KHARTOUM 

Sudanese Irrigation Minister Mutaz Musa said Saturday that an agreement in principle that is expected to be signed by his country, Egypt and Ethiopia would put the three states on the right track.

"This will be a historic agreement," Musa was quoted by the official Sudanese news agency as saying.

Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi, Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, and Ethiopian Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn are expected to sign the agreement in Khartoum on Monday.

The agreement will reportedly regulate the three countries water relations as far as a multibillion dollar hydroelectric dam now being built in Ethiopia is concerned.

Ethiopia's Grand Renaissance Dam has been at the center of a diplomatic row between Cairo and Addis Ababa for several months.

While Ethiopia views the multibillion-dollar dam as a prerequisite for economic development, Egypt fears the project will lead to a marked reduction in its Nile water supply.

A committee of ministers from Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan convened several times in Sudan and Ethiopia to discuss the dam's potential impact on downstream states.

Musa said South Sudanese President Silva Kiir and the Prime Minister of Uganda Ruhakana Rugunda would attend the signing of the agreement in Khartoum.

He added that Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi and Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, the head of the African Union Commission, would also be present.