Egypt says date and location of meeting on water has yet to be determined

August 11, 2013 (KHARTOUM) – The Egyptian ambassador to Ethiopia Mohamed Idris has denied media statements attributed to him saying that water ministers of Ethiopia, Sudan, and Egypt have agreed to hold a meeting in Addis Ababa within the coming few days.

An Egyptian farmer holds a handful of soil to show the dryness of the land due to drought in a farm formerly irrigated by the river Nile, in Al-Dakahlya, about 120 km (75 miles) from Cairo June 4, 2013. ( REUTERS/Mohamed Abd El Ghany)

He stressed in statements to the Egyptian state-owned Al-Ahram daily newspaper that contacts and consultations are still underway to convene the meeting and pointed that no agreement has been reached on its schedule or location but said that it is likely to be hold late this month in any of the three capitals.

Idris further said that this meeting comes in accordance with the agreement reached during the visit of Egypt’s former foreign minister Mohamed Kamel Amr, to Addis Ababa, adding that the agreement called for adopting two tracks to address all water issues including Ethiopia’s Renaissance dam.

According to the accord, water ministers will be responsible for the technical aspects while foreign ministers will take on the political side.

The envoy pointed that Egypt’s current foreign minister Nabeel Fahmy, and his Ethiopian counterpart have agreed in a telephone conversation a few weeks ago to expedite the process of holding these meetings.

Tensions between Egypt and Ethiopia heightened this year after Cairo threatened Addis Ababa in connection with its first dam project along the Blue Nile.

The controversial Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), formerly known as the Millennium Dam is being constructed on the Blue Nile 40km from the Sudanese border.

Egypt argues that the construction of the dam would negatively affect their water shares and insisted the project should be scrapped, calling on international donors against funding it.

However Sudanese president Omer Hassan Al-Bashir announced his support to the scheme saying his government understands the mutual benefits the project could offer Ethiopia and Sudan.

Khartoum’s stance has aggravated Egypt with many political figures blasting Sudan’s "treachery".

Egypt believes its “historic rights” to the Nile are guaranteed by two treaties from 1929 and 1959 which allow it 87 percent of the Nile’s flow and give it veto power over upstream projects.

But a new deal was signed in 2010 by other Nile Basin countries, including Ethiopia, allowing them to work on river projects without Cairo’s prior agreement.

The first phase of construction of the $4.2 billion dam is expected to be complete in three years, with a capacity of 700 megawatts.

Once complete, the dam will have a capacity of 6,000 megawatts

Experts estimate that Egypt could lose up to 27% of its share of the Nile’s water when Ethiopia fills the GERD, which, when complete will be the Africa’s biggest reservoir with a capacity of 63 billion cubic meters.

(ST)