(borkena) Toronto based international intelligence publication and consultancy firm, Geopolitical Monitor, lists Nile as one of the three international waters likely to cause conflict.
In addition to Nile, the report by Patrick Johnson identified Brahmaputra river between India and China, Tigris river and Ilisu Dam between Turkey and Iraq as prone to cause international conflict.
With regard to Nile, the report projected the Renaissance Dam as important undertaking to supply the region with hydroelectric power but indicated potential problem it invites too. The report highlighted what it calls “legal argument” on the part of Egypt :
- Cairo’s legal argument defers to treaties from 1929 and 1959 that guarantee Egypt two-thirds of the Nile’s waters along with the right to veto any upstream projects – a right that was ignored when Ethiopia unilaterally went ahead with construction.
Conceivably, the report does not highlight the circumstances under which treaties, which Egypt seem to think in terms of an absolute right, were signed in Colonial Africa.