I'm concerned about how the new discovery will be used and replinished.

Let me add:

Powerful people control commerce and governments and they see themselfs as owners of earth's resources which profit them; we are nothing more than consumers in their eyes.

It's our governments that should be standing as laisons to see it's people are treated fairly.

Sharing will bring peace!

It's a puppet government, when the water is developed it will belong to the developer who financed the gig.

My reasoning for my opinion is history.

It's positive.

Maybe they can grow strawberries for Safeway.

ezeflyer July 19th, 2007 5:30 pm

"Watch them try to privatize it."

Yeah, no kidding! Now the globalist plunderers have two reasons to create turmoil and death in that region: OIL and WATER.

I think it is extremely naive to think that additional anything will stop the fighting in Dafur and places like it. This is the post neo-colonial state in all of its glory.
Water or no water, oil or no oil, these warring factions, (the formerly repressed tribes with old scores to settle and religious fanatics) will eventually recognize the real enemy, but of course the real enemy will do everything in it's power to keep that from happening...there is a lot of loot to be made from chaos, especially when it can be contained in an area relatively isolated from the developed world and it's delicate sensibilities.
I'm with the cynics...Coca Cola or the highest briber, using foreign labor no less, will find a way to tap into this resource and sell it back to the people. The concept of 'free water' will soon be a thing of the past anyway, so why should the people who live on top of the water expect any right to it.

The invisible hand of the market is usually given brass knuckles and formed into a fist by multinational corporations and robber barons who buy out most of the competition, cooperate with the rest, steal labor and resources from the rightful owners, waste the resources and move on.

I agree with above comments suggesting this water in Sudan will make multinational corporations rich, leave the natives poor, and provide a new excuse for bloodletting.

Yeah Im sure this will help. And in a way it will but about about drought? will we completly exhaust this aquifer and make water an even more preciouse commodity since once this lake is empty there will be absolutly no water?

It will be a daunting task to keep the capitalists from finding a way to steal the water so they can sell it back to those who live there. Worse, they'd probably ship it out and sell it to people who don't live there. What next, "artesian water from North Africa" coming to a bottle near you?

Might the Israeli and the Palestinian peoples hold hands on a similar and collaborative issue! What ever they do, let's hope that they not have their Palm Springs spa's and swimming pools of evaporating wanton waste, and the depletion of "their" aquifer! Better make sure that the moguls of greed don't sweep and slip in and again devour other peoples collective rights! Water in the future will be their gold!

Now they will be able to irrigate fields to grow fresh vegetables for Europe in the winter as is done in other Mideast countries.

Of course the locals won't be able to afford the produce, but that is the invisible hand of the market in action.

Watch them try to privatize it.

when the world finally agrees to bring along the least amongst us, then, and only then will the human race finally be able to realize it's full potential.

Oh Boy, WATERWORLD
Now all we need is a Darfur type Kevin Costner
I can see it now............................

Actually, Darfur has represented what we can expect with global warming and those economies and societies which live on the margins even in times of good weather. The nomads and the settlers got along without problem until a few years ago when the droughts came and caused conflicts with the scarcity of water. That's when the killing began. Finding water could very well restore civility to the area, although it's hard to imagine how those who have suffered at the hands of the janjaweed could accept them as neighbors again.

Finding the water is great. Isn't the Darfur conflict due to finding oil?

"The United Nations needs water supplies for its planned 20,000-strong joint UN-African Union force, due to deploy in Sudan possibly next year."

And the locals living there don't need it first? UN forces/guys with guns are more important than everyday people? No mention at all of the population there, just the UN forces.

At least somebody is finding something they need.

You guys are so cynical! What ever could have made you so? (OK, don't take up 10 pages with a list)

Ogallala, and Enron came to mind when I read about this oasis in the desert.

We need a line in the sand when it comes to privatization and exploitation of a countries resources.

Finding water in the desert is good news, but since when has the discovery of precious resources ever brought peace to a troubled region? And is hog-wild mismanagement going to dry the underground lake up in a decade? Even in the "peaceful" U.S., an underground lake like Oglalla is running dry because we've treated it as an infinite supply.

Wow! Look what can we do if we work together! Finding solutions, hand in hand.

This lake can provide alot of jobs for the new coca cola bottling plant that will soon be availble to provide water at a lowcost of $2/ bottle

Perhaps, the troubles in Darfur represents the first of the water wars? It is all well and good to postpone the underlying problem of overpopulation, limited resources and ethnic sentiment, but if this aquifer is anything like the Ogallala here in the US, meaning depletable, they should still resolve fundemental issues.

That would be great if it could stop the genocide and reduce the suffering the people in Darfur...