Cairo, Jan 5 (Aswat Masriya) - A high-level Egyptian technical delegation will visit Addis Ababa on Tuesday to attend the first meeting on Egypt’s concerns about the Renaissance Dam as per the Khartoum Document agreed on recently.

Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia signed the “Khartoum Document” in late December, agreeing on a mechanism for resolving contested issues related to the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, which is still under construction.

The document provided that a French firm would conduct studies on the dam’s effect on water supply, and set a timeframe of eight months to a year for the completion of the technical studies, which the Sudanese foreign minister said would start in February.

The document also stipulates full compliance with the “Declaration of Principles”, a preliminary documented signed by the heads of the three states in March and considered to be a milestone after numerous rounds of negotiations.

Egypt fears that Renaissance Dam could seriously hinder its water supply.

For decades, Egypt has been receiving 55 billion cubic meters of the Nile river's water annually, the largest share, as per colonial-era agreements signed in the absence of Ethiopia, whose Blue Nile tributary supplies most the water. 

Once an agricultural state, Egypt relies on the Nile river as its main source of water but Ethiopia believes it is entitled to using the water for development, by creating electricity using the dam. The two countries have reiterated multiple times that they will not harm each other's interests, which seem to conflict.