, reports the Financial Times. He sees the Treaty as a way to prevent transboundary water conflicts.

Related news: Netherlands: new Minister for Development Cooperation to push for right to water, Source Weekly, 10 Apr 2007 ; Right to water: Human Rights Council requests study on equitable access, Source Weekly, 20 Dec 2006 ; Right to water: NGOs criticise Green Cross International campaign, Source Weekly, 23 Nov 2004

Web sites: Green Cross International - Water Treaty.org; The Right to Water ; WWC – Right to Water

Source: IPS, 29 Jun 2007 ; Fiona Harvey, Financial Times, 12 Jun 2007

Tags: policies & legislation