The issue of Egypt's access to Nile water and Ethiopia's planned construction of the Grand Renaissance Dam came to the fore this week during the Third Arab-African Summit meeting held in the Gulf city of Kuwait on Tuesday and Wednesday. The Kuwaiti authorities had wanted to focus the meeting on an Egyptian, Sudanese and Ethiopian summit that would discuss the issue of the Grand Renaissance Dam and ways to make sure that all the parties involved would benefit from the project. Egypt's interim President Adli Mansour, Sudanese President Hassan Al-Bashir and Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemarain Desalegn attended the summit. Egypt's minister of foreign affairs, Nabil Fahmi, met with his Sudanese counterpart Ali Kerty ahead of the summit to discuss ways to implement the recommendations of the tripartite technical committee. The summit, convened under the banner of “Partners in Development and Investment”, aimed to improve Arab-African cooperation on various levels and in different fields. Fahmi's first official visit abroad when he came to office in July was to Sudan and Southern Sudan. That visit aimed to emphasise the importance of Egyptian-African cooperation. These new efforts to resolve disagreements over Ethiopia's proposed dam were welcomed by Maghawri Diab, a professor of hydrogeology and water resources, as further tracks that could resolve the Nile water issue. “Dialogue, diplomacy, even hugs and kisses can be helpful. But Egypt needs a clear-cut international procedure by which it can submit to the international bodies concerned the reasons why it is so important for it to conserve its right to the Nile's water,” Diab told Al-Ahram Weekly. He expressed his frustration that the presidency had not established a special legal committee to defend Egypt's right to the Nile's water, referring to reports that Mansour would be releasing a presidential decree setting up such a committee that were later denied. “This committee could have collected all the technical reports done by experts on the issue, together with the 35 résumé reports of the tripartite technical committee and other reports done by the Ministry of Irrigation and Foreign Affairs and other important bodies, and take them to the international institution or bodies that are possibly supporting or financing the Grand Dam project,” Diab said. He saw no problem with the legal and diplomatic tracks going hand-in-hand. However, one diplomat who spoke on condition of anonymity said that the establishment of a legal committee, if it was ever done at all, would be “too little too late”. Ethiopia “has been talking to various national and international parties about its right to Nile water and its need for development by generating electricity through the building of the Renaissance Dam. Meanwhile, Egypt has not been active at all in this respect,” the diplomat said. The River Nile, 85 per cent of whose water comes from Ethiopia, is a lifeline to over 90 per cent of Egyptians. The Blue Nile on which the dam will be built provides Egypt with nearly 85 per cent of its water. It is for this reason that Egypt has been concerned by the $4.6 billion Dam project, which Ethiopia intends to build near the Sudanese border. This dam could diminish water flow to Egypt and go against its historic water rights. These rights are enshrined in the 1959 agreement that gave Egypt and Sudan the lion's share of the Nile's water — 55.5 and 18 billion cubic metres, respectively — and the right to veto any projects built along the river. Ethiopia together with other Nile Basin states has wanted to see the 1959 Agreement replaced by the later Entebbe Agreement, which it claims provides for a fairer distribution of the water. Cairo and Khartoum have both refused to sign the Entebbe Agreement. Southern Sudan signed in April last year after it seceded from Sudan. A tripartite technical committee, formed by Egyptian, Ethiopian, Sudanese and international experts in 2011, was responsible for assessing the possible risks of the Renaissance Dam for Sudan and Egypt. The committee concluded in its final report, released earlier this year, that the studies of the dam's impact were not detailed enough for the establishment of a major project like the Renaissance Dam. The committee recommended that further studies be carried out to analyse the impact of the dam. In June, Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia agreed to start negotiations on the recommendations made by the international technical committee. The agreement was declared after former foreign minister Mohamed Kamel Amr paid a visit to Ethiopia and Sudan to discuss the issue. Ethiopia's foreign minister was expected to visit Egypt early in July, but the visit was cancelled owing to the events following 30 June. A new date for the visit has not yet been disclosed. “The report stated clearly that there were defects in the design of the dam, the operation process and the absence of accurate information about it,” Diab said. It was for this reason that he had recommended that building should stop for at least six months, or until the recommendations of the technical committee were addressed, he added. Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan agreed to hold several meetings to discuss ways to implement the recommendations of the committee. The first meeting was supposed to be held as early as August, then it was postponed to October, and finally it was held this month. Although encouraging statements from both Cairo and Addis Ababa preceded the meeting and seemed to raise hopes of an agreement between Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan on the issue, the meeting failed to come up with tangible outcomes that could put the problem on track towards an agreement between the three parties. They agreed to hold another meeting next month. This month, Egypt's minister of water resources and irrigation, Mohamed Abdel-Mottaleb, underlined that Egypt supported an initiative put forward by the Ethiopian prime minister to treat the Renaissance Dam as a regional joint venture between Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia, such that the three countries could share its benefits. He stressed that the time had come to consider a new strategy for investment opportunities in order to achieve the best benefits for the three countries. However, he pointed to the importance of cooperation and coordination between them. In a surprising move, Egypt also said it would consider participating with Ethiopia in the construction of the Dam. Prime Minister Hazem Al-Beblawi told a cabinet meeting last month that the dam would bring prosperity to Egypt, Ethiopia and the Nile Basin countries. He emphasised that Ethiopia had no problem with water availability, but only sought to generate electricity through the dam. Desalegn also announced last month that his country welcomed the participation of Egypt and Sudan in the construction of the dam and stressed that it would not affect the water interests of the downstream countries. He said that the project should be turned into a partnership rather than a source of conflict. Any delay in reaching an agreement on the matter was in the interest of Ethiopia, Diab said. “It can keep discussing the problem and writing reports and forming committees while building is in process. Once the dam is built, any reversal of that fact will be impossible,” he added. The dam presents real dangers to Egypt, the diplomat said. “Ethiopia claims it has a right to development through generating energy. But if the dam is built, it will impede Egypt's development plans without any doubt.”
