NEW YORK CITY, N.Y. (Semonegna) – Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has made a bold stress regarding the Nile River and Ethiopia’s Renaissance Dam on the river while he was addressing the general debate of the 74th Session of the General Assembly of the United Nations (UNGA) in New York on 24 September 2019.
In his 14-minute speech, the president has said that, acknowledging Ethiopia’s right development, the Nile water issue a matter of life and existence for Egypt, and the international community should play a substantial role in creating a consensus between Ethiopia and other Nile Basin countries, specifically Egypt.
The portion of Sisi’s speech, where he talked about the Nile River and Ethiopia’s Renaissance Dam (starts at 13:17), is scripted in English as follows:
Mr. President, for decades Egypt has sought to strengthen and deepen the bonds of cooperation with its brotherly Nile Basin countries with whom it enjoys eternal relations. As a testament to its keenness to further the well-being of the peoples of the Nile Basin, Egypt expressed its understanding regarding Ethiopia’s commencement to construct the Renaissance Dam despite the fact that the later did not conduct the necessary studies on the effects of this huge project to insure that no harm befall the water interest of downstream countries including Egypt.
Notwithstanding, Egypt took the initiative to bring forth the agreements on the Declaration of Principles signed on the 23rd March 2015 in Khartoum; ad this launched a four-year long negotiations process to reach an agreement governing the process of filling and operating the Renaissance Dam. Unfortunately these negotiations have not yielded the desired results. Nevertheless Egypt still hopes for an agreement that will secure the common interests of the peoples of the Blue Nile – in Ethiopia, the Sudan and Egypt.
The continued impasse in the negotiations on the Dam will have negative repercussions on the stability as well as on the development in the Region in general and in Egypt in particular, while we recognize Ethiopia’s right to development, for Egypt the water of the Nile is a matter of life. It is an existential matter and this places a great responsibility on the international community to play a constructive role in urging all parties to demonstrate flexibility in order to achieve a mutually satisfactory agreement.