Khartoum Announces Deal on Filling Renaissance Dam in 7 Years

The Grand Renaissance Dam hydroelectric project in Ethiopia. (AFP)
The Grand Renaissance Dam hydroelectric project in Ethiopia. (AFP)
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Khartoum Announces Deal on Filling Renaissance Dam in 7 Years

The Grand Renaissance Dam hydroelectric project in Ethiopia. (AFP)
The Grand Renaissance Dam hydroelectric project in Ethiopia. (AFP)

Sudanese Irrigation Minister Yasser Abbas said on Sunday that Egypt, Ethiopia, and Sudan have agreed on filling the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam’s (GERD) reservoir “over a period of up to seven years.”

The Sudanese official said the two-day talks held on November 15 in Addis Ababa between the three states and in the presence of representatives from the US and the World Bank, made progress on some disputed issues.

He said a breakthrough in the talks was reached over the hydroelectric dam, which has generated much tension between Egypt and Ethiopia over the past few years.

Ethiopia insists the $4 billion hydro-electric barrage is essential for its economic growth given that most of its population still lives without electricity.

Abbas said last week’s negotiations also tackled the “permanent operations of the dam and its effect on the dam systems in Egypt and Sudan.”

While the spokesperson of the Egyptian Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation Mohammed al-Sibai refused to confirm or deny the Sudanese minister’s comments, he told Asharq Al-Awsat that the Addis Ababa talks discussed filling the dam’s reservoir in stages and based on the hydraulic system of the Blue Nile River.

He said that such technique would help prevent any harm to downstream countries.

Representatives from Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan are set to meet on December 2-3 in Cairo to continue technical talks over outstanding matters.

On Saturday, Ethiopian Ambassador to Egypt Dina Mufti told Asharq Al-Awsat that any misunderstanding between Egypt and Ethiopia should be solved peacefully.

Egypt states that all Nile Valley countries have a right to economic development. However, Cairo insists that this policy should not affect “its interests and rights in the Nile,” particularly that Egypt relies on the river to cover more than 90 percent of its irrigation and drinking water needs.

Meanwhile, the president of the Arab Parliament Mishaal bin Fahm Al-Salami said Sunday he had sent a written message to the Ethiopian prime minister and the head of the Ethiopian House of Peoples’ Representatives announcing the Arab Parliament’s solidarity with Egypt and Sudan in protecting their water security.

In a post on his official Twitter account, Salami stressed the importance of reaching a fair agreement on filling and operating the GERD as soon as possible, and in a way that protects the interests of all parties.



Trump Administration Ends Some USAID Contracts Providing Lifesaving Aid across the Middle East

A USAID flag flutters outside, as the USAID building sits closed to employees after a memo was issued advising agency personnel to work remotely, in Washington, DC, US, February 3, 2025. (Reuters)
A USAID flag flutters outside, as the USAID building sits closed to employees after a memo was issued advising agency personnel to work remotely, in Washington, DC, US, February 3, 2025. (Reuters)
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Trump Administration Ends Some USAID Contracts Providing Lifesaving Aid across the Middle East

A USAID flag flutters outside, as the USAID building sits closed to employees after a memo was issued advising agency personnel to work remotely, in Washington, DC, US, February 3, 2025. (Reuters)
A USAID flag flutters outside, as the USAID building sits closed to employees after a memo was issued advising agency personnel to work remotely, in Washington, DC, US, February 3, 2025. (Reuters)

The Trump administration has notified the World Food Program and other partners that it has terminated some of the last remaining lifesaving humanitarian programs across the Middle East, a US official and a UN official told The Associated Press on Monday.

The projects were being canceled “for the convenience of the US Government” at the direction of Jeremy Lewin, a top lieutenant at Trump adviser Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency whom the Trump administration appointed to oversee and finish dismantling the US Agency for International Development, according to letters sent to USAID partners and viewed by the AP.

About 60 letters canceling contracts were sent over the past week, including for major projects with the World Food Program, the world’s largest provider of food aid, a USAID official said. An official with the United Nations in the Middle East said the World Food Program received termination letters for US-funded programs in Lebanon, Jordan and Syria.

Both officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly.

Some of the last remaining US funding for key programs in Yemen, Somalia, Afghanistan and the southern African nation of Zimbabwe also was affected, including for those providing food, water, medical care and shelter for people displaced by war, the USAID official said.

The UN official said the groups that would be hit hardest include Syrian refugees in Jordan and Lebanon. Also affected are programs supporting vulnerable Lebanese people and providing irrigation systems inside Syria, a country emerging from a brutal civil war and struggling with poverty and hunger.

In Yemen, another war-divided country that is facing one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters, the terminated aid apparently includes food that has already arrived in distribution centers, the UN official said.

Aid officials were just learning of many of the cuts Monday and said they were struggling to understand their scope.

Another of the notices, sent Friday, abruptly pulled US funding for a program with strong support in Congress that had sent young Afghan women overseas for schooling amid Taliban prohibitions on women’s education, said an administrator for that project, which is run by Texas A&M University.

The young women would now face return to Afghanistan, where their lives would be in danger, according to that administrator, who was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The Trump administration had pledged to spare those most urgent, lifesaving programs in its cutting of aid and development programs through the State Department and USAID.

The Republican administration already has canceled thousands of USAID contracts as it dismantles USAID, which it accuses of wastefulness and of advancing liberal causes.

The newly terminated contracts were among about 900 surviving programs that Secretary of State Marco Rubio had notified Congress he intended to preserve, the USAID official said.

There was no immediate comment from the State Department.