By Theodore Jones –
Egypt and Sudan used Tuesday’s Nile Day meeting in Dar es Salaam to call for dialogue on the use of Nile waters, making a turn around from their confrontational stance with Ethiopia over its Grand Ethiopia Renaissance Dam (Gerd) project.
On the eve of the meeting, Ethiopia had announced the launch of electricity generation on the dam, a move that was swiftly condemned by both Egypt and Sudan, because the three countries are yet to agree on many points of contention on the effects of the project on downstream countries.
“Egypt affirms that this step is a further move by the Ethiopian side in insisting to violate its obligations under the 2015 Declaration of Principles, signed by the Ethiopian Prime Minister,” said a statement from the Egyptian Foreign Ministry.
“Before the move, Ethiopia should have provided the other parties with enough information, such as the volume of water expected to exit from behind the dam, to know if the Sudanese reservoirs would be able to absorb it to adopt the necessary precautions,” said Sudan’s acting Irrigation and Water Resources minister Daw Al-Bait Abdul-Rahman.
Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed labelled the launch “good news for our continent and the downstream countries with who we aspire to work together.”