@DemocVoiceBurma
Protests have been staged outside of the Indian parliament building in New Delhi over India’s financing of the Tamanthi dam project in Burma, which environmental groups warn could displace up to 45,000 people in the country’s northwestern Sagaing division.
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@IntlRivers
Burma’s hawkish vice president will travel to Beijing before the end of the month to discuss Naypyidaw’s shock cancellation of a major dam project in northern Burma financed by China
Like many members of his government, Mr Thein Sein is a former general. But the “civilian” regime that succeeded the military junta after rigged elections last year is trying hard to look different. The suspension of the dam comes after a series of conciliatory gestures, notably a meeting in August between the president and Aung San Suu Kyi
In a lengthy interview with China’s Xinhua news agency, Lu Qizhou claimed that Naypyidaw would have a “series of legal issues” owing to the agreements already made between the government and the state-owned China Power Investment (CPI) Corporation.
Myitsone dam prayer service leads to police summons
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- Post 19 April 2012
- Last Updated on 19 April 2012
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A Kachin Baptist pastor's Easter prayer service at an historic cross at Myitsone dam site resulted in police demanding that he appear for questioning, according to sources close to the incident.Rev. Nlam Brang Nu from Tang Hpre, a village forcibly relocated in 2010 to make way for the officially suspended mega dam project, was ordered to appear before police at the Aung Min Thar relocation site one day after holding the prayer service at the cross on a mountain near his old village.
According to our sources the reverend declined to obey the police summons.
During the service, the reverend led a group of more than 50 followers in prayer urging the protection of the sacred confluence of the Mali Hka and N’Mai Hka rivers, known as the Myitsone. The service was held at a location overlooking Tang Hpre village where church two old crosses remain in defiance of local authorities demands that they be taken down.
The two crosses were built on the mountain by members of the Baptist and Roman Catholic Churches in Tang Hpre. According to local residents both crosses are over 100-year old.
Although local authorities have demanded that the crosses be taken down both crosses currently remain in place. The Baptist cross was later modified by parishioners, according to Tsa Ji, a spokesperson of Kachin Development Networking Group which has been closely following the situation at the Myitsone.
The special prayer service was held in support of the historic crosses remaining in place and too honor the Irrawaddy river, according to participants.
The Myitsone dam project is being led by China's state-owned China Power Investment Corporation and its Burmese partner Asia World, owned by Lo Hsing Han (or Law Sit Han) and his son Steven Law, alleged by the US government to be involved in drug trafficking and money laundering.
The two notorious firms have stepped up their so far unsuccessful public relations campaign to convince former residents of Tang Hpre that the dam will be good for their future and good for the environment, said Tsa Ji. The firms are also offering more financial compensation to displaced families who have lost their land, according to former villagers.
According to relocated villagers from Tang Hpre, government officials at the Aung Min Thar relocation site have threatened villagers telling them “No one can stay” at Tang Hpre after the Water Festival, which ended April 16.
On April 14, a group of about 100 soldiers arrived at Tang Hpre to prevent anyone from trying to return to their now destroyed homes, according to villagers.
Despite President Thein Sein's surprise announcement last year that the controversial dam was officially suspended none of the thousands of villagers forcibly relocated to make way for the dam have been allowed to return to their homes. Instead all buildings in the five forcibly relocated villages have been destroyed.
CPI continues to keep a large group of its workers at the Myitsone dam site. A recently leaked memo written by Chinese officials to their Burmese counterparts reveals that construction on the dam will soon be restarted.
Leaked document reveals Myitsone dam project to reopen in #burma http://t.co/Y3ohblMV #myanmar
— DVB (@DemocVoiceBurma)
Protests have been staged outside of the Indian parliament building in New Delhi over India’s financing of the Tamanthi dam project in Burma, which environmental groups warn could displace up to 45,000 people in the country’s northwestern Sagaing division.
More than 2,400 have already been forcibly relocated since construction began in 2007, and that figure is set to rise as both governments push ahead with the $US3 billion venture, 80 percent of whose output will go to India and provide crucial energy to its northeastern states.
The Kuki Women’s Human Rights Organisation, which represents the Kuki ethnic group that populates areas of northwestern Burma and into India, is one of the organisations campaigning against the dam.
Its general secretary, Ngai Ngai, said that the thousands already relocated were denied proper compensation by the Burmese government. “They were forcibly relocated and could not choose to go where they wanted – they were ordered to move to specific locations designated by the government.
“Women and children relocated to new villages are facing huge difficulties over food – the new settlement is located up north and there is also a shortage of water. And as the land is dry, it is difficult to grow crops up there.”
The protesters yesterday handed a letter to India’s National Hydroelectric Power Corporation, as well as the Burmese embassy in the Indian capital. They are hoping to capitalise on widespread anti-dam sentiment in Burma that some speculate triggered President Thein Sein’s decision to suspend the huge Myitsone dam in Kachin state, which is backed by China. Various analysts claim however that the decision pivoted more on concern within the Burmese government about the country’s economic subservience to China.
The campaigning group Burma Rivers Network says the Tamanthi dam, which will create a reservoir the size of Delhi, is designed to produce 1,200 MW of electricity – the 20 percent that will remain in Burma is likely destined for the vast Monywa copper mine in Sagaing division. Switzerland’s Colenco Power Engineering, Ltd. was involved in preparing the feasibility reports for the project.
BRN claims that an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) was commissioned by the Burmese government prior to construction, “but the assessment team reports that it is incomplete because they were not given enough time”.
In May,India’s ambassador to Burma unsuccessfully urged a withdrawal from the project, which despite years of stop-start construction, has struggled to take shape.
Pulling out now would avoid “expending further diplomatic capital on seeking clearances etc,” Ambassador V.S. Sheshdari wrote in a letter to India foreign secretary Nirupama Rao. “The delay is affecting our image and is seen as confirming local (mis)perceptions about Indian companies.”
Washington—By inviting US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to visit their country and suspending construction of a dam financed by the Chinese and intended to supply electricity to China, the leaders of the poor nation of Burma have taken the risk of offending Beijing in manner that most rich countries would not, CNN’s Fareed Zakaria said on his weekly talk show, GPS.
“One of the world's poorest countries has done something few rich nations would dare to do these days. It said no to China. I'm talking about Myanmar [Burma], an impoverished country that was until this year the world's longest serving military dictatorship,” said Zakaria.
“It [Burma] shocked Beijing recently by pulling the plug on a dam that was meant to supply millions of Chinese with electricity. Beijing may have been upset, but it nonetheless invited Myanmar's top general to the capital last week. He was greeted by none other than the man who is expected to become China's president next year….,” he said.
Referring to Clinton’s trip to Burma last week, the first visit by a US secretary of state in 56 years, Zakaria said Burma is opening up, which is turning this country into a cockpit of international occurrence, rivalries and diplomacy.
The fact that Burma is now making overtures toward Washington suggests that “It is seeking a hedge against China's influence in the region, it wants the West to drop sanctions and it wants more generally to reengage with the world,” he said, adding that these are all positive signs for Washington.
Burma’s progress opens a window for the US to further strengthen its footprint in Asia and maintain a balance of power on that continent, said Zakaria.
“The Chinese will still have deep ties in Myanmar, but increasingly so will India. Myanmar clearly wants to play all three powers against each other. But in doing so, and to really get America interested, it realizes that it will have to open up its economy and its political system,” he said.
“The good news is that the winners of this great power game may turn out to be the long-suffering people of Myanmar,” said Zakaria.
Meanwhile, the US State Department on Monday said that its Special Envoy in Burma, Derek Mitchell, could be travelling to the region to brief the countries about Clinton’s recent trip to Burma.
Clinton’s trip to also figured in her meeting with the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-moon, in Bonn, Germany, a senior US official said.
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NEW DELHI – China’s frenzied dam-building hit a wall recently in Burma (Myanmar), where the government’s bold decision to halt a controversial Chinese-led dam project helped to ease the path to the first visit by a US secretary of state to that country in more than a half-century.
The now-stalled $3.6 billion Myitsone Dam, located at the headwaters of Burma’s largest river, the Irrawaddy, was designed to pump electricity exclusively into China’s power grid, despite the fact that Burma suffers daily power outages. The State-Owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of China’s State Council hailed Myitsone as a model overseas project serving Chinese interests. The Burmese decision thus shocked China’s government, which had begun treating Burma as a reliable client state (one where it still has significant interests, including the ongoing construction of a multibillion-dollar oil and natural-gas pipeline).
Despite that setback, China remains the world’s biggest dam builder at home and abroad. Indeed, no country in history has built more dams than China, which boasts more dams than the rest of the world combined.
Before the Communists came to power in 1949, China had only 22 dams of any significant size. Now the country has more than half of the world’s roughly 50,000 large dams, defined as having a height of at least 15 meters, or a storage capacity of more than three million cubic meters. Thus, China has completed, on average, at least one large dam per day since 1949. If dams of all sizes are counted, China’s total surpasses 85,000.
According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization, China’s dams had the capacity to store 562.4 cubic kilometers of water in 2005, or 20% of the country’s total renewable water resources. Since then, China has built scores of new dams, including the world’s largest: the Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River.
China is also the global leader in exporting dams. Its state-run companies are building more dams overseas than all other international dam builders put together. Thirty-seven Chinese financial and corporate entities are involved in more than 100 major dam projects in the developing world. Some of these entities are very large and have multiple subsidiaries. For instance, Sinohydro Corporation – the world’s largest hydroelectric company – boasts 59 overseas branches.
Both the profit motive and a diplomatic effort to showcase its engineering prowess drive China’s overseas dam-building efforts. China’s declared policy of “noninterference in domestic affairs” actually serves as a virtual license to pursue dam projects that flood lands and forcibly uproot people – including, as with Myitsone, ethnic minorities – in other countries. But it is doing the same at home by shifting its focus from dam-saturated internal rivers to the international rivers that originate in the Tibetan plateau, Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia, and Manchuria.
China contends that its role as the global leader in exporting dams has created a “win-win” situation for host countries and its own companies. But evidence from a number of project sites shows that the dams are exacting a serious environmental toll on those hosts.
As a result, the overseas projects often serve to inflame anti-Chinese sentiment, reflected in grassroots protests at several sites in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Moreover, by using a Chinese workforce to build dams and other projects abroad – a practice that runs counter to its own “localization” requirement, adopted in 2006 – China reinforces a perception that it is engaged in exploitative practices.
As the world’s most dammed country, China is already the largest producer of hydropower globally, with a generating capacity of more than 170 gigawatts. Yet ambitious plans to boost its hydro-generating capacity significantly by damming international rivers have embroiled the country in water disputes with most neighbors, even North Korea.
More broadly, China’s dam-building passion has spawned two key developments. First, Chinese companies now dominate the global hydropower-equipment export market. Sinohydro alone, having eclipsed Western equipment suppliers like ABB, Alstom, General Electric, and Siemens, claims to control half the market.
Second, the state-run hydropower industry’s growing clout within China has led the government to campaign aggressively for overseas dam projects by offering low-interest loans to other governments. At home, it recently unveiled a mammoth new $635 billion investment program in water infrastructure over the next decade, more than a third of which will be channeled into building dams, reservoirs, and other supply structures.
China’s over-damming of rivers and its inter-river and inter-basin water transfers have already wreaked havoc on natural ecosystems, causing river fragmentation and depletion and promoting groundwater exploitation beyond the natural replenishment capacity.
The social costs have been even higher, a fact reflected in Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao’s stunning admission in 2007 that, since 1949, China has relocated a total of 22.9 million Chinese to make way for water projects – a figure larger than the populations of Australia, Romania, or Chile. Since then, another 350,000 residents – mostly poor villagers – have been uprooted.
So, by official count alone, 1,035 citizens on average have been forcibly evicted for water projects every day for more than six decades. With China now increasingly damming transnational rivers such as the Mekong, Salween, Brahmaputra, Irtysh, Illy, and Amur, the new projects threaten to “export” the serious degradation haunting China’s internal rivers to those rivers. The time has come to exert concerted external pressure on China to rein in its dam frenzy and embrace international environmental standards.
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Since 1949, China has completed, on average, at least one large dam per day, and today boasts more dams than the rest of the world combined. But China's over-damming of rivers has already wreaked havoc on natural ecosystems, and the social costs – both at home and abroad – have been even higher.
By MYAT HTOO RAZAK Thursday, December 1, 2011
After decades of repeated disappointments, the people of Burma are entering into an exciting endeavor. The National League for Democracy has re-registered as a political party and will participate in by-elections early next year.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is visiting Burma. People, both inside and outside the country are cautiously optimistic about the changes taking place. As global citizens, we are entitled to be excited and optimistic for Burma, but we are also wise to be cautious.
Under the military dictatorship the once-prosperous country became one of the world’s least-developed countries. This decline occurred despite nationwide resistance and protests for the last six decades. So far, glimmers of hope have not been realized. We can only hope this time will be different.
The people of Burma have a leader who is highly respected and trusted, both nationally and globally. Daw Aung San Suu Kyi has clearly demonstrated that, for the betterment of the country, she can work with anyone, including those who put her under house arrest for most of the last 22 years.
Her messages are clear, cognizant and conciliatory for the sake of the country and the people of all ethnic, regional, social, economic, and political backgrounds. She and the people of Burma are seeking pragmatic approaches to move the country forward from the long impasse and atrocities under successive military rulers. They know that it will not be an easy path. They have lived their lives under such circumstances in the country for many decades.
We, “the outsiders,” should provide all the support that Daw Suu and the people of Burma need at this critical time. Enthusiasts, cynics, or those who still undecided about the current changes can provide different types of support for the people of Burma.
Continue the pressure on the Myanmar government to improve the democratic process and human rights policy, including the release of political prisoners. Explore opportunities to work with the government or national and international agencies to help the people inside, or express your thoughts through the Internet or other communications channels. Whatever we decide to do, we must listen to the people who struggle every day inside Burma and along its borders.
The recent cancellation of the Myitsone dam construction (a Chinese-financed plan to construct a huge dam on the Irrawaddy River) by the Myanmar government provides an important example of how collaboration at local, national, regional and global levels can bring about change inside Burma.
The seemingly impossible task of opposing China was successful (for now) because of the unity, strategy and tireless work of many people and groups from inside and outside Burma.
Secretary Clinton’s visit has raised expectations for increased humanitarian assistance from the United States and other Western countries. People are asking what kind of assistance? To whom? By whom?
There is no doubt that increased humanitarian assistance is much needed for the majority of the people in Burma and along the borders. Humanitarian groups and agencies, especially the local and community groups, have been working in Burma for decades under challenging circumstances imposed by the military junta, with very limited assistance from international donors. Their voices must be listened to, heard, and responded to directly by Secretary Clinton and her top officials.
The current global financial difficulties will require potential donors to set clear priorities for any humanitarian assistance to Burma. Health must be a priority because healthy people are essential for economic growth, security, peace, prosperity, and democracy.
Burma was once an example of a good health system in Southeast Asia. However, health services have declined in recent decades. Patients, families and doctors have described overcrowded public hospitals with empty medical cabinets and overworked and underpaid staff.
Although modern private hospitals have become available in Burma, most people who cannot afford the fees have to rely on public hospitals and clinics. Smaller states and rural areas have even less favorable services.
In a short-term approach, humanitarian assistance in health should be considered in three key priorities:
Improve service delivery on the top five most common diseases in both urban and rural areas, through sufficient support of trained health workers, medicines and supplies. Local and national organizations can implement the services with support from communities and international donors through re-programming of existing activities.
Enhance capacity of the health workforce with on-the-job training that reflects the actual needs of the population.
The Kachin region is a major hydropower energy resource that is eyed greedily by India and Thailand as well as China. Somebody is going to build dams there, and the Chinese took advantage of the US-led sanction regime against the Myanmar to go huge into the region
Nearly a month after Burma's President Thein Sein announced the suspension of the controversial Myitsone dam project in Kachin State, Chinese workers have begun returning to China, even as Beijing continues to signal its desire to resume the US $3.6 billion project in the near future.
On Thursday, the ethnic Kachin Independence Army (KIA) said that Chinese workers were leaving the project site and that there were no signs of construction.
“Chinese workers are leaving the site through border gates in Kachin State. We also learned that the construction materials stored for the project, such as cement and fuel, are being sold to local businessmen,” said KIA spokesman La Nan.
“But we don't know if this means the project is just suspended or canceled,” he added.
A similar report was made by the Rangoon-based Eleven Weekly journal this week.
The suspension of the controversial hydropower project on The Irrawaddy River was seen as a move by the new quasi-civilian government in Naypyidaw to counter growing Chinese influence in the country and improve ties with the West.
While the Burmese government said it acted according to the will of the people, Beijing was clearly angered by the decision and called for talks with Naypyidaw to resolve the issue. Recent reports from China, many of which described concerns about the environmental impact of the dam as exaggerated and fabricated by the Western media, made clear that Beijing remains hopeful the project will resume.
On Monday, The Global Times, a Chinese government mouthpiece, described Burma's decision to suspend the Myitsone project as a move to garner short-term political gain at the expense of business, adding that “the whimsical change will inevitably send troubling signals to potential investors.”
Apparently to contain the fallout, Burmese Vice President Tin Aung Myint Oo went to Beijing and held talks with Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao last week.
During the meeting, Wen asked the Burmese government to honor bilateral agreements between the two countries and allow the successful implementation of Chinese investments in Burma.
“Implementing important China-Myanmar cooperative projects is in the interests of both countries,” Wen was quoted as telling Tin Aung Myint Oo, according to China's state-run People's Daily newspaper, which also reported that the Burmese vice-president said that Burma valued cooperative relations and would “proactively look for ways to resolve issues.”
According the Burmese government, the project will be suspended until 2016 when Thein Sein's presidential tenure expires. A top Burmese presidential adviser recently told The Irrawaddy that Naypyidaw will probably compensate China by granting it further economic concessions in Burma. He added that bilateral relation would not be much affected by the dam suspension because there are still many other Chinese investments in the country.
Despite the suspension of the Myitsone dam, which was expected to generate 6,000-megawatts of electricity, most of it for export to China, both China and Burma expressed hopes that a strategic oil and gas pipeline from Burma's Bay of Bengal coast to China's landlocked Yunnan Province would be successfully completed.
According to the China National Petroleum Corporation, which is constructing the pipeline, work on section 4 of the pipeline has begun in Shan State, and the whole project is expected to become operational by May 2013.
The pipeline, with an estimated capacity of 20 million tons of crude oil per year that will enjoy tax concessions and customs clearance rights from the Burmese government, will enable China to bypass the Strait of Malacca when importing crude oil from the Middle East and Africa, cutting the shipping distance by around 1,200 km.
As part of the oil pipeline project, China is also constructing a deep-water crude oil unloading port and oil storage facilities on Burma’s Maday Island off the coast of Arakan State—an investment that will provide China with crucial access to the geopolitically strategic Indian Ocean, where the US is poised to increase its navy presence in the coming decade.
To feed escalating energy demand in China and Thailand, neighboring Southeast Asian nations weigh massive hydroelectric projects that would alter vital rivers.
The Mekong and Irrawaddy rivers, though unconnected and hundreds of miles apart, are both integral to life in Southeast Asia, supporting millions of people and more than 1,200 species of animals, including freshwater dolphins and-in the Mekong-giant catfish.
Now, in an energy-hungry age on the continent, the rivers share another distinction, as wellsprings of financial temptation for the struggling countries that rely on their flow, Laos and Myanmar (Burma). Both countries are grappling with decisions on whether to build massive hydropower dams on the two significant rivers. The projects could put fragile ecology and associated livelihoods at risk, but the dams could help the two countries reap billions of dollars by exporting the megawatts to China and Thailand, two neighbors with rapidly growing energy demand.
For now, it looks like the two nations are taking different paths. In Laos, the government appears to be going ahead with the $3.8 billion Xayaburi dam on the Mekong River-despite opposition by environmental groups, some international donors, and some neighboring countries. In Myanmar, meanwhile, the government shocked many observers last month when it announced it would suspend work on the $3.6 billion Myitsone dam project on the Irrawaddy River. The decision came without notice to its Chinese partner, and just weeks after Myanmar's power minister was adamant the project would go forward. Some observers both within and outside Myanmar are skeptical the suspension will hold.
(See "Myanmar-Land of Shadows" and related map: "Exploiting a Land of Plenty")
A Region's Changing Flow
The dams, if completed eventually, would be the first on the mainstreams of the lower Mekong and the Irrawaddy. But China has been building a series of dams on the upper Mekong.
Energy demand has been rising exponentially as the region becomes more prosperous. The money could transform the poorly developed economies of Laos and Myanmar, although many worry the revenues would just enrich the elite.
Scientists and environmentalists are concerned the dams will displace thousands of people, and damage river ecology and the livelihoods of people along the river. They are concerned the dams will lead to additional projects that could have even more devastating impacts.
The dams on the upper Mekong and on the Mekong's tributaries are already triggering changes in river flows.
There are longstanding plans to build as many as 11 additional dams on the Mekong in Laos and Cambodia. Researchers project that if all those dams were built, the impact on wetlands and migratory fish such as the endangered giant catfish could be disastrous.
In addition, 30 percent of the protein sources in Laos and Cambodia would be at risk, according to an environmental assessment (pdf) done for the Mekong River Commission (MRC), an international cooperative body that aims to manage river uses sustainably.
Many poor people living along the Mekong subsist on a diet of rice, fish paste, and some vegetables.
(Related: Video on the Mekong giant catfish)
Diana Suhardiman, a research scientist for the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) in Vientiane, Laos, said the issues are complex, with "formal political/environmental agendas, vested interests, desire for economic growth, all mixed up and contextualized into one single dam development." (Suhardiman was speaking about Laos's planned Xayaburi, but Myanmar's Myitsone reflects similar conflicting interests.)
IWMI is one of 15 nonprofit research centers collectively known as the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research, funded by 60 governments, private foundations and international organizations.
(Related: "New Dam a Go and a Blow to Megafishes?")
Potential Financial Gains Immense
Laos and Myanmar stand to benefit immensely from hydroelectric plants.
Laos-long referred to as a potential "battery" for the region-would primarily sell power from the 1,260-megawatt Xayaburi to neighboring Thailand. If Laos eventually moves ahead with all six of its planned foreign investor-financed dams on the Mekong, it could generate more than $2.5 billion a year in revenue, according to estimates.
Myanmar's suspended Myitsone project was envisioned to have a capacity of 6,000 megawatts, nearly the size of the largest hydroelectric plants in the United States and Russia.
Myanmar was under contract with the state-owned China Power Investment Corporation to sell 90 percent of Myitsone's power to China and reap an estimated $500 million of revenue a year. There also was an agreement between the two countries for six additional large dams in the region.
But the economic costs could be steep as well. Although there is no similar analysis of the potential impact of Myitsone, this issue as it pertains to the Mekong River has been studied intensively.
Losses from the damage to the fisheries and agricultural industries on the Mekong could reach $500 million a year if planned dams are completed, according to the environmental assessment done for the Mekong River Commission (MRC). The lower Mekong strategy began during the Cold War, when the United States, Soviet Union, and China similarly envisioned large hydropower dams for economic development. However, costs, water management disputes, and conflicts such as the Vietnam War impeded the plans. (A 1,070-megawatt hydropower plant recently was completed on the Nam Theun River in Laos with the backing of the World Bank and Asian Development Bank.)
In 1995, the Mekong River Commission, originally a United Nations body but now an independent international oversight organization, was reformed with an agreement that its four member countries-Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam-would discuss the 12-dam Mekong River plan before any decisions were made. But the MRC has no legal authority.
Laos earlier paid heed to the process and opposition by such neighboring countries as Vietnam. But the Laotian government apparently has chosen to ignore the MRC's April consensus to delay a decision on Xayaburi.
Laotian energy ministry officials didn't respond to a query. In July, a letter leaked to the environmental organization International Rivers revealed that the government told its Thai partner that the study process had been completed. Construction work at the dam site has been proceeding for months, says International Rivers, a nonprofit that works to protect rivers and the people who live along those rivers.
Complex Environmental Impacts
The Mekong has been researched extensively, but the impacts of large hydroelectric development can be complex. The potential for damage depends on the location of the facility in the river system, said Tira Foran, a research scientist who has studied the Mekong for years and is now with the Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Research Organization in Canberra.
(Related blog: "Sustainable Hydropower: A New Flow of Ideas")
Hydropower dams redistribute river flows; dry season flows generally increase, and monsoon peak flows generally decrease. Theoretically that can lead to better flood control in the wet season, and benefit irrigation during the dry season. But a hydropower operator's first priority is to produce electricity, not to prevent floods or irrigate dry season crops.
Researchers project that dams and the changing water flows on the lower Mekong will have significant, negative impacts on river ecology. Preliminary research indicates the impact on migratory fish is potentially catastrophic and unlikely to be mitigated by fish ladders and other technology.
Foran and other researchers also note the Tonle Sap wetlands area in Cambodia-which bulges in size during the wet season-may be threatened. The Tonle Sap is one of the most bountiful inland fisheries in the world. During the monsoon season, the Mekong River swells and exerts such a force of water that the Tonle Sap tributary reverses direction and floods the lake.
(Related: "Why We Shouldn't Dam the World's Most Productive River")
Similar conclusions have been made for the Myitsone in Myanmar, with devastating impacts predicted for many species of migratory fish.
In Myanmar, a Case of Unity
Activist groups long have opposed dam building on Southeast Asia's main rivers.
Opposition in Myanmar came from an unusually passionate discourse in a country that has had a civilian government since early this year, but where a military junta remains in firm control.
The Irrawaddy has a special place in the hearts of the Burmese and in their folklore. One local legend describes the Irrawaddy being formed by water poured from two gold cups by a great spirit sitting in the Himalayas. (The Irrawaddy starts at the confluence of two smaller rivers fed from the Himalayan region.)
The Burmese tested the boundaries of a limited democracy by speaking out against the dam, holding art and photo exhibitions, and circulating a petition to stop the dam. Nobel Peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, who was freed from house arrest last year, has spoken out against the project.
(Related: "Myanmar's River of Spirits")
In a surprise turn of events last month, President Thein Sein, in a letter to parliamentarians, suspended work on the Myitsone, saying the government would respect the wishes of its people. He added the project could damage the natural beauty of the area, the livelihoods of local people, and agricultural plantations.
Other factors besides public pressure may have been at play as well.
An environmental impact assessment commissioned by the Chinese power company and recently released concluded such a massive project wasn't needed.
Fighting has been intense between the Myanmar army and an ethnic Kachin army in the region, according to reports by the Kachin News Group. Some Burmese observers note there may have been concerns that the Chinese were exerting too much power over Myanmar's affairs; there may be hopes that the West will ease sanctions against the country.
(The United States already has made signals it may do so not just because of the Myitsone suspension but because Myanmar has released some political dissidents, has relaxed its control over the media, and has made other "welcome" gestures that signal "a trend toward greater openness," a U.S. State Department official said in a briefing this month.
Whatever the motive or combination of motives, Burmese see the dam suspension as a milestone.
"Irrawaddy has become the first issue on which the government, opposition and the people have become united since the 1962 coup," Yangon journalist Ye Naing Moe wrote in an email. "It could be public pressure or it could be the so-called new civilian government's effort in seeking legitimacy. Anti-Chinese sentiment could be a part of it as well. Anyway, the decision to suspend Myitsone dam has encouraged Myanmar people to keep pushing forward and has taught the government that being loved by the people is good."
Ye Naing Moe traveled to the area in late 2009 with a group of journalists to document and photograph the Irrawaddy as it was before the dam was built. Their efforts were made into a photo book called "Sketch of a River: Irrawaddy," which was published recently as part of an art and photo exhibition.
Uncertain Futures
It's unclear what will happen next in Laos and Myanmar.
Activist groups hope that Laos reconsiders its decision.
"The decisions now are being made without knowledge but with politics," said Pianporn Deetes, Thailand campaign coordinator for International Rivers. "They forget that livelihoods and food security of millions are at stake."
In Myanmar, hundreds of Chinese and Burmese construction workers have left the area but some remain, according to the Kachin Development Network Group. Fighting between the ethnic Kachin army and the Myanmar army has continued, the Kachin News Group has reported.
More than 2,000 people living near the dam site already have been relocated to "model villages," according to the government's New Light of Myanmar newspaper. Aung San Suu Kyi in August said 12,000 people had been relocated.
An ethnic Kachin, who asked that her name not be used because of security concerns, said she has heard from villagers that they can't grow anything on their soil because it is covered with rocks or gravel, and they feel separated from their homelands. But she said she doesn't know whether they will try to go home.
Deetes of International Rivers said there's a window of opportunity to pressure the government to be more transparent and to consider more responsible development and environmental standards. The Burmese people also hope for greater openness.
"People want the transparency because they are not sure how much they will benefit from the project," Aung Htun U, a consultant, said in an email from Yangon. Like many, he's skeptical the Myitsone dam project is dead for good.
This story is part of a special series that explores energy issues. For more, visit The Great Energy Challenge.
Myanmar Replaces Myitsone Dam Construction With Gold Mining
NAYPYIDAW, Myanmar (Burma), October 21, 2011 (ENS) - Just five days after Myanmar President Thein Sein announced the suspension of the Irrawaddy Myitsone dam construction due to the "will of the people," local authorities ordered residents evicted to make way for a government-led gold mining operation at the dam site.
On September 30, President Sein told Parliament in a letter that he will suspend construction on the Myitsone Dam for the duration of his presidency. The dam was being constructed by China Power Investment to generate power for China.
The Kachin Development Networking Group has obtained an order issued by the Myitkyina Township office on October 5, which demands that all residents, private miners, and shopkeepers in Tang Hpre village move out within five days or face "punishment in accordance with existing laws."
Signed by Administrative Office Chief Nyein Htun Kyaw, the order states that it "applies to all citizens in Tang Hpre village except for the Hka Ka Bo Company, which has received an official license for gold mining in the Myitsone area in Tang Hpre Village in Myitkyina Township."
Tang Hpre village is located where the Irrawaddy River arises, at the confluence of the N'mai and Mali rivers in Kachin State. Both of these rivers flow from the Himalayan glaciers of northern Myanmar on its northeastern border with China. The river flows south and empties into the Indian Ocean, creating the Irrawaddy Delta.
The Myitkyina Township order clears the way for a joint venture between Mining Ministry No. 2 and the Kha Ka Bo Mining Company to blast river banks, excavate the land, and dredge the Irrawaddy in search of gold.
"Unregulated gold mining, often using mercury and cyanide, has been ravaging lands and rivers across Kachin State for several years, causing erosion, alteration of river flows, and toxic pollution," said the Kachin Development Networking Group in a statement today.
"The operation at the Myitsone will destroy the beauty of the confluence and directly pollute the Irrawaddy ecosystem, impacting communities living downstream," the Kachin group said.
"On the one hand the government says it loves the Irrawaddy but on the other hand they're poisoning the river at its source," said Ah Nan from Kachin Development Networking Group.
After the dam plans were announced in 2006, mining and logging concessions were granted in order to clear the dam site. Large-scale gold mining at the site began in 2010, leaving toxic mercury and cyanide that are used in the mining process to be dumped without regulation into the rivers.
The Kachin Development Networking Group warns that the Myitsone dam may go ahead anyway. There is "no evidence on the ground that the dam project has indeed been suspended," the KDNG said in a statement October 17.
KDNG has received reports from villagers in dam construction relocation camps that workers are still operating at the dam site. Ah Nan says there are two relocation camps housing about 1,000 people.
Local Kachin resistance against the dam is documented in the report "Resisting the Flood," which is online at: www.kdng.org
For earlier ENS coverage of the Myitsone dam controversy, see: Burmese President Halts Chinese Dam at Irrawaddy Headwaters
Copyright Environment News Service (ENS) 2011. All rights reserved.
The Kachin Development Network Group claim in a media statement released on October 14 that all work on the Myitsone dam project has not stopped as surveys are still been carried out and equipment and supplies are still being delivered.
A spoke person for KDNG, Ah Nan, said land surveys are still being carried out at construction site 7 on the southern part of the dam project.
Ah Nan spoke to Karen News and said that the Kachin Development Network Group wants an official cancellation from the China Power Investment Corporation.
“Work on the dam project infrastructure is still ongoing, we don’t believe in the [government’s] suspension anymore. If the project is to be genuinely suspended, the China Company will also have to issue an official statement for the suspension, and then we can believe it.”
KDNG also pointed out that nothing has really changed as equipment such as bulldozers, trucks and a cement-making plant, company workers and security measures are still going ahead as before.
The KDNG press release stated that the destructive gold mining in the planned Myitsone dam reservoir area is ongoing and the local Kachin villagers have yet to see evidence the project will be stopped and are scared and uncertain about their future.
A local villager from the dam site quoted in KDNG’s press release said.
“We do not trust what the [government’s] President said about suspending the Myitsone dam; we can see workers and dam construction machines still at the site.”
Ah Nan confirmed that the Kachin Development Network Group would continue to fight for the entire seven dams in the area to be stopped.
“All the seven dams in the Irrawaddy project will have devastating effects on the millions of people living along the river. We will continue to oppose the dams until they are all officially cancelled.”
China and Burma reached an agreement in 2005 on the Myitsone dam project that will produce 13,360 megawatts of electricity. China intends to invest US$20 billion on the Myitsone dam project - it is one of China’s biggest investments in Burma.
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October 14, 2011
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Press release from Kachin Development Networking GroupDespite the announcement by Burma’s military government that the Myitsone dam will be suspended, local Kachin villagers have yet to see evidence the project will be stopped and remain fearful and uncertain about their future.
An update released today by the Kachin Development Networking Group (KDNG) shows evidence that equipment and supplies for the project remain in place, security restrictions continue for local residents, and destructive gold mining in the planned Myitsone dam reservoir area is ongoing.
There had been a lull in construction at the dam site before the suspension announcement due to the rainy season. However, work on the dam project infrastructure has continued, even after the announcement. As of October 11, Chinese workers were still carrying out land survey work south of the dam site, and were continuing construction of a supply road linking the Myitsone dam site to the Chinese border town of Tengchong.
Staff from China Power Investment Corporation (CPI), the main project holder, recently told local staff of their project partner, Asia World, not to move any equipment as the project will continue after the rainy season, despite the suspension announcement.
“We do not trust what the President said about suspending the Myitsone dam,” said a villager from the dam site. “We can see the workers and dam construction machines still at the site.”
KDNG is calling for an official cancellation announcement from CPI, withdrawal of all equipment and personnel, and for the safe return of all the relocated villagers back to their original homes.
“All seven dams of the Irrawaddy project will have devastating effects on the millions living along the river. We will continue to resist the dams until they are all officially cancelled, not just
‘suspended’,” said Ah Nan of KDNG.Contact: Ah Nan (+66) 848854154
Email: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
To read full An Update on the Irrawaddy Myitsone dams project, please visit www.kdng.org
To download: English | Burmese
The Irrawaddy provides continuous coverage of events in Burma and Southeast Asia, delivering news, analysis and opinion on issues that matter to our readers.
More than two weeks have passed since Burmese President Thein Sein announced the suspension of the controversial Myitsone hydroelectric dam project in Kachin State, but according to sources in the area, there is still little to suggest that the Chinese state-owned company behind the project is preparing to pull out.
“There are still Chinese workers at the dam site and they are still working on a road connecting it to the Chinese border,” said Awng Wa, the chairman of the Kachin Development Networking Group (KDNG), speaking to The Irrawaddy on Monday.
In a statement released on Friday, KDNG said that “equipment and supplies for the project remain in place, security restrictions continue for local residents, and destructive gold mining in the planned Myitsone dam reservoir area is ongoing.”
The statement also alleges that China Power Investment Corporation (CPI), the major investor in the project, recently told local staff of their project partner, Asia World, not to remove any equipment, as work would resume after the rainy season, despite the suspension announcement.
According to Awng Wa, after Thein Sein ordered a suspension of work on the dam on Sept 30, residents of the village of Aung Myay Tha Yar whose land had been confiscated to make way for the project attempted to return to their homes, only to be told that they were not permitted to enter the “restricted area.”
Pho Zaw, a Kachin border trader from Myitkyina, said that work has only been stopped in areas that are accessible to the public. Farther upstream on the two rivers that converge at Myitsone, construction of six other dams continues “night and day,” he said.
According to the KDNG statement, Chinese workers are also still carrying out land survey work south of the dam site and are continuing construction of a supply road linking the Myitsone dam site to the Chinese border town of Tengchong.
“All seven dams of the Irrawaddy project will have devastating effects on the millions living along the river. We will continue to resist the dams until they are all officially canceled, not just ‘suspended’,” said KDNG spokesperson Ah Nan.
The Irrawaddy provides continuous coverage of events in Burma and Southeast Asia, delivering news, analysis and opinion on issues that matter to our readers.
Chiang Mai (Mizzima) – There is “no evidence on the ground that the [Myitsone] dam project has indeed been suspended,” the Kachin Development Networking Group (KDNG) said in a statement released on Friday.
“Despite the announcement from Burma’s president, there has been no confirmation from the project manager, China Power Investment Corporation (CPI),” said the press statement.
The KDNG said that until the CPI confirms the announcement of the suspension of the Myitsone Dam project and six other planned hydropower projects, the projects could “go ahead at any time.”
The statement followed President Thein Sein’s announcement of the suspension of construction on the Myitsone Dam Project at the confluence of the Irrawaddy River. Villagers, who have been removed from the area, are still “living in a state of uncertainty and fear,” the statement said.
According to the KDNG, villagers who have been forced to move from the construction areas and are living in relocation camps have reported that they have seen workers continuing to operate at the site. There are two relocation camps where about 1,000 people are situated, Ah Nan, a KDNG spokesperson, told Mizzima.
On other environmental issues, destructive mining activities still continue in the area, the KDNG reported. “Gold mining and logging that are also destroying the Myitsone and the Irrawaddy rivers are actively going on at the Myitsone and upstream of Myitsone. If the dams are really stopped, all these destructive activities should stop immediately,” a villager at the dam site told KDNG.
Land confiscation and forced eviction for construction projects is rife in Burma. Ah Nan told Mizzima on Monday that KDNG had obtained a letter written on October 5 that had been sent to villagers living around the gold mining site, ordering them to vacate the area by October 10.
The letter, sent by Nyein Tun Kyaw, a government official in Myitkyina Township, said that all persons except personnel from the Hka Ka Bo Mining Co. Ltd in Tan Pha Ye village had to leave. It said that any mining performed by persons other than from the Hka Ka Bo company was illegal, and “violators will be punished in accordance with existing laws." The KDNG said that traditional gold mining has taken place in the area for years.
After the dam plans were announced, mining and logging concessions were granted in order to clear out the dam site. Large-scale gold mining at the site began in 2010, leaving toxic mercury and cyanide that are used in the mining process to be dumped without regulation into the rivers, the KDNG said. An Nan told Mizzima that the Hka Ka Bo Mining Company Limited and the government’s mining ministry no.2 had been given joint venture rights to mine concessions at the dam site.
On September 30, in response to President Thein Sein’s announcement of a moratorium on construction, the activist group Burma Rivers Network said, “Until the Chinese project holders publicly declare their cancellation of the Myitsone Dam and pull out from the dam site, we must assume the project is going ahead.”
The KDNG report released on Friday features photographs taken since the announcement of work continuing in progress on the Myitsone Dam project. One photo taken on Friday, shows Chinese workers downstream from the dam site taking land surveys between Lahpye and Tawngban villages. They have also documented active construction using heavy machinery since September 30.
Most Chinese workers had already left the site before September 30, but this did not reflect a genuine halt on construction, but was “most likely due to the rainy season conditions.” A promotional video produced by Sinohydro (a Chinese state-owned hydroelectric power and construction company hired by CPI to build the dam) stated that workers around the dam site could only work for seven months in a year.“The CPI staff told us they would work with the Burmese government and not to worry for our jobs. He told us, please wait at the project site; after rainy season, we will continue the project, so don’t take back the trucks and equipment,” an Asia World employee told KDNG.
Asia World is a Burmese conglomerate that partnered with Burma’s state power utility Myanma Electric Power Enterprise (MEPE) and Chinese state-owned electrical company China Power Investment Corporation (CPI) on the dam project.
Thein Sein’s move to suspend the project until 2016 shocked China. CPI chairman Lu Qizhou called the move “bewildering.” Lu Qizhou told Xinhua, a Chinese news agency, on October 3, “In February this year, Burma’s prime minister urged us to accelerate the construction when he inspected the project site, so the sudden proposal of suspension now is very bewildering. If suspension means a construction halt, then it will lead to a series of legal issues.”
He also remarked that, “I am totally astonished to hear the news of suspending this project. Under the announcement of halting this project, we must stop all of our construction work there.”
Rebounding from the decision to suspend the project, Naypyitaw then moved to presumably secure ties and quell China’s concerns, by sending Burmese Foreign Minister Wunna Maung Lwin to visit Beijing on October 10. It was reported that he went to discuss Naypyitaw’s decision to suspend the project and come to an agreeable arrangement for both parties. According to Xinhua, Wunna Maung Lwin met with Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping and Chinese Foreign Minister Yan Jiechi during his visit, and “pledged to work towards the mutual benefit of the two countries.”
AFP quoted the Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Liu Weiman, who said the meeting had been arranged “to handle this project in the proper way and continue to move forward with bilateral relations, which are very important to us.”
It was reported that Naypyitaw would compensate China for the halt of the Myitsone project. In an interview with the Irrawaddy, presidential advisor Dr Nay Zin Latt told the news group that Burma might have to compensate China in the form of granting economic concessions. “I don't think we have to pay them back in the form of billions of dollars…Using revenues from other sources, not only from Myitsone, we can repay the loan. For example, we can pay back using revenues from the gas pipeline to China.”
The sale of gas from the Shwe gas pipeline project is set to be operational in 2013, and is estimated will earn Naypyitaw US$ 29 billion in revenues over the next 30 years.
In the Friday statement, KDNG reported that construction on the main dam has not yet begun, but that several diversion tunnels and containment walls surrounding the sites have been completed. A supply road, railway, and a 600 metre long suspension bridge south of the dam site that will link the project supply headquarters in Tengchong, China, to the construction site, are nearly completed.
KDNG and other environmental and campaign groups have been urging the cancellation of all seven hydropower dams planned by China.
“All of these dams will export electricity to China and will have the same negative impacts as the Myitsone dam. Building these mega dams will cause irreparable environmental destruction, unpredictable water surges and shortages, and inflict social and economic damage to the millions who depend on the Irrawaddy. Thousands of Kachin villagers will also be forced to relocate,” said the KDNG statement.
Lessons learned for #China from the recent suspension of #Myitsone #Dam in #Burma http://ow.ly/6Mj0N
— International Rivers (@IntlRivers)
Burma’s hawkish vice president will travel to Beijing before the end of the month to discuss Naypyidaw’s shock cancellation of a major dam project in northern Burma financed by China.
The suspension of the Myitsone dam has angered China, which appears not to have been consulted over the decision. Around 90 percent of the power would have gone to China, which provided the vast majority of the $US3.6 billion price tag on the project.
Now Tin Aung Myint Oo is being forced to explain the decision to officials in Beijing, and will travel to China shortly after President Thein Sein returns from a visit to India on 15 October, Reuters quoted a government official as saying. The official reason for the vice president’s trip is to attend the opening of a China-Asean Exposition.
The People’s Daily, the official newspaper of China’s ruling Communist Party, today carried an article responding to protestations against its energy projects in Burma.
“Looking at public opinion in Myanmar [Burma], as some non-government organisations do not trust the government and have been influenced by foreign media, very few present positive information regarding Chinese investors…”
It continued that assessments had been carried out prior to starting on the Myitsone dam, with experts finding the impact would be “rather small”. Environmental groups however point to the estimated 20,000 people likely to be displaced by the dam, as well as long-term damage to the ecosystem of the IrrawaddyRiver, to counter these claims.
Following the announcement a week ago that the dam would not go ahead, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Hong Lei told Burma that it must “guarantee the lawful and legitimate rights and interests of Chinese companies”.
It marks a rare fissure in relations between the two countries: Burma relies on Beijing for political support and the billions of dollars in investment it pours into the country each year, while China sees its neighbour as a veritable goldmine of easily-exploitable natural resources.
Writing in the Jakarta Globe, journalist Bertil Lintner said that the decision may have been triggered by a disagreement within the upper echelons of Burma’s government over the extent to which China’s energy need were dictating the priorities of Naypyidaw.
This theory suggests that growing public disquiet over the dam was less a factor, despite Thein Sein’s reference to “respecting the will of the public” as the cause of the decision.
Although the strong relationship has major benefits for both countries, Burma’s rulers remain intensely nationalistic and wary of an over-dependence on the regional superpower. Recent shifts in the political landscape in Burma also suggest the government is attempting to curry favour with critical western countries.
“From the Burmese regime’s point of view, improved relations with the West could be accomplished simply by playing up the Chinese threat, with the hope of diminishing Western criticism of the regime,” Lintner wrote.
In an interview with the New York Times yesterday, US envoy to Burma Derek Mitchell appeared to suggest that Washington was rethinking its punitive measures on Burma in light of recent changes, of which the Myitsone cancellation is being hailed as the most positive.
OBSERVERS are still wrestling with the implications of a stunning piece of news out of Myanmar on September 30th. Thein Sein, the president, informed parliament that work on a huge $3.6 billion dam on a confluence of the Irrawaddy river in the north-east of the country would be suspended for the duration of his term in office, ie, until at least 2015.
The decision has provoked China, which has been building the Myitsone dam and would buy almost all of the electricity generated by the associated 6,000MW hydropower plant, into a rare public rebuke of a friendly neighbour. And critics at home and abroad have been taken aback by the reason Mr Thein Sein gave for the suspension: that it was “contrary to the will of the people”. That has not, in the past, been a consideration for Myanmar’s rulers.
Like many members of his government, Mr Thein Sein is a former general. But the “civilian” regime that succeeded the military junta after rigged elections last year is trying hard to look different. The suspension of the dam comes after a series of conciliatory gestures, notably a meeting in August between the president and Aung San Suu Kyi, the de facto leader of Myanmar’s opposition, who was freed from house arrest last November, just after the election.
That the new regime seems willing to antagonise China is the latest sign that things may really be different. Shunned by the West, Myanmar had been falling ever more closely into China’s orbit. China is Myanmar's biggest foreign investor, followed by Thailand. A Chinese foreign-ministry spokesman has condemned the suspension of the dam and called on Myanmar to protect the rights of the Chinese companies involved.
Myitsone is one of the most important of China’s many projects in Myanmar. The main investor is the state-owned China Power Investment Corporation, whose construction arm had already started work. On a visit to the site this year, The Economist’s correspondent found that it had built supply roads and large pre-fabricated living quarters for the Chinese workers, cleared hillsides and moved the population to a resettlement village (pictured to the right).
Of a series of seven Chinese-built dams planned on the Irrawaddy, the Myitsone was to be the largest, and at about 150 metres (458 feet), one of the highest in the world. If completed, the dam’s reservoir would flood an area the size of Singapore and drive more than 10,000 people, mainly from the Kachin ethnic group, from their ancestral lands. The area straddles territory controlled by the Kachin Independence Organisation (KIO), one of Myanmar’s myriad insurgencies. Last May the KIO warned China that building the dam would lead to “civil war”. Since then fighting between government forces and the KIO’s armed wing, the Kachin Independence Army, has increased markedly. Thousands of villagers caught up in the clashes have fled the area.
Hitherto suppressed environmental NGOs spoke out against the project. They were backed by Miss Suu Kyi, who in August wrote an open letter calling for a reassessment of the project. She has welcomed the suspension because “every government should listen carefully to people's voices.”
It is not just concerns about the environment or the people displaced that have raised hackles. There is widespread popular resentment against Chinese economic expansion within Myanmar, and against the large-scale immigration of Chinese nationals into northern Myanmar—estimates range from 1m to 2m—that has accompanied it. Many Burmese complain that Myanmar’s states have become like provinces of China.
The government’s decision to suspend the dam comes at a time when it is also showing more willingness to engage with the West. Barack Obama’s special envoy to Myanmar was there in September. The regime has even been hinting that it might release at least some of its 2,000 political prisoners. Their continued detention makes it hard for Miss Suu Kyi to advocate the lifting of Western sanctions, and her support for sanctions makes it hard for Western governments to drop them. In an interview this week with the BBC, she urged caution in assessing the government’s intentions, but expressed at least moderate optimism: “We are beginning to see the beginning of change.”
Among the many signals the regime is sending by suspending the dam is that it does not want to be dependent solely on its neighbours, especially China. The regime is trying to build bridges with both its opponents at home and its critics overseas. The danger is that the changes it is making may not be fast enough or fundamental enough to win big concessions from the West. And in the past, when engagement has failed, there has been no shortage of vengeful hardliners waiting to come out of the woodwork.
Beijing has poured billions of dollars of investment into Myanmar to operate mines, extract timber and build oil and gas pipelines. China has also been a staunch supporter of Myanmar’s politically isolated government.
Lu said the Chinese side had followed all laws and regulations and “diligently fulfilled our duties and obligations.”
The Irrawaddy provides continuous coverage of events in Burma and Southeast Asia, delivering news, analysis and opinion on issues that matter to our readers.
Lauding the potential economic benefits of the project for Burma, Lu said the Burmese president's decision was “very bewildering” because Thein Sein himself urged CPI to accelerate work on the dam when he inspected it in February as the then prime minister of the ruling military regime.
The head of the Chinese company behind the recently scrapped Myitsone Dam in northern Burma has spoken of his consternation at U-turn announced last week by Burma’s president.
In a lengthy interview with China’s Xinhua news agency, Lu Qizhou claimed that Naypyidaw would have a “series of legal issues” owing to the agreements already made between the government and the state-owned China Power Investment (CPI) Corporation.
Lu added that he was “astonished” by he move, and found it “very bewildering”, particularly in light of an announcement by President Thein Sein in February this year when he was still prime minister, that CPI should “accelerate the construction” of the dam.
China’s Foreign Ministry Spokesperson, Hong Lei, had earlier urged “relevant countries to guarantee the lawful and legitimate rights and interests of Chinese companies.”
President Thein Sein has stated his commitment to the rule of law, but under the constitution is entitled to executive power over major infrastructure or energy projects. He said on Friday last week that the $US3.6 billion project would be suspended during his tenure, rather than an outright cancellation of the project, causing confusion about the exact situation.
Indeed a minefield of financial and loan agreements are already in writing and huge resources have been spent, with the construction of a smaller 2,000 MW dam at Chinbwe built solely to generate the electricity needed to build the Myitsone dam.
Lu noted that “the loss would go far beyond direct investment and financial expenses”, and that “there would also be tremendous amount of default claims from contractors.” On the Burmese side these include Asia World, run by military crony Steven Law.
China has committed to various major projects in Burma, including the trans-Burma Shwe gas pipeline and a corresponding high speed railway being discussed. The China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC), the main company in the Shwe project, said yesterday that it would go ahead despite the cancellation of the dam.
Professor Shuije Yao, an expert of Chinese economics from the Universityof Nottingham in the UK, told DVB that a cancellation of the 6,000 MW Myitsone dam project would be a “blow” to China in its bid for energy security.
He notes that the country has an extremely large carbon emissions-to-GDP growth rate. With every nine percent of GDP growth, the current annual rate, carbon emissions rise by roughly 20 percent.
China currently generates 80 percent of its electricity from coal, which is widely recognised as one of the worst catalysts for catastrophic climate change. It is strenuously looking to diversify its energy make-up, with hydropower one of the most effective alternatives.
China’s energy-hungry growth rates are largely as a result of its reliance upon manufacturing as an export base.
The CNPC announced on Monday that it would donate $US1.32 million to Burma to build eight schools along the pipeline route, which will now face scrutiny as critics smell blood.
The Myitsone cancellation has raised the imperative for China to woo the disaffected – as Lu claimed, “We provided each household [affected by the dam building] with a 100,000 kyat [$US120] living subsidy, a 21-inch colour TV and other living necessities”.
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