Sudan Asks UN Security Council to Meet over Ethiopia’s Controversial Blue Nile Dam

A view of the Nile River flowing through Cairo, Egypt. (Getty Images)
A view of the Nile River flowing through Cairo, Egypt. (Getty Images)
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Sudan Asks UN Security Council to Meet over Ethiopia’s Controversial Blue Nile Dam

A view of the Nile River flowing through Cairo, Egypt. (Getty Images)
A view of the Nile River flowing through Cairo, Egypt. (Getty Images)

Sudan asked the United Nations Security Council on Tuesday to meet and discuss a dispute over a giant dam being built by Ethiopia on the Blue Nile, a government statement said.

Ethiopia is pinning its hopes of economic development and power generation on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), while the two downstream countries - Egypt and Sudan - are concerned about it and seeking a binding agreement on the filling and operation of the dam.

Egypt relies on the Nile River for as much as 90 percent of its fresh water and sees the dam as an existential threat. Sudan is concerned about the operation of its own Nile dams and water stations, Reuters reported.

Sudan’s Foreign Minister Mariam Sadiq al-Mahdi called on the Security Council to hold a session as soon as possible to discuss GERD and “its impact on the safety and security of millions of people,” the government statement said.

In a letter to the council head, she called on him to urge Ethiopia to stop the “unilateral” filling of the dam “which exacerbates the dispute and poses a threat to regional and international peace and security,” the statement added.

Ethiopian officials did not immediately return messages seeking comment.

Sudan and Egypt had already agreed this month to work together on all levels to push Ethiopia to negotiate “seriously” on an agreement, after African Union-sponsored talks remained deadlocked. The two countries called on the international community to intervene.

Earlier this month, Arab states called on the Security Council to discuss the dispute and Ethiopia’s plans to go ahead with the second filling of the dam this summer even without an agreement with Sudan and Egypt.

Ethiopia rejected the Arab League resolution in its entirety, its Foreign Ministry said.

The country previously rejected calls from Egypt and Sudan to involve mediators outside the African Union.

Sudan said earlier in June that it was open to a partial interim agreement on the multibillion-dollar dam, with specific conditions.



Toll in Syria Opposition-army Fighting Rises to 242

Fighters from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) ride in military vehicles in the eastern outskirts of the town of Atarib, in Syria's northern province of Aleppo on November 27, 2024, during clashes with the Syrian army. (Photo by Abdulaziz KETAZ / AFP)
Fighters from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) ride in military vehicles in the eastern outskirts of the town of Atarib, in Syria's northern province of Aleppo on November 27, 2024, during clashes with the Syrian army. (Photo by Abdulaziz KETAZ / AFP)
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Toll in Syria Opposition-army Fighting Rises to 242

Fighters from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) ride in military vehicles in the eastern outskirts of the town of Atarib, in Syria's northern province of Aleppo on November 27, 2024, during clashes with the Syrian army. (Photo by Abdulaziz KETAZ / AFP)
Fighters from Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) ride in military vehicles in the eastern outskirts of the town of Atarib, in Syria's northern province of Aleppo on November 27, 2024, during clashes with the Syrian army. (Photo by Abdulaziz KETAZ / AFP)

More than 240 people, mostly combatants, were killed as intense fighting approached Syria's northern Aleppo city after the opposition launched a major offensive on government-held areas this week, a monitor said Friday.
On Wednesday, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and allied Turkish-backed factions launched an attack on government-held areas in the northwest, triggering the fiercest fighting since 2020, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Rami Abdel Rahman, who heads the Observatory, said fighting reached two kilometers (1.2 miles) from the main northern city of Aleppo, where the group’s artillery shelling on student housing killed four civilians, according to state media.
"The combatants' death toll in the ongoing... operation in the Idlib and Aleppo countrysides has risen to 218," since Wednesday, said the British-based monitor with a network of sources inside Syria.
In addition to the fighters, it said 24 civilians were killed.
Syrian ally Russia launched air strikes that killed 19 civilians on Thursday, while another civilian had been killed in Syrian army shelling a day earlier, said the Observatory which on Thursday had reported an overall toll of about 200 dead, including the civilians.