Tomorrow, Monday, negotiations on the Renaissance Dam will be resumed by video link between Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia.
It is expected that the negotiations will discuss a new draft document prepared by Sudan based on the comments of the three countries, in addition to evaluating the negotiating track.
The negotiations seek - according to a statement issued by the Sudanese Ministry of Irrigation - to reach an "integrated agreement" regarding "the technical aspects of filling and operating the Renaissance Dam in conditions of normal rainy seasons, one dry season, long successive dry seasons, and permanent operating methods."
The Sudanese Ministry of Irrigation confirmed that a consensus occurred between the three countries in "most of the technical issues," and the statement indicated that Sudan was mandated to prepare a new draft agreement based on the comments of the three countries.
While Ethiopia said it had reached understandings with Egypt and Sudan over the first stage of filling the reservoir of the Renaissance Dam, Cairo accused Addis Ababa of stubbornness in the negotiations.
And Saturday, Egypt announced that the tripartite talks with Ethiopia and Sudan over the Renaissance Dam on the Nile River had reached a wall due to the "intransigence" of Addis Ababa.
A spokesman for the Egyptian Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation, Mohamed El Sebaei, said he was not optimistic about "any breakthrough or progress in the ongoing negotiations on the dam," in a statement posted on the ministry's Facebook page.
Al-Sibai attributed this to "Ethiopia's intransigence, which was evident during the meetings that are taking place between ministers of water resources in Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia."
"The Ethiopian position is based on forcing Egypt and Sudan either to sign a document that makes them prisoners of Ethiopia's will, or to accept Ethiopia taking unilateral measures, such as starting to fill the Renaissance Dam without an agreement with the downstream country," he added.
The strong-worded statement came after days of negotiations on the project, amid growing insistence that an agreement be reached before Ethiopia began filling the dam reservoir due in July.
Last Tuesday, the talks between the water and irrigation ministers resumed in Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan after a four-month hiatus, with the participation of three observers from the United States, the European Union and South Africa.
After several failed rounds of negotiations, the United States and the World Bank sponsored talks from November 2019 aimed at reaching a comprehensive agreement, after Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi asked US President Donald Trump.
The US Treasury urged Ethiopia to sign an agreement that Egypt accepted as "fair and balanced", but Ethiopia denied reaching an agreement, and accused Washington of being "non-diplomatic" and a differentiation between one party and another.