Negotiations over a disputed Ethiopian dam on the Nile were scheduled to resume after a month-long break.
Relations between Ethiopia and neighbours Egypt and Sudan, already strained by disagreements over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam project, have soured over pronouncements and domestic policy from Addis Ababa.
On Thursday, Egypt’s government summoned the Ethiopian charge d’affaires in Cairo to complain about comments made by Dina Mufti, the Ethiopian Foreign Ministry spokesman, accusing Egypt of using the dispute over the dam project to bury its internal problems.
The diplomat, according to the Egyptian Foreign Ministry, was told that the remarks constituted a “blatant and unacceptable transgression” and were a provocation designed to conceal “Ethiopia’s own repeated failures”.
Egypt and Sudan, both downstream of the dam, have been trying to persuade Ethiopia to enter a legally-binding deal on its operation and the means of handling future disputes and the region’s persistent droughts.
The ministerial-level talks, sponsored by the African Union, were scheduled to take place online as a coronavirus prevention measure.
Sudan has a quarrel with Ethiopia which escalated after a border dispute flared into a series of deadly clashes.
Ethiopian federal forces are fighting separatist rebels in the Tigray region.
That conflict, which began in November, forced tens of thousands of mainly Tigrayans to seek refuge in Sudan.
Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed hinted that Egypt was trying to drive a wedge between his country and Sudan, where the military side of a transitional government is close to the Egyptian leadership.
On Saturday, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El Sisi and Sudan’s head of state, Gen Abdel Fattah Al Burhan, held discussions by phone.
Presidential spokesman Bassam Rady said Mr El Sisi assured Gen Al Burhan of Egypt’s “full support of Sudan” because of the “close bond between the national security” of the two countries.
For nearly a decade, the three nations have held negotiations over the dam without agreement.
The Nile meets nearly 95 per cent of Egypt’s water needs.
A significant drop in its share of the river’s water could mean the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs and the disruption of food supplies.
For Sudan, the absence of co-ordination on the operation of the dam built a short distance away from its border could spell disaster for its eastern breadbasket region through flooding and the disabling of its hydroelectric dams on the Nile.
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Tearful appearance
Chancellor Rachel Reeves set markets on edge as she appeared visibly distraught in parliament on Wednesday.
Legislative setbacks for the government have blown a new hole in the budgetary calculations at a time when the deficit is stubbornly large and the economy is struggling to grow.
She appeared with Keir Starmer on Thursday and the pair embraced, but he had failed to give her his backing as she cried a day earlier.
A spokesman said her upset demeanour was due to a personal matter.
Our legal columnist
Name: Yousef Al Bahar
Advocate at Al Bahar & Associate Advocates and Legal Consultants, established in 1994
Education: Mr Al Bahar was born in 1979 and graduated in 2008 from the Judicial Institute. He took after his father, who was one of the first Emirati lawyers
Dubai works towards better air quality by 2021
Dubai is on a mission to record good air quality for 90 per cent of the year – up from 86 per cent annually today – by 2021.
The municipality plans to have seven mobile air-monitoring stations by 2020 to capture more accurate data in hourly and daily trends of pollution.
These will be on the Palm Jumeirah, Al Qusais, Muhaisnah, Rashidiyah, Al Wasl, Al Quoz and Dubai Investment Park.
“It will allow real-time responding for emergency cases,” said Khaldoon Al Daraji, first environment safety officer at the municipality.
“We’re in a good position except for the cases that are out of our hands, such as sandstorms.
“Sandstorms are our main concern because the UAE is just a receiver.
“The hotspots are Iran, Saudi Arabia and southern Iraq, but we’re working hard with the region to reduce the cycle of sandstorm generation.”
Mr Al Daraji said monitoring as it stood covered 47 per cent of Dubai.
There are 12 fixed stations in the emirate, but Dubai also receives information from monitors belonging to other entities.
“There are 25 stations in total,” Mr Al Daraji said.
“We added new technology and equipment used for the first time for the detection of heavy metals.
“A hundred parameters can be detected but we want to expand it to make sure that the data captured can allow a baseline study in some areas to ensure they are well positioned.”
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