Egyptian Ambassador in Ottawa Ahmed Abu Zeid held intensive meetings with members of the Canadian House of Commons and Senate representing all political parties to present Egypt's vision on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) crisis. The Egyptian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Tuesday that the meetings, which were also attended by members of the Canada-Egypt parliamentary friendship committee, aimed at posting the Canadian MPs on Egypt's fair stand on the Nile water issue and the danger of Ethiopia's unilateral measures, which in turn would harm Egypt's water security. Abu Zeid said his talks in the Canadian capital, Ottawa, reflected complete understanding about the importance of the Nile River in Egypt and the necessity of abiding by international law in this regard. For their part, some lawmakers in the Canadian parliament said their country applies the international law principles in managing joint water resources with the US. They added cooperation and negotiations are the right approach to achieve joint interests away from taking any unilateral measures. Several proposals were reviewed to activate the Canadian role in boosting efforts aimed at reaching a comprehensive and urgent deal about rules regulating the filling and operation of the dam, said Abu Zeid. He underlined that the absence of Ethiopia's genuine political determination to resolve this matter is behind the stalemate in the three-way negotiations, held over the past ten years. Such stalemate poses grave repercussions for the stability of the region at present, as well as interests of international partners, including Canada, if Ethiopia decided to begin the second filling of the dam regardless of the results of negotiations, he added. Tensions have mounted in the past weeks after the latest trilateral round of talks between Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia in Kinshasa earlier in April failed to produce an agreement to re-launch deadlocked negotiations. Addis Ababa had announced it will move ahead with the second filling of the dam in July despite the objections of Cairo and Khartoum to the move in the absence of a legally binding deal. The three countries have resorted to diplomacy in the past weeks, briefing regional and international counterparts on their stances and developments on the latest deadlock in negotiations. The second filling is meant to amass around 18.4 bcm of Blue Nile water in the GERD reservoir, up from the 4.9 bcm secured during the first filling last year.
