Politics

Egypt sets red line over Blue Nile amid deadlock with Ethiopia

An Egyptian minister warns Ethiopia it will "pay" for any harm done to Egypt's water security, stoking speculation that the long-running clash over its GERD dam will spark a water war

An aerial view of the Nile River.
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An aerial view of the Nile River.

Egypt sets red line over Blue Nile amid deadlock with Ethiopia

Amr Emam
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The row between Egypt and Ethiopia over water security has deepened, stoking fears that diplomatic efforts over the clash are becoming exhausted without any resolution to the dispute.

A fresh warning from Cairo’s irrigation minister to its neighbour over plans for a dam on the Blue Nile has reverberated internationally. Speaking to journalists in late March, Hani Sewilam said: "Ethiopia will pay for any impact on Egypt one day".

The tough talk continued. He said his country has the right to take the necessary measures to protect itself from the dam's potential impact, speaking as the construction phase of the near $5bn project neared its completion.

Sewilam’s words marked a change in tone in Cairo’s approach to a long-running dispute, according to people who have been following it as it has run through various international diplomatic channels, including a referral to the United Nations Security Council.

The new position stoked speculation about what action Egypt is considering after a long period in which the country has clarified its concerns.

Long-running spat

It has been months since the country suspended negotiations over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), a multibillion-dollar hydroelectric project on the main tributary of the Nile itself, Egypt’s main source of freshwater.

Egyptian negotiators walked out of what they called “futile negotiations” with the Ethiopians in December. Sudan, another downstream state, was also involved in discussing the dam's filling and operation before the project's completion, which is now expected soon.

Those talks started in 2011 and have produced no meaningful results, even with various mediators, including the United States, the African Union and the World Bank. Egypt accused Ethiopia of using the negotiations to waste time until progress on the dam is irreversible.

Egypt is already short of water resources, and its concern over the impact of GERD, which it fears will worsen its problems with irrigation, goes back to the start of the project.

The Nile’s flow into the country brings around 55.5 billion cubic feet of water daily. That used to be enough to meet the needs of Egypt’s population, agriculture, and industry.

Bur population growth has created more demand, just as Ethiopia’s plans threaten supply. According to government estimates, 105 million Egyptians and around 9 million refugees live in the country, creating a widening water deficit of over 30 billion cubic feet a year.

"The problem is that water shortages will increase in the future," Abbas Sharaqi, a professor of geology and water resources at Cairo University, told Al Majalla.

"The population keeps growing, but the amount of water Egypt gets from the Nile and other sources, including rainfall, remains the same over the years," he added.

Egypt is already short of water resources and fears GERD will worsen its irrigation problems.

Expected devastation

When GERD is fully operational, the drop in water flow may cause massive devastation to Egypt's farmlands, widening the gap between food consumption and production capacity and leaving Cairo more dependent on food imports.

Egypt has been trying to partly overcome its water shortages by increasing its water treatment capacity, including seawater desalination, which has become a major national expense.

Throughout, Ethiopia argues it has the right to use its own natural resources, including water, to make developmental progress and help its own people out of poverty.

It insists the dam will provide much-needed electricity to tens of millions of poor people in Ethiopian cities and neighbouring countries.

The Ethiopian government has already signed electricity interconnection and export deals. A fully operational GERD will play a central role in fulfilling them. It expects the dam's construction to be complete within a few months.

And so, the timing of Egypt's warning over water security has caught more attention, as has the wider context in which the minister made his remarks.

Sewilam referred to a 2015 declaration of principles signed by Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan, stipulating that any party responsible for causing significant harm to any of the others shall take all appropriate measures to mitigate or eliminate such harm and, where appropriate, discuss the issue of compensation.

But Ethiopia interprets the declaration differently. Its officials insist that it is not a binding agreement between the three countries.

AFP
A member of the Republican March Band poses for photo before at the ceremony for the inaugural energy production at the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) in Guba, Ethiopia, on February 20, 2022.

Egypt's redline

Egypt will likely be making preparations to deal with what may happen next. President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi has been clear, saying not a drop of water will be taken away from his country's share of the Nile, describing it as a "red line".  

Nevertheless, it will be difficult for Egypt to minimise the potential impact on its water security.

Diplomatic efforts to do so are complicated by the civil war in Sudan, which has robbed Cairo of the ability to work with a downstream ally. For most of the last decade, the two countries were united in their opposition to GERD.

With the alliance compromised, it is easier for Ethiopia to impose its own view of what a fair share of flow from the Nile should be.

In 2021, Egypt referred the GERD issue to the United Nations Security Council, which referred the case to the African Union. The AU did not take action to solve the dispute.

In 2022, Egypt sent a letter to the Security Council, complaining against Ethiopia's unilateral filling of the dam's reservoir.

When GERD is fully operational, the drop in water flow may cause massive devastation to Egypt's farmlands.

Diplomatic channels run dry

Observers point out that it now looks like Egypt has exhausted all legal and diplomatic channels.

"Over the past 13 years, Egyptian negotiators tried every legal and diplomatic channel to get Ethiopia to agree to a formula that would not harm Egypt's water security," Diaa al-Qousi, a former advisor to the minister of irrigation, told Al Majalla.

"Sorry to say, all attempts over these years had failed, which is why – I think – Egypt will start talking tough," he added.

How far Egypt will take its rhetoric is open to question, although it has previously said it will not exclude any option over the issue.

And there has been top-level speculation on the world stage. In October 2020,  when serving as US president, Donald Trump said Egypt might end up blowing up the Ethiopian dam.

Any military action over the issue would be catastrophic to the region and herald a new era in Africa: one of water wars.

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