GERD: FM, India's Permanent Representative to UN Hold Talks in New York

Egypt's Foreign Minister (FM) Sameh Shoukry held talks Wednesday with the Indian Permanent Representative to the United Nations (UN)  in New York.

During the meeting, Shoukry presents Egypt's position on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) ahead of the Security Council session, scheduled for tomorrow, Thursday.

On Wednesday, the Egyptian delegation briefed the United Nations Security Council members on Egypt’s position and the negative repercussions of failure to reach an agreement on the filing and operating mechanisms of the (GERD).

This comes within the framework of intensive activities in New York to present all aspects of the dam issue.

Tunisia, the only Arab member of the 10 elected and non-permanent members of the UNSC, submitted last Friday an Egyptian-Sudanese GERD-focused draft resolution to the UN body, which is due to convene on Thursday upon the request of Cairo and Khartoum to discuss the issue.

According to AFP, the draft resolution calls on “Egypt, Ethiopia, and Sudan to resume negotiations at the joint invitation of the Chairperson of the African Union (AU) and the S ecretary-General of the United Nations to finalize, within a period of six months, the text of a binding agreement on the filling and operation of the GERD.”

The resolution stresses that the agreement should “ensure Ethiopia’s ability to generate hydropower from the GERD while preventing the inflicting of significant harm on the water security of downstream states.”

It also urges the “three countries to refrain from making any statements, or taking any action that may jeopardize the negotiation process, and urges Ethiopia to refrain from continuing to unilaterally fill the GERD reservoir.”

Ethiopia has already commenced its second-year filling of the GERD as Egypt and Sudan announced on Monday and Tuesday, respectively, that Addis Ababa had notified them of its unilateral move, which both downstream countries rejected with Cairo describing it as a “blatant and dangerous” violation of international laws as well as the Declaration of Principles signed in 2015.

Should the draft resolution be passed, in light of the current version of its text, Ethiopia has to halt its ongoing second filling of the GERD’s 74 bcm reservoir and postpone it to summer 2022. The filling takes place during the flood season – which starts in July and ends in September.

During the daily press briefing, Spokesman for the Secretary-General of the UN Stéphane Dujarric said on Tuesday that Inger Andersen, the executive director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), and the Political Affairs department will both have a briefing following Thursday’s UNSC session on GERD.