Egypt’s Ambassador in Rome Bassam Radi has explained to the Italian public opinion Cairo’s stance on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), directly, in detail and explicitly.
Renowned Port Porta talk show on Italy’s Rai 1 channel offered a whole episode on the dam issue.
Considering the great popularity and the huge viewing of the Rai channels, Radi moderated the story in Italian, and was able to give a detailed account of the issue.
The programme presented video clips shown for the first time showing details of the dam from the inside as well as its general location. Radi offered viewers an explanation of the Egyptian position on dam, stressing that Cairo is not against development for any country, yet not at the expense of other countries’ water security.
He highlighted Egypt’s insistence on preserving its historical rights in the Nile River waters,a source of life for all Egyptians, through concluding a legally binding agreement between Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan on the rules of filling and operating the dam.
This goes in line with the rules of the international law regulating the use of shared and cross-border river waters between countries. No agreement has been concluded despite ten years of negotiations, amid absence of a political will on the Ethiopians’ side, Radisaid.
He noted that Egypt had initialed an agreement drafted by the US regarding rules for filling and operating GERD, but the Ethiopian side did not. Egypt suffers from water poverty, as defined by the international standards of the
United Nations, as the per capita share in Egypt is less than 500 cubic metres of water annually, according to Egypt’s annual share of 55.5 billion cubic metres of water, he said.
Ethiopia receives huge amounts of water, up to about 950 billion cubic metres of rain water annually, he added, and stressed that the Nile is Egypt’s top source of water, which constitutes an existential issue for the country. Egypt, has never been complacent on its water security, and will never be, he said.
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