Sudan’s cabinet backs UAE mediation in disputes with Ethiopia

Tensions between the two neighbours have escalated over the al-Fashaqa farmlands and the GERD.

Sudan’s transitional cabinet has backed an initiative by the United Arab Emirates to mediate in a border dispute with Ethiopia, as well as over a controversial large dam built by Addis Ababa on the Blue Nile River. Tensions surrounding the control of farmland in the al-Fashaqa region, on the border, have escalated in recent months, while talks over the operation of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD),  which will affect water volume downstream on the Nile in Sudan and Egypt, are deadlocked. Sudan’s Information Minister Hamza Baloul said on Tuesday the cabinet had supported the proposal for Emirati mediation after it had been studied at the ministry level.