US national security advisor Jake Sullivan recently announced that the Biden administration has chosen Sen. Chris Coons as its special envoy to Ethiopia. According to Sullivan’s statement, Coon was due to arrive in Addis Ababa within days in order to hold meetings with Abiy Ahmed, the Ethiopian prime minister. When I read this news, I was elated. I was immediately filled with optimism and joy — hoping that the arrival of the new envoy would imply that the Americans are finally exerting pressure on the Ethiopian government, pushing it to reach a resolution with Egypt and Sudan on the Renaissance Dam issue. However, my optimism quickly evaporated with the arrival of the envoy. The senator came to Ethiopia not only to meet with the Ethiopian prime minister, but also to hold meetings with officials of the African Union, whose headquarters is based in Addis Ababa, in order to “enhance” American-African relations. One would think that the envoy’s first visit to the region would revolve around the most burning regional issue of our time, but this wasn’t the case with Coons. Instead, the envoy focused his visit on demanding an investigation into human rights violations in Ethiopia’s Tigray region. This is all that mattered to Coons and, one can only imagine, to President Biden, who sent him there. Apparently, the issue of the Renaissance Dam, which threatens the lives of 130 million people in Egypt and Sudan, isn’t a major concern for the Biden administration. In fact, it turns out that the Biden administration refused to stop aid to Ethiopia until the latter took positive steps on the issue of the dam. Certainly, the Biden administration seems determined to make every possible mistake in the book. Since their logic is far beyond me, perhaps we need a cup or palm reader to try and decipher what exactly the Americans are trying to achieve in the region? – Suleiman Jawda (translated by Asaf Zilberfarb)