Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok on Wednesday said Sudan would defend Egypt’s right in water share in the ongoing negotiation talks over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam with Ethiopia, reported Egypt Today.
“Our stance on the Renaissance Dam is the same as Egypt’s, and we are with [Egypt] in every step,” Hamdok told Al-Ahram newspaper.
Egypt and Ethiopia are at loggerheads over the $4-billion GERD, which is under construction on the Blue Nile.
Egypt has voiced concern over its water share as it fears the filling of the dam reservoir would restrict already scarce supplies of water from the Nile, on which the country is almost entirely dependent. Ethiopia, on the other hand, says the hydroelectric dam is crucial to its economic development. The GERD is expected to produce over 6,000 megawatts of electricity and become Africa’s largest hydropower dam upon completion.
Egypt is seeking a minimum annual flow of 40 billion cubic meters of water from the Blue Nile branch to its lands. Filling the reservoir with a capacity of 74 billion cubic meters may take several years. While Ethiopia wants to fill it in five to six years, Egypt seeks to prolong the period to avoid the negative effects of water shortage.
During the interview, Hamdok affirmed that Sudan and Egypt have a similar stance on the GERD issue and that information exchange would help the three countries reach a solution to the crisis.
Several months of negotiations between the involved countries have failed to make any breakthrough. Representatives from the three countries recently started new rounds of talks with the mediation of the United States and the participation of the World Bank.
The foreign ministers of Egypt, Ethiopia, and Sudan are next set to meet in Washington on Jan. 13 to develop rules and guidelines for the filling and operation of the dam, the definition of drought conditions, and drought mitigation measures.
