US to back Three Gorges Dam?
A coalition of 15 environmental, development, church and human rights organisations has called on the Clinton administration to oppose the construction of the massive Three Gorges Dam planned for China's Yangtze River.
Until now, the US official stance on the project has been one of non-involvement. But in an unusual move, the Clinton administration has called for an inter-agency review of the US position.
If completed, the dam will force the relocation of an estimated 1.3 million people.
The US reconsideration, according to Owen Lammers, executive director of the International Rivers Network, can be attributed to a push for lucrative contracts for US corporations.
"It appears that the US Export/Import Bank would like to aid US corporations to capitalise on the $20 to $50 billion Three Gorges bonanza", says Lammers. "What they would be investing in is one of the greatest planned human rights violations of all time — the forced eviction of 1.3 million people. All of this for a project that experts around the world warn will not work."
In a letter and accompanying brief delivered to Vice-President Al Gore on September 28, the coalition pointed to the need for Chinese authorities to maintain a state of siege over the project opponents. Prior to the massacre at Tiananmen Square, open opposition had succeeded in getting the project temporarily shelved.
Serious technical flaws relating to sedimentation, the dam's operating regime and structural soundness are cited in the coalition documents, suggesting that the project will be unable to deliver promised economic benefits, while at the same time threatening the safety of more than 100 million people downstream.
Now in its second year of pre-construction, the Three Gorges Dam, if completed, will be the largest hydro-electric dam ever built. It will be more than 170 metres high and more than 1.6 km long. Its reservoir, which will inundate the majestic Three Gorges, will stretch over 560 miles.