The UN gets Involved in the Nile Dam Saga

Egypt has told the United Nations it faces an existential threat, from a hydroelectric dam that Ethiopia is building on the Blue Nile River. Ethiopia is expected to start filling the Grand Renaissance Dam with water next month. But at a virtual meeting of the Security Council, Egypt warned of conflict if the UN does not intervene. Ethiopia’s U.N. Ambassador Taye Atskeselassie Amde said his government does not believe the dispute should be in the Security Council since leaders of the three countries have agreed to the AU-led process, and efforts to resolve it peacefully are not yet exhausted. He argued that Ethiopia has been deprived of its right to use the Blue Nile’s waters, saying more than 60 percent of the country is dry land with no sustaining water resources while Egypt is endowed with ground water and has access to sea water which cud be desalinated.

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA