Ambassador Dr. Desta W/Yohannes, Director General of Women’s Affairs in Ministry of Foreign Affairs, spoke of the vital role of women as an agents of development in international relations, and in international peace-keeping and peace-building processes.

A long-simmering water conflict between Ethiopia and Egypt has moved a step closer to resolution, after the countries' foreign ministers announced last week they had reached a preliminary agreement on sharing Nile water.

The foreign aid budget has been increased so quickly that ministers and officials are ‘struggling’ to spend it properly, a major report warns today. It found that they were ‘unprepared’ for the challenge of spending a 30 per cent increase in the budget last year. The increase followed David Cameron’s controversial pledge to spend 0.7 per cent of the UK’s income on foreign aid.

The house of late Turkish businessman Mohamed Ali in Harar, a town 525km east of Addis Ababa, reflects the strong cultural relations that go back more than a century.  The house is now being transformed into a museum that will exhibit the culture and heritage of both countries.

This comes as part of Egypt’s penchant toward using all types of soft power on various levels in an attempt to regain its lost role in Africa and rectify the widespread perception on the popular level in all upstream countries that depicts Egypt as stealing Nile water.

Faiza A. el-Naga noted that the recent Ethiopian Public Diplomacy Delegation’s visit to Cairo was a complete success. Faiza Abou el-Naga further suggested both countries needed to tap more potential areas of cooperation incuding investment and trade.

Organized by the Ministry, the conference aimed at creating awareness and encouraging the officials and staff to participate and inject impetus to the advancement of the country's foreign policy goals and objectives of Ethiopia through the proactive deployment of digital diplomacy.