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AgenceEcofin.com: Sudan intensifies tone against Ethiopia over filling of the Great Renaissance Dam

Posted by: Berhane Habtemariam

Date: Thursday, 18 February 2021

Ethiopia is continuing to fill its massive dam on the Nile, ignoring repeated warnings from Sudan and Egypt. For these two countries, the regulation of the flow of the Nile, which supplies them with 90% of their water, is a matter of national security and must be negotiated.

Sudan is increasingly worried about its Ethiopian neighbour, which announces the second phase of filling its mega-dam on the Blue Nile, the Great Renaissance Dam (GERD). “If Ethiopia continues to fill the Renaissance dam next July, it will pose a direct threat to our national security,”Sudanese Water Minister Yasser Abbas said in a recent interview with AFP in the capital Khartoum.

These comments come at a time when talks between Khartoum (Sudan), Cairo (Egypt) and Addis Ababa (Ethiopia)have been deadlocked for almost ten years, around the filling and exploitation of the immense infrastructure of the Great Renaissance, launched by Ethiopia in 2011, and which will have undeniable consequences for its neighbours. Indeed, 85% of Nile water comes from Ethiopia, so Sudan and Egypt are worried about future flows and access to its waters, the dam of which will hold 74 billion cubic meters of water.

Similarly, for Sudan, while filling will help regulate flooding, it is nevertheless true that it will “also threaten the lives of half the population of central Sudan, as well as irrigation water for agricultural projects and electricity generation from the Roseires Dam (Sudan).”

Cairo and Khartoum therefore want to negotiate an agreement with guarantees on the duration of the filling, on the amount of water that Ethiopia will release downstream, once the dam is in full operation, and on the management of disputes in the future.

Much has been done, despite, more recently, three-way talks, in the presence of observers from the African Union and the European Union (last January). At the contarire, Ethiopia announced that it would proceed with the filling of the reservoir of the dam, whether or not an agreement had been reached.

Worse still, relations between Addis Ababa and Khartoum have deteriorated in recent weeks due to tensions in the border region of Al-Fashaqa (one of the indirect consequences of the conflict in Tigray), where Ethiopian farmers are cultivating fertile land claimed by Sudan.

Remember that the Nile, the longest river in Africa and the world, is a veritable lifeline, providing both water and electricity to the ten countries it crosses, including Egypt (military power, with one of the fastest demographics of the continent), Ethiopia (the second most populous country in Africa), and Sudan, where the various tributaries of the river converge (the White Nile and the Blue Nile) , before flowing to Egypt, to flow into the Mediterranean.

The Renaissance Dam, and access to water, is a geopolitical issue more than strategic for these three countries, and could eventually lead to an open conflict, if no agreement is reached.

Recently, to help break the deadlock, Sudan has proposed mediation by the United Nations, the African Union, the European Union and the United States, whose new administration announces its intention to be more active in Africa, including on conflict prevention.


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