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US Urges 'Green' Guidelines The effort is aimed at preventing a repeat of the fights over China's giant Three Gorges dam, which has displaced more than 1m people along the Yangtze River. The US Export-Import Bank, under pressure from Congress, pulled its funding in 1996 while Canada, Japan and several European countries supported the project. Similar issues have arisen over Turkey's planned Ilisu dam, which would displace about 25,000 people in southern Turkey. European and US companies are seeking government export credit support for that project, which has been denounced by environmental and human rights groups. OECD members have been negotiating in Paris this week to try to hammer out an agreement before a ministerial meeting later this month. In addition, leaders of the Group of Eight industrialised nations have agreed that such guidelines should be in place by this year's summit in July. The US wants to compel all export credit agencies to do thorough environmental assessments on projects and to make that information public. James Harmon, chairman of the US Export-Import Bank, said the negotiations to date had been "tortuous", and that most large export credit agencies remain opposed to adopting common guidelines on the environmental impacts of the projects they finance. At most they been willing to agree to do assessments and share information on a case-by-case basis, he said. About half of all export credit agencies currently have some internal requirements to assess the environmental and social impacts of projects. The strongest resistance to common guidelines had come from France, Germany and Japan, said another US official. Export credit agencies are the largest source of government support for developing countries. Environmentalists charge that official export credits continue to pay for a host of destructive schemes in developing countries such as dams, coal and nuclear power plants, oil pipelines and large-scale logging operations. The US Congress in 1995 forced the Ex-Im Bank to adopt environmental
criteria for project approval. US companies have grumbled since that time
that they are being disadvantaged by the more stringent US The OECD secretariat has tabled a proposal for the meeting this week that goes some way to meeting US concerns. It would require export credit agencies to ensure that the environmental standards they adopt are at least equivalent to those used by the World Bank and other international financial institutions. It would also require greater transparency and sharing of information with environmental groups, a sticking point for some export credit agencies. The US initiative is so far being carried by career officials and by holdovers from the Clinton administration, including Mr. Harmon. But the Bush administration, which has been under fire from the Europeans for abandoning the Kyoto protocol on global warming, may be willing to embrace an issue where the US so far appears greener than Europe. "This is an opportunity for the administration to show that the US has taken the lead on an environmental issue," he said.
NGOs say project would hurt Kurds and take control of the Tigris, and west should not provide aid for it, reports Kevin Brown: Financial Times, Jul 14, 2000, 429 words Western governments are coming under growing international pressure to revise their rules on export credit guarantees, as concern mounts about a controversial dam project in south-eastern Turkey. The Turkish government says its plans for a 1200MW hydro-electric dam at Ilisu form an essential part of a long-term project to develop the area and bring Turkey's inadequate electricity supply up to European standards. But the dam - the biggest of 22 planned in the area - is opposed by a powerful coalition of non-governmental organisations, headed by Berne Declaration, a human rights group in Switzerland, and Friends of the Earth in London. Much of their campaign revolves around allegations that the dam is intended
to undermine minority Kurdish communities and enforce control of the Tigris
river at the expense of Iraq and Syria, where farmers rely on Campaigners say Turkey has no serious plans to compensate 12,000-25,000 residents and is indifferent to the fate of the ancient, part-Kurdish town of Hasankeyf, some of which would be flooded. Turkey denies all these claims. However, the NGOs have also succeeded in focusing public attention on requests for export credit guarantees - a form of government-backed insurance - from the companies that want to build the dam. These are Sulzer Hydro, the Swiss turbine maker leading the project; Balfour Beatty, the British civil engineer; ABB, the Swiss engineering group; Impregilo of Italy; and Skanska of Sweden. Three Turkish construction companies are also involved. The campaigners scored their biggest success on Wednesday, when a British parliamentary committee said the dam contravened international standards and should not be funded by British taxpayers. This was in spite of attempts by government ministers to head off opposition to the project by insisting Turkey meet conditions on water quality, downstream water flow, the future of Hasankeyf and resettlement. The consortium argues that it is raising standards for the dam, which Turkey is determined to complete because hydro-power is its only big fuel source. However, member companies admit Turkey had not conducted an environmental
impact assessment before approving the dam. Several have now been produced,
with varying results, and a final version will appear No contracts have been signed, and a final decision is not expected until early next year. But the NGOs say that the most worrying aspect of Ilisu is the lack of international standards for export credit applications. Campaigners say donor countries should agree to observe World Bank rules banning involvement in dam projects unless alternatives have been assessed and there has been consultation with local people and interested countries. None of this seems to have occurred in Turkey. Attempts to set tougher rules through the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development have made little progress, but NGOs are pressing the British government to raise the issue at the next meeting of the G8 group of economically advanced countries.
The US wants to put World-Bank-style environmental guidelines in place at leading export credit agencies, which provide financial support for exporters. It wants a strong commitment to the environmental guidelines included in the communique for this year's G8 summit, which starts tomorrow in Okinawa. But the German government, a coalition that includes the Green party,
is leading an effort to water down the language. The US Export-Import
Bank already uses environmental guidelines similar to the World Bank's
- including accounting for the greenhouse gas production and providing
environmental impact assessment of US industry groups complain that other export credit agencies are not constrained by such guidelines, and US companies therefore suffer a competitive disadvantage. The US also argues that export credits and guarantees, totalling Dollars 400bn a year, dwarf lending from the World Bank and other development banks. Since these loans are often made without consideration for the environment,
the ecological impact can be significant. "To protect the global
environment, we can't have a race to the bottom among export credit The German position, supported by France, is being condemned by environmental groups. "What's scandalous is that this current German government is worse than the Kohl government," said Bruce Rich of the Environmental Defence Fund in Washington. Last year's G8 summit in Cologne agreed that environmental guidelines
should be introduced for export credit agencies in time for the G8 summit
in 2001. However, at last month's ministerial meeting of the Organisation In the preparations for the Okinawa summit the US has been pressing,
so far unsuccessfully, for G8 governments to go ahead with the initiative
since they represent 70 per cent of all export credits. It also wants
a reference to Alan Larson, US undersecretary of state for economic, business and agricultural
affairs, said: "It's very important that these export credit agencies
follow 'green' policies and use environmental guidelines as they assess
the ISTANBUL -- Turkey's controversial plan to build a $1.8 billion (1.95 billion euro) dam on the Tigris River may accelerate the Group of Eight industrialized nations' consideration of changing its criteria for lending on such projects. Western diplomats and environmental activists say G-8 leaders, who are
meeting in Okinawa, Japan, may act on a proposal by the U.S, Japan and
Britain to establish a working group that would draw up revised rules
for Since last year, environmental, ethnic and international controversy
has surrounded the proposed construction of the 1,200-megawatt Ilisu Dam
60 kilometers from the Syrian border. The dam is part of Turkey's $32
billion Meanwhile, the dam project might become another bone of contention in Turkey's efforts to meet European Union requirements for membership. Critics charge that it demonstrates Turkey's failure to respect Kurdish rights and international law. In an incident that has focused increased attention on the project, Turkish police last week temporarily confiscated the passports of two representatives from the British Parliament's human-rights committee who were visiting the region as part of a fact-finding mission. The passports were returned 15 hours later. Flood of Opposition Opponents of the project say it would flood the medieval fortress of Hasankeyf in southeastern Turkey and destroy its historic architecture. It also threatens to destroy villages, which would leave thousands of Kurds homeless. GAP's director, Olay Unver, said the Ilisu Dam, which would be the largest dam on the Tigris in terms of hydropower production, will be the second-largest in the project in those terms. He said if the Ilisu Dam isn't built, it would be impossible to build a dam further downstream, which is needed to irrigate large tracts of arid land. The project's supporters nonetheless concede that Turkey has so far failed to address international concerns summed up by four conditions for British government support formulated in December by Britain's Department for Trade and Industry. These conditions include independently monitored resettlement plans for the displaced, the saving of as much as possible of the archaeological riches of Hasankeyf, the most important of the towns and hamlets that might be submerged, water-flow controls and water-quality standards.' There Is No Policy' Dogan Altinbilek, head of the State Hydraulic Works, says his office has already invested $1.2 million in efforts to salvage whatever antiquities can be saved from Hasankeyf and surrounding areas. In addition, Mr. Altinbilek says Ayse Kuday, a World Bank expert, is studying resettlement issues. "We will not penalize the people. We offer them homes and land to
be repaid in 25 years with a five-year grace period," Mr. Altinbilek
says. Adding to the controversy, Britain's junior foreign minister, Peter
Haine, last month Western diplomats fear that mounting water tensions between Syria and
Turkey could affect Syria's relations with Jordan and Israel and aggravate
Israel's negotiations with its Lebanese and Palestinian neighbors, with
whom it has yet to reach agreement on regional water issues. "You
can't put boundaries on water," says John Kolars, a professor emeritus
at the University of Michigan and a leading Middle East water expert.
"Turkey and Meanwhile, Syria has built 23 small dams on the Yarmouk River, which
is a major tributary of the Jordan River, which means this exacerbates
the water shortage in Israel, Jordan" and areas under Palestinian
control. Both Syria and Iraq charge that GAP is exacerbating their dire
water problems. "This situation has resulted in immense damages to
various aspects of life in Iraq. And these damages will increase with
each new project carried out by Turkey," the Iraqi foreign ministry
said recently. In a July 3 letter to environmentalist group Friends of
the Earth, Syria's state minister for foreign affairs, Nasser Khaddour,
said Syria had yet to be consulted on the A Turkish foreign ministry spokesman confirms Mr. Khaddour's
assertion. "We don't provide any information nor do we have any obligation
to do so," the spokesman said, adding that Turkey had earlier informed
Syria about its GAP project. |
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