The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam and the Revival of the Dispute Over the Colonial Nile Water Treaties

Abstract

For over five years, Ethiopia, Sudan, and Egypt have been conducting a series of negotiations over the filing and annual operation of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) but failed to strike a way forward deal acceptable to all of them. The recent involvement of the USA and World Bank in the negotiation further complicated the dispute and resulted in diplomatic crises. Although international and regional institutions, such as the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), the African Union (AU), and the European Union (EU), have recently been involved in the negotiations, the three states have made no progress and yet to agree on several outstanding issues. This doctrinal legal research, using an evaluative legal research model, expounds the ramifications of the colonial and 1959 Nile Treaties (colonial Nile Water Treaties) and argues that they comprise the principal obstacle to the GERD negotiations. Building on the disagreement over the baseline for the GERD’s impact studies, and examining the sticking points during the Washington, D.C., negotiations, the research indicates how the dispute over the colonial Nile Water Treaties is reviving and affecting the GERD negotiations. Finally, the research calls upon the three states to address the problems associated with the colonial Nile Water Treaties by limiting the scope of the current negotiations on the filling and annual operation of the GERD and leaving the long-term operation of the dam, water allocation, and dispute resolution for the Cooperative Framework Agreement (CFA).