Nile water-sharing deal
Uganda, Rwanda, Tanzania and Ethiopia signed an agreement late last week to seek the rights to use a greater share of water from the River Nile. Egypt and Sudan currently control 90% of the river's water flow under a colonial-era accord dating from 1959.
The four East African countries have been negotiating to get more water from the Nile for the past 13 years but have so far failed to reach a new deal. Three other upstream countries - Kenya, Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo - who were also represented at Friday's meeting on 14 May 2010 in Entebbe, Uganda, may sign up later, according to the BBC.
The head of the European Union delegation in Egypt, Marc Franco, warned on Thursday that a separate deal between the upstream countries would only worsen existing political problems.