By Meredith Lee-Clark
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

CAIRO, Egypt – Egypt has rejected a potential water sharing agreement proposed by a conference of the ten Nile River Basin countries in Sharm Al-Sheik earlier this month. Egypt claims that reducing its traditional water rights threatens its fragile agriculture along the Nile, and perhaps Egypt itself.

Egypt’s latest refusal has led to the other countries upstream, including the Congo, Tanzania, Uganda, and Ethiopia, to threaten to shut Egypt out of the pact. Water pacts along the Nile have been in place since 1929, when most of the countries along the river were under British colonial European control. Egypt has traditionally been the most powerful country in the region, and has also held the most robust water rights.

“We will not sign on to any agreement that does not clearly state and acknowledge our historical rights,” said Egyptian Water Minister Mohamed Nasreddin Allam, after the meeting with representatives from the other Basin countries.

The countries upstream, led by Ethiopia, which contributes eighty percent of the water flowing into Egypt, have demanded what it calls a fairer water deal, departing from pre-independence treaties. Ethiopia and the other upper riparian countries also dispute the legitimacy of a 1959 water treaty between Egypt and Sudan, which allows Egypt alone to use 55.5 billion cubic meters of water per year, 87% of the Nile’s water per year, and granting Sudan 18.5 cubic meters per year. The 1929 and 1959 agreements also give Egypt veto power over any proposed dams and upstream river projects that may influence Egypt’s water flow.

Egypt says the issue could soon be one of national security, and that Egypt may be forced to use military force to protect its water rights. As the effects of climate change worsen, Egypt faces water threats from both ends of the Nile: as sea levels rise, the Egyptian cultural hub in the Nile River Delta could be flooded and inundated with salt water; as water needs become dire upstream, the fabled breadbasket of the Nile River Basin could become arid. Some analysts fear that the Nile River Basin could be a hotspot for a potential “water war.”

For more information, please see:

Afrik.com – Egypt Better Off Settling Water Spat with Ethiopia Led Nile Basin Negotiations – 27 April 2010

Al-Masri Al-Youm – Dying of Thirst vs. Death by Drowning – 27 April 2010

Daily Nation – Tension as Egypt Rejects New Deal for Nile Water – 27 April 2010

Guardian – Egypt Must Negotiate on Nile Water – 26 April 2010

All Headline News – Egypt Will Reassert Traditional Rights to Nile River Water – 23 April 2010