Ethiopia denies reports that it started filling dam

ADDIS ABABA – The water ministry of Ethiopia is denying local Ethiopian media reports that the country has started filling the reservoir of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD).

In a statement to The Associated Press, Water Minister Sileshi Bekele said that his country has not started filling the dam, and that the swelling of the dam’s reservoir, which has been captured in satellite images, is the result of heavy rains.

On Wednesday afternoon, the state-run Ethiopian Broadcasting Corporation reported that Ethiopia had started to fill the GERD’s reservoir despite a failure to reach an agreement with downstream countries Egypt and Sudan.

“The Ministry of Water, Irrigation and Energy announced that the Grand Renaissance Dam has started filling,” the agency said in a statement on Facebook. The news has gone viral in Arab and international media.

Despite Bekele’s denial that his country has started filling the dam, he did not deny other statements made to local media that the storage capacity of the dam’s reservoir will be 4.9 billion cubic meters of water in its first stage of filling.

He also added the filling of the dam would “go hand in hand” with the dam’s construction.

Cairo has made no formal response, but the Sudanese irrigation ministry said that it was following the situation with the aim of preserving the Sudanese people’s best interest.

Ethiopia has repeatedly said it would start filling the dam’s reservoir this month, with or without an accord with downstream countries Egypt and Sudan.

Both countries have warned about the consequences of Addis Ababa taking any unilateral action on the project, including beginning the filling process.

The Ethiopian announcements come two days after the end of the latest round of GERD talks between Ethiopia, Egypt and Sudan, which were held under the auspices of African Union (AU) and attended by observers from the European Union, the United States and the World Bank.

After 11 days of online talks that started on 3 July 2020, the three countries announced that no agreement was reached concerning the major points of disagreement, despite Sudan and Ethiopia indicating that there was limited progress in the talks.

The three countries presented their final reports on the progress of the talks to President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa, who is the current chairman of the AU. Ramaphosa is expected to hold a mini-summit of AU officials and heads of member states to discuss the next steps.

Cairo, which relies on the Nile for 95 percent of its fresh water, fears the dam will significantly reduce its share of water, especially during the filling stages through periods of drought and dry years.

Khartoum has said that the safety of its Roseires dam will be directly impacted by the operation of the GERD, which is located around 100km from the Sudanese dam. Ethiopia, on the other hand, says the project is key to its development efforts.

A previous round of negotiations in June had failed to produce an accord due to Ethiopia’s refusal to enter into a legally binding agreement and its announcement that it would begin filling the dam in July, with or without the approval of the two downstream countries.

Egypt, as a result, presented a draft resolution for deliberation to the UN Security Council, which encouraged the three countries to reach an accord within two weeks and refrain from any unilateral actions related to the dam.