Subject: ACTION ALERT: US SUPPORTING HUGE NEPAL DAM From: Patrick McCully Date: 1996/09/24 Message-Id: <5293hs$h36@usenet.srv.cis.pitt.edu> Sender: Niraj "the Mirage" Pant Organization: None Newsgroups: alt.india.progressive Originator: kamat@sunos-Eval.cis.pitt.edu [part 1 of 2] 23 SEPTEMBER, 1996 ACTION ALERT STOP CLINTON ADMINISTRATION SUPPORTING WORLD'S HIGHEST DAM The Parliament of Nepal is scheduled to debate this Friday a treaty committing Nepal to cooperate with India in building the world's highest dam. If the treaty is ratified the 945-feet-high Pancheswhar Dam is supposed to be built within the next ten years on the Mahakali River on Nepal's far western border with India. Nepalese environmental and human rights groups are lobbying parliament not to ratify the treaty to which there is much opposition in Nepal. The job of treaty opponents has been made more difficult by pro-treaty lobbying and press comments by the US Ambassador and officials of the US State Department. IRN has written the following letter to Secretary of State Warren Christopher urging the State Department to halt its advocacy of the Pancheshwar Dam. Please write similar letters to Mr Christopher and send copies to the people listed at the bottom of the letter. Please also send copies of any letters to IRN. Thank you, Patrick McCully Campaigns Director ------------------------------------------------ 23 September, 1996 Warren Christopher Secretary of State State Department Washington, DC 20520 Fax. 202 647 7120 Dear Mr Christopher We are writing to express our concerns over reports that the State Department has been lobbying Nepalese political parties to ratify the Mahakali Integrated Development Treaty which is due to be debated in the Nepalese Parliament on September 27. If ratified this treaty would commit India and Nepal to build within ten years the Pancheshwar Hydroelectric Project, which at 945 feet would be the world's highest dam. According to the Nepalese government daily The Rising Nepal (September 7), US Assistant Secretary of State Robin Lynn Raphel during a recent visit to Kathmandu urged the Nepalese parliament to ratify the treaty and stated that the "Mahakali Treaty is important and it opens the market for power sale (sic) which will be key to international financing in hydro power in Nepal." Because it is inconceivable that a dam of this size could now be built in the US due to public opposition on environmental and economic grounds, and because US government agencies have recently withdrawn from assisting other major dams overseas citing economic, technical, social and environmental concerns, we believe it highly inappropriate for the State Department to be lobbying Nepal to commit itself to this massive project. When the World Bank withdrew its support for the Arun III Dam in Nepal in August 1995, its reasons were that the project was too large and complex for a poor country such as Nepal and that investing in the dam would "crowd out priority social expenditures." Yet the Arun project would have been dwarfed by the Pancheshwar Dam, the cost of which is currently estimated at $12 billion, compared to the $1 billion price-tag of Arun III. Citizens' groups in Nepal opposed the Arun project for the same reasons given by the World Bank and also because it would have destroyed the nascent indigenous hydro industry. This indigenous industry is building small and medium-sized projects which can cost-effectively exploit the hydropower resources of Nepal and provide electricity for the country's cities and its scattered rural population without causing major environmental harm or necessitating the resettlement of large numbers of families. The groups opposed to Arun III also raised concerns over the social and environmental impacts of the project and the secretive and undemocratic nature of the dam's planning process. All these concerns are magnified many times by the mammoth Pancheshwar scheme. No detailed feasibility studies, environmental impact assessments or resettlement plans for Pancheshwar have yet been completed. Lobbying for this massive dam without any detailed knowledge of its technical and economic viability, safety, or social and environmental impacts is, we believe, irresponsible. (Get Next Article Segment) _________________________________________________________________ [Previous] [Next] [Hitlist] [Get Thread] [Author Profile] [Post] [Post] [Reply] _________________________________________________________________ Home Power Search Post to Usenet Ask DN Wizard Help Why use DN? | Advertising Info | New Features! | Policy Stuff Copyright © 1996 Deja News, Inc. All rights reserved.