Sudanese, Ethiopian, Egyptian water & foreign ministers to meet in Khartoum

December 1, 2015 (KHARTOUM) – Water and foreign ministers of Sudan, Ethiopia and Egypt will meet in Khartoum on December 7-8 to discuss matters related to the controversial Renaissance Dam that Ethiopia has embarked on building on the Blue Nile.

Mu’taz Musa, Sudan’s Minister of Electricity and Waters on Tuesday, told the press the meeting will discuss ‘’ the challenges and give a political and technical drive ” to the declaration of principles on the Renaissance Dam project, signed here by the leaders of the three countries in March .

A meeting of the three countries water ministers was supposed to be held here in late November but was deferred upon Egyptian request. Cairo had said, then, that the three countries foreign ministers should also take part in that meeting.

Earlier, the Egyptian Irrigation and Water Resources Minister Husam Maghazi said he was holding contacts “at the highest level” with the governments of the three countries to convene this six-man meeting.

The upcoming meeting will be attended by the Dam foreign consultants: The French B.R .L and the Dutch Deltars.

Musa said the meeting will seek to narrow the differences between the two consultants on the mechanisms for conducting the required studies.’’

The two consultancies are assigned to assess the negative and positive impacts of the Dam on the down- stream states.

Musa said the meeting will discuss “different scenarios for dealing with the two consultants, in case the two of them do not agree on the mechanisms for conducting the require studies”.

In a meeting in Cairo on 7-8 November, Egypt handed the Ethiopian side a list of remarks about the dam construction.

Egypt had, at the time, noted that the dam construction was very fast while the negotiations were going on at a low pace, a matter that could render the consultants’ findings of no value.

(ST)