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Egypt: Unquiet flows the Nile

Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on June 24, 2009 at 6:36 am

From AllAfrica.com:

Differences over sharing of Nile waters may have deepened following the failure among the nine countries along the Nile to come to an agreement.

Egypt refused to sign a long-negotiated water-sharing agreement at the talks held in late May. Egyptian experts say the proposed treaty failed to guarantee a fair share of Nile water. “Egypt’s position on the matter isn’t new,” Hani Raslan, head of the department for Sudan and Nile Basin countries at the Cairo-based Al-Ahram Centre for Political and Strategic Studies told IPS. “Egypt has the right to maintain its current share of Nile water under international law.”

Under the two Nile treaties signed in 1929 and 1959, Egypt has the right to consume up to 55.5 billion cubic metres per year of Nile water. “Egypt’s longstanding right to this amount was only referred to in the treaty as a postscript,” said Raslan. “It was not included in the main text of the proposed NBI (Nile Basin Initiative) agreement, prompting Egypt to reject it.”

“We will not concede our historic share of Nile water,” minister for water resources and irrigation Mohamed Nasreddin Allam was quoted as saying in independent daily Al-Dustour Jun. 2. Two days later, Allam declared that Egypt and Sudan had agreed that neither would relinquish water rights as stipulated in previous agreements.

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June 24, 2009 · Filed Under International Water Issues

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