Ethiopia calls for the formation of an African front against the "colonial claims" of Egypt and Sudan

Today, Wednesday, Ethiopia called on the African countries of the Upper Nile Basin to form what it described as a front against the Egyptian and Sudanese moves on the issue of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam project, hours before a Security Council session called by the two countries to object to Addis Ababa’s implementation of the second filling of the dam.

A statement by the Ethiopian Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated that the Ethiopian Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Demke Mokkinen Hassan, met in his office the ambassadors and diplomats of the Nile Basin countries to Ethiopia to inform them of the latest developments in the Renaissance Dam negotiations.

During the meeting, the minister said that the recent attempts of Sudan and Egypt to raise the issue of the Renaissance Dam to the UN Security Council, by mobilizing the League of Arab States, would internationalize the issue and unnecessarily add security to it.

He added that this leaves a dangerous precedent, takes the negotiation process away from the position of the African Union and contravenes the principle of solving African problems through African-led mechanisms.

The Deputy Prime Minister indicated that Ethiopia believes that the Renaissance Dam is a development project that does not fall under the mandate of the United Nations Security Council, calling on the Council to respect the ongoing negotiations and the tripartite process led by the African Union, according to the statement.

He also called on the countries located on the upper Nile Basin to "form a common front to oppose the downstream approach, which undermines the role of the African Union and confirms the colonial and monopolistic claims of the two countries over this common resource."

The statement stated that the ambassadors stressed that the issue of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam is also a source of concern, because they all aspire to benefit from the Nile River for development purposes.

The diplomats also stressed that the UN Security Council does not have a mandate to take a decision on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, according to the statement.

They said that the Renaissance Dam negotiations have been in the capable hands of the African Union so far, which should be encouraged more, stressing that all negotiating parties should seek peaceful solutions within the framework of the process led by the African Union by committing to the principle of finding "African solutions to African problems."

An official source in the General Secretariat of the League of Arab States expressed the League’s dismay at what was stated in Ethiopia’s last letter to the Security Council on July 5, in which it rejects the intervention of the Arab League in the issue of the Renaissance Dam, claiming that this may undermine the friendly and cooperative relations between the League and the African Union.

The source concluded his statements by saying that the Ethiopian endeavor is trying to portray the issue as an Arab-African conflict, which is wrong and causes alarm and regret, calling on Addis Ababa to review this unconstructive approach.

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