Egyptian Minister of Irrigation Travels to Uganda to Join NBI Meeting

CAIRO - 27 March 2017: Egyptian Minister of Irrigation Mohamed Abdel-Ati, accompanied by a delegation of ministers, arrived in Uganda’s Entebbe Monday, according to a press release issued by the Egyptian Ministry of Water Resources & Irrigation.

The delegation will meet with the Nile Basin Initiative’s ministerial council to address Egypt’s concerns about unilateral actions taken by some NBI members which resulted in Egypt boycotting the initiative’s activities since 2010.

The press release stated that Egypt seeks the NBI members’ understanding of Egyptian concerns and hopes to re-open the discussion about certain points in the Entebbe agreement which are highly contested by some member states. Only 5 NBI members signed the agreement in 2010: Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, and Rwanda, and it was rejected by Egypt and Sudan. Egypt later boycotted the initiative’s activities.
The agreement sought to change Egypt and Sudan’s historical shares of the Nile’s water.