Cairo was notified in advance about the diversion of the Blue Nile before the move was officially announced by Ethiopia late Monday evening, an informed government official told Ahram Online.
“We had already known this; we were notified and the president knew,” he said.
Ethiopia on Tuesday began diverting the course of the Blue Nile, one of the Nile River’s two major tributaries, as part of a project to build a new dam.
The move, called “historic” by Ethiopian government spokesman Bereket Simon, is likely to anger downstream Egypt and Sudan, both of which fear the move will negatively affect their annual quotas on Nile water.
Ethiopia’s ‘Renaissance Dam’ is one of four dams planned for construction along the Blue Nile, which provides Egypt with the lion’s share of its annual 55 billion cubic metres of Nile water.
On Monday, Ethiopian Foreign Minister Gebre-Christos said the dam, which is currently under construction and will be able to store some 84 million cubic metres of Nile water, would be used exclusively for power generation and would not reduce Egypt’s share of Nile water.
The Egyptian government source said that, during President Mohamed Morsi’s visit to Addis Ababa – which ended Monday evening only hours before the announcement – there had been unsuccessful attempts to convince the Ethiopian side to delay the move.
“There were attempts [to persuade Ethiopia to postpone the move] through several diplomatic channels, both direct and indirect, and during the president’s talks with senior Ethiopian officials,” the source said.
“President Morsi raised the matter, but it was clear Ethiopia is determined to go ahead.”
The source added that Addis Ababa was offering “reassurances” that it would be “sensitive” to Egyptian concerns and would “try to accommodate” Cairo’s demand that it fill the planned dam’s reservoir only gradually, so as to ensure that the effect on Egypt’s annual share of Nile water would not be too abrupt.
The Ethiopian move to redirect the course of the Blue Nile is perceived by Cairo as an indication of Addis Ababa’s determination to follow through with its plans, despite Egypt’s objections that such plans violate international agreements that put Egypt’s annual share of Nile water at 55 billion cubic metres.
Addis Ababa has repeatedly shrugged off these agreements, asserting that they deny all Nile Basin states – apart from Egypt and Sudan – any serious share of river water.
Read more at: Cairo knew of planned Blue Nile diversion in advance: Govt source – Ahram Online.
You should better read east African politics before commenting. We all know Egypt has been participating in many civil wars in upstream countries or Islamist terrorists operating from Somalia and Eritrea. Although we have many options, we have the right to use our natural resource without the permission of Egypt, Israel or any ignorant Arab politicians. Stop your barbarian thinking and come up with idea better ideas.
I don’t know why you/Egypt people attribute everything to Israel sabotage against you? Is Arab spring the dream of Israel? We Ethiopian good enough to make our decision. With the will of God and our hard working people will reach what we planned. But you loser your stupidity forgiven.
Here is one of Egyptians wrote in http://www.almasryalyoum.com/node/1789536
اتبع الرئيس مبارك سياسة العصا والجزرة مع دول حوض النيل خاصة اثيوبيا . فمن جهة كان يعرض عليهم التعاون الاقتصادي واستيراد منتجاتهم بكثرة ” اللحوم الاثيوبية مثلا ” وفي نفس الوقت تنفيذ الشركات المصرية لمشروعات للري في هذه البلاد تتيح لهم الاستفادة من مياه الأمطار – لمن لا يعلم مياه الأمطار التي تهطل على دول حوض النيل تعادل عشرين ضعف مياه نهر النيل تقريبا لا يستفاد منها بسبب نقص تمويل مشروعات الري – . وفي نفس الوقت ارتبطت مصر بعلاقات سرية وثيقة مع حركات المعارضة والمتمردين في دول منابع النيل مثل جيش الرب الأوغندي والحركة الانفصالية في اريتريا التي نجحت في فصل اريتريا عن اثيوبيا ووصل الأمر أن أنشأت مصر حركة شباب المجاهدين الصومالية التي كانت تعلن الجهاد على اثيوبيا كلما حاولت اثيوبيا العبث في مياه النيل .
بهذه السياسة نجح الرئيس مبارك في الحفاظ على توازن العلاقات لسنوات مع التهديد برد فعل عنيف في حال المساس بحصة مصر . الحقيقة أن هذه الشعوب لا تعادي مصر ولكن حكوماتها تتخذ هذه الخطوات مدفوعة من الصهاينة للضغط على مصر
In English:
President Mubarak pursued a policy of carrot and stick with the Nile Basin countries, especially Ethiopia.
On the one hand was offering them for Economic Cooperation and import their products heavily “meat Ethiopian example,” At the same time the implementation of the Egyptian companies to irrigation projects in this country allows them to take advantage of rain water – those who do not know the rainwater that falls on the Nile Basin countries, equivalent to twenty times the Nile water almost underutilized due to lack of finance irrigation projects -.
At the same time associated with Egypt relations secret document with opposition movements and rebels in the countries of the Nile sources such as the Lord’s Resistance Army of Uganda and the separatist movement in Eritrea, which has succeeded in separating Eritrea from Ethiopia and it came to Egypt established the Young Mujahideen Movement in Somalia, which was declared jihad against Ethiopia whenever you try to Ethiopia tampering in the waters of the Nile.
This policy of President Mubarak succeeded in maintaining the balance of relations for years with the threat of a violent reaction in the event of compromising Egypt share. The fact that these people are not hostile to Egypt, but their governments take these steps driven by the Zionists to put pressure on Egypt