CAIRO, May 24 (Xinhua) -- Egypt on Wednesday urged Ethiopia to respect the Nile River downstream countries' water rights over the handling of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD). He urged the Ethiopian side to stop using such a claim to evade its international obligations to downstream countries over its operation of GERD. The ministry slammed Egypt for exerting pressure on Ethiopia via the AL forum, calling Egypt to stop citing "defunct colonial agreements" as the basis of its claim, without detailing. Ethiopia started building the dam in 2011 which was expected to produce more than 6,000 megawatts of electricity, while Egypt and Sudan, both downstream Nile Basin countries, are concerned that the dam might affect their share of the water resources. The GERD negotiations between Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia have been suspended since April 2021, following marathon talks that lasted for years without yielding results.

Source: Ethiopian News May 24, 2023 23:39 UTC