FAYYOUM (Egypt)-An Egyptian official has said that a current dispute between his country and other Nile Basin countries is technical not political. "The Nile water is enough for all. This disagreement can be solved through a quiet dialogue," said Egyptian Minister of Irrigation Nasr Eldin Allam at a rally in Fayyoum, in southern Egypt late Sunday. In May Nile Basin countries signed a controversial water-sharing agreement without Egypt and Sudan. Egypt and Sudan have strongly opposed the agreement, fearing that their historic majority share of the water supply would be severely reduced. Egypt wants all the Nile basin countries to return to the negotiating table. Egypt, which depends mainly on the Nile for its water consumption, has vowed to take legal action to maintain its current water rights that it has described as a "red line" not to be crossed. The Information and Decision Support Centre (IDSC), a governmental think tank, warned last year that the country's water needs would surpass its resources by the year 2017. Egypt is allocated 55.5 billion cubic metres of water from the Nile each year, under a 1959 agreement with Sudan that was based on 1929 promises from Britain that it will not undertake projects in its East African colonies that would interfere with Egypt's water supply.
