Hydroelectric projects have begun to spring up across the Mekong River, with some already under way and other already creating tensions between Southeast Asian neighbors.
Experts on water security met in Siem Reap on Friday at a two-day conference of the Council for Security Cooperation in the Asia Pacific in an effort to address upcoming issues surrounding such projects and other water conflict.
“Some water-related conflicts will take place because some farmers or people who used to be living alongside the Mekong River basin, because of the dam construction, they need to be resettled, which means that there are refugees because of the dam construction, and then it will give some kinds of social impacts on particularly poor people and the marginalized,” Seungho Lee, a water expert from Korea University, based in Seoul, said on the sidelines of the conference Friday.
Government officials and experts from across the globe attended the meeting, including experts from the US, China, Japan and Southeast Asia. China already has four hydrodams in operation and four more under construction along the Mekong. At least 12 dams are planned in the lower Mekong regions of Laos and Cambodia. More >>>
