Southeast Asia / In the Medias

AFP [27.3.08] The Mekong River in southern Vietnam, the world's 12th largest waterway crossing six countries, may soon be tamed by a cascade of mega dams, but critics say the plan will harm the fish stocks millions of people rely on.

BANGKOK, Mar 6 (IPS) - An opportunity to review the balance sheet of the benefits and burdens of regional integration and opening borders lies ahead, at the Third Mekong Summit to be held in Laos at end-March.

CAN THO, Vietnam - Nguyen Huu Chiem was born in Can Tho province, the eldest of ten children and the seventh generation of a Mekong Delta farming family.

Article was reported in TIME Magazine

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1657580,00.html

Article from Economist.com

TWO years ago the World Bank returned, after a decade's absence, to the business of financing giant hydroelectric dams. This was in spite of a damning (pardon the pun) report in 2000 from the World Commission on Dams, which had been set up to investigate the many concerns of economists, environmentalists and civil-society groups about big hydropower projects. The commission's report confirmed many of their fears about the underestimated costs and over-hyped benefits of such schemes.

Newsweek, March 19, 2001, Atlantic Edition
SECTION: ASIA; Pg. 26
HEADLINE: Strangling the Mekong
BYLINE: By Ron Moreau and Richard Ernsberger Jr.; With reporting by Kevin Platt in Beijing

HIGHLIGHT: