BREAKING: President Sisi, Abiy Ahmed discuss GERD, bilateral ties in Cairo meeting

CAIRO – 13 July 2023: Egypt’s President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi has received Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed in Cairo, where they discussed enhancing Egyptian-Ethiopian relations, a statement by the Egyptian Presidency said early on Thursday.

During their meeting on the sidelines of the Sudan Neighboring States Summit, which Cairo will host on Thursday, Sisi and Ahmed discussed means of settling the Sudanese crisis.

They also discussed developments of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD).

Egyptian-Ethiopian relations

Relations between Egypt and Ethiopia have been disturbed over the past years due to the disputes over the GERD that Ethiopia builds on the Blue Nile.

Ethiopia plans to conclude the fourth filling of the dam’s reservoir by September unilaterally despite the Egyptian and Sudanese concerns over the filling of the dam without reaching a legally binding solution.

This Cairo meeting between the Egyptian and Ethiopian leaders come ahead of Sudan Neighboring States Summit that the Egyptian capital will host with the participation of leaders of Egypt, Libya, Chad, Central Africa, South Sudan, Ethiopia and Eritrea and representatives from Sudan.

Since the start of the crisis in Sudan on 15 April, Egypt, Ethiopia and other neighboring countries have received nearly 700,000 people from Sudan, including Sudanese and third-country nationals, according to the International Organization for Migration (IOM) on 6 July.

Sudan Neighboring States Summit

The summit seeks to discuss ways to end the current conflict and its negative repercussions on neighboring countries.

The summit aims to establish effective mechanisms to settle the crisis in Sudan in a peaceful manner and in coordination with other regional and international tracks, the Egyptian Presidency announced this week.

The world is pinning hopes on the summit to find a solution to the conflict that has continued since mid-April between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), killing hundreds, displacing millions and causing hundreds of thousands of Sudanese to flee the country to neighboring states.

The Sudanese delegation will be headed by Malik Agar, the Deputy Chairman of the Transitional Sovereignty Council (TSC) and will include Sudan’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ambassador Ali Al-Sadiq, according to Al-Sudani news website.

Egypt has repeatedly called for a permanent ceasefire in Sudan, which would pave the way for resolving the ongoing conflict peacefully and stop the bloodshed.

On Sunday, the Presidency stressed Sisi’s keenness to formulate a joint vision for Sudan’s neighboring states and take steps to settle the crisis, end the bloodshed in Sudan, and spare the Sudanese people the repercussions of the crisis.

The Presidency also highlighted keenness to protect the Sudanese state and its resources and put an end to the grave effects of the crisis on the neighboring states as well as on the regional security and stability.