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Syria: Countries
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Syria is a party to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), and Syria has called for an area free of all weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East. Although Syria has long been cited as posing a nuclear proliferation risk, the country seems to have been too strapped for cash to get far. Syria allegedly began a military nuclear program in 1979 and has not provided the IAEA with full information on all its nuclear activities. Syria has claimed that it was interested in nuclear research for medical rather than military purposes, but Israel and the United States have opposed sales of a reactor to Syria on the grounds that it would serve as an important step toward the building of a nuclear weapon.
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[F]ive months after the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime, Syria potentially stands to be one of the biggest winners of the war. Fears that an angry US would seal the border with Iraq have proved unfounded. While trade between Iraq and Syria has yet to reach prewar levels, the future looks promising. Syria recently agreed to supply electricity to Mosul, in northern Iraq, in exchange for Iraqi oil. Rail links between the two countries reopened in July, and trucks carrying goods from Syria, Lebanon, and Turkey cross into Iraq daily.
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Syria has three major rivers. The largest, the Euphrates, enters from Turkey and is joined by the Khabur and the Balikh before crossing into Iraq southeast of Al Bu Kamal. The Euphrates system is regulated by the Euphrates Dam at Tabaqa, just west of al-Raqqa, which stores water for use in irrigation and power generation. Running south from mountains in the pre-1920 Syrian province of Iskenderun (now the Turkish province of Hatay), through the fertile Ghab basin and past the cities of Hama and Homs, is the Orontes river (Nahr al-Asi). The Yarmuk river, across which small irrigation dams were constructed during the 1980s, defines the border between Syria and Jordan. At current rates of use, Syria's groundwater reserves are expected to run dry by 2010, leaving the country entirely dependent on river water.
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Syria has produced heavy-grade oil from fields located in the northeast since the late 1960s. In the early 1980s, light-grade, low-sulphur oil was discovered near Dayr al-Zur in eastern Syria. Syria's rate of oil production has been decreasing steadily, from a peak close to 600,000 barrels per day (bpd) in 1995 down to approximately 425,000 bpd in 2005. Experts generally agree that Syria will become a net importer of petroleum not later than 2012. Syria exported roughly 200,000 bpd in 2005, and oil still accounts for a majority of the country's export income. Syria ... produces 22 million cubic meters of gas per day, with estimated reserves around 8.5 trillion cubic feet.
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Syria's missile program began in the early 1970s as a means to counter Israel’s superior conventional military capabilities; since that time, the missile program has grown in tandem with the development of chemical weapons (CW). Syria now has one of the largest arsenals of ballistic missiles in the region, made up of hundreds of Scud-derived missile systems. In the 1970s and 1980s, Syria relied on Soviet technology and support for its missile program and imported the Soviet FROG-7, Scud-Bs, and the solid-fueled Scarab SS-21 missiles. In the 1990s, Syria looked to other states to supply it with missile technology and found willing partners in Iran and North Korea. Iran provided Syria with technical assistance for solid-fueled rocket motor production, while North Korea supplied it with equipment and technical assistance for liquid-fueled missile production. Syria... has had difficulty creating an indigenous production capability and has had to rely on continued imports from countries such as North Korea and China.
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In 2003, Syria produced about 245 Bcf of natural gas, up sharply from 205 Bcf in 2002. Syria plans to increase this production in coming years as part of a strategy to substitute natural gas for oil in power generation in order to free up as much oil as possible for export. A number of new gas-fired power projects are currently under construction or being planned. Another possible source of natural gas is imports. Syria signed agreements with Egypt, Jordan, and Lebanon in early 2001 for an onshore pipeline network (the "Arab Gas Pipeline") which would link the four countries and make Syrian imports of natural gas from Egypt a possibility. The section of the pipeline running from Egypt to northern Jordan currently is in the final stages of construction.
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