Special to WorldTribune.com

CAIRO — Key opinion leaders in Egypt have expressed alarm over a foreign project to divert the
Nile River.

Officials said the regime of President Mohammed Morsi has been
monitoring the launch of an Ethiopian project to construct a dam over the
Blue Nile. They said the dam could deny Egypt more than 60 percent of its
annual allocation from the giant river.

“We’re expecting Ethiopian officials to make good on their earlier
promise to act in a way that would not harm Egyptian interests,” Egyptian
ambassador to Ethiopia, Mohammed Idris, told the official Al Ahram daily on May 29.

On May 29, the Egyptian Foreign Ministry summoned Ethiopian ambassador Mahmoud Dardir to protest the dam project. Officials said the Foreign Ministry complained that Addis Ababa should have waited until the release of a report on the Nile by an international committee.

Officials said Cairo, with the most modern air force in the Arab world,
has warned that the dam would violate the 1959 agreement on sharing of the
Nile. They said Egypt was also working with Sudan to stop the Ethiopian
project.

On May 28, Ethiopia held a ceremony to launch the construction of the
Great Ethiopian Renaissance Dam. At the ceremony, Deputy Prime Minister
Demeke Mekonnin said Ethiopia would use the dam for hydroelectricity for
Ethiopia and the rest of the region.

Egypt, believed restrained by the United States, was said to have been
quietly discussing the dam with Ethiopia.

Officials said the Morsi regime had been informed of plans to launch the dam
as early as November 2012.

“They [Morsi] have hypnotized Egyptian society, making the issue appear
much smaller than its repercussions will be,” Hani Raslan, an analyst at the
state-sponsored Al Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies, said.

In contrast, the Islamist opposition said the Ethiopian dam could result
in war. The Gamiat Islamiya, transformed from an insurgency network to a
political movement, called on the government to “confront this danger.”

“The construction of a Ethiopian Renaissance Dam is tantamount to a
declaration of war against Egypt,” Gamiat political bureau chief Tareq Al
Zumur said.

Still, Morsi sought to play down the significance of the dam project.
The Egyptian president said he was awaiting a report by a Nile committee
comprised of Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan before Cairo reacted. The report was
expected to be issued by June.

“Our position in principle is that Egypt would not accept any project
that negatively affects the current water flow,” Water Resources Minister
Mohammed Baha Eddin said.

  Demeke Mekonnin, Egypt fears losing much of the Nile to Ethiopian dam, Great Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, Mahmoud Dardir, Mohammed Morsi