CAIRO, Oct 27 (NNN-MENA) – Egypt confirmed yesterday that it will participate in a tripartite video ministerial meeting between Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan, over the Ethiopian grand hydropower dam, built over the Nile River, said the Egyptian water ministry in a statement.
Arranged by South Africa, the current chair of the African Union, the meeting will be held with the aim of resuming negotiations, over the rules of filling and operating the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), said Mohamed al-Sebai, spokesman of Egypt’s Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation, in the statement.
“Egypt is ready to negotiate earnestly for the success of these talks, in order to reach a fair and balanced agreement, that meets the interests of the three countries,” Sebai said.
U.S. President, Donald Trump, recently blamed Ethiopia for the failure of previous negotiations over the GERD.
“It’s a very dangerous situation, because Egypt is not going to be able to live that way,” Trump told Sudanese Prime Minister, Abdalla Hamdok, in a phone call, saying, Egypt may “end up blowing up the Dam.”
Ethiopia summoned U.S. ambassador over Trump’s remarks.
Earlier in Oct, Egyptian President, Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi, held talks in Cairo, with his Kenyan counterpart, Uhuru Kenyatta, on the disputed dam, and later in mid-Oct, he received a phone call from South African President, Cyril Ramaphosa, over the issue.
Ethiopia started building the GERD in 2011, while Egypt is concerned that the dam might affect its 55.5-billion-cubic-metre annual share of Nile water. Sudan has recently been raising similar concerns over the four-billion-U.S.-dollar dam.
Over the past few years, tripartite talks on the rules of filling and operating the GERD, with a total capacity of 74 billion cubic metres, have been fruitless, including those hosted by Washington and recently by the African Union.– NNN-MENA
