DUSHANBE, September 7, 2012, Asia-Plus — Euro MP Struan Stevenson said in an interview with The European Times that he is dismayed to learn that a final independent, technical assessment of the project by the World Bank is not expected until well into next year.
According to him, when he visited the site for the construction of the Roghun hydroelectricity power plant (HPP) in 2010, over 9000 workers were involved in the Roghun hydroelectricity project. But when he visited the dam in July this year, “5,000 of these skilled workers had lost their jobs, in response to a demand from the World Bank that all work should be suspended until after they have concluded their assessment of the project.” There is now a risk that these workers will migrate to other countries in search of work, meaning that even if the World Bank eventually gives Roghun a green light, vast numbers of new employees will have to undergo costly training and retraining to complete the project, Mr. Stevenson noted.
The scale of this project is impressive enough, but its strategic importance for this area of extreme poverty and high political sensitivity is of global significance, Euro MP stressed.
“Tajikistan shares a 1300 km (830 mile) border with Afghanistan. In Afghanistan and nearby Pakistan, there is abject poverty and a lack of job opportunities which has driven successive generations of young people into the arms of the drugs barons and Islamic terrorists. A secure supply of electricity from Tajikistan will transform the economies of these ravaged regions and provide new sources of employment and opportunities for their impoverished and war-weary citizens.
“This is something that we in the West should welcome and support. Instead, we find ourselves trying to pacify the most vociferous opponent of the hydro project at Roghun – President Karimov of Uzbekistan. He is deeply hostile to the plans for Roghun, claiming that it is crazy to build the world’s highest dam in an earthquake zone and that any breach of the 335 meter embankment would have devastating consequences for downstream nations like his own. He also fears that Roghun will enable Tajikistan to control the flow of water to Uzbekistan which they rely on every summer for irrigating their cotton and rice crops. Uzbek hostility to the Roghun project has manifested itself in a series of border closures, trade disruption and protests, with Karimov at one point ordering the severing of the electricity grid which linked Tajikistan to the rest of Central Asia.
“I am of the firm belief that President Karimov’s fears are unfounded. As far as the supply of water is concerned, the Tajiks point out that they have never and will never withhold water from their downstream neighbors. They say that in any case, Roghun is being built upriver from Nurek with a reservoir that will take 17 years to fill and as such, cannot have any impact on downstream nations like Uzbekistan. They also point out, the River Vaksh does not even flow into Uzbekistan and as far as earthquakes are concerned, Roghun will be designed in exactly the same way as Nurek which has withstood the test of time.
“Against this background, it is really unhelpful for the World Bank to dither and delay their decision on Roghun. This is a lifeline project which will be good for Tajikistan, good for Afghanistan, Good for Pakistan and good for Central Asia. It is time for the World Bank to take the bull by the horns, gave the go-ahead to Roghun and get this project back on track.”
Mr. Struan Stevenson is a Conservative Euro MP representing Scotland in the European Parliament. He is President of the Climate Change, Biodiversity & Sustainable Development Intergroup.
