Il Nuovo Postiglione - Ethiopia denies Trump claim mega-dam was financed by US

The $4-billion Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) straddles a tributary of the River Nile and will generate 5,150 megawatts of electricity, making it the largest dam by power capacity in Africa.

Egypt, a close ally of the US which depends on the Nile for 97 percent of its water, considers the dam an "existential threat".

In Davos last month on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum, Trump backed that claim, saying the dam "was financed by the United States and it basically blocks the Nile".

The Ethiopian premier pushed back in a speech to parliamentarians on Tuesday.

"We did not receive a single birr (the Ethiopian currency) in loans or financial aid from any foreign sources for the construction of the mega-dam. We achieved this through the strong commitment of Ethiopians living in the country and in the diaspora," Abiy said.

The GERD, whose construction began in 2011, was financed through taxes and loans from Ethiopians.

The construction firm behind the dam says there is no reason why it would divert waters from Egypt.

The dam "releases water to produce energy. They are not irrigation schemes that consume water," Pietro Salini, CEO of Webuild, the project's prime contractor, told AFP at the inauguration in September.

Salini also said the project was entirely financed by Ethiopia.

"Not one international lender was willing to put money in this project," he told AFP.

Trump, a longtime ally of his Egyptian counterpart, pledged to "get negotiations back on track" between Cairo and Addis Ababa.

Egypt has said it is ready "to relaunch mediation efforts" but Ethiopian authorities have not yet responded.

T.Cusumano--INP