India to monitor China’s mega Tibet dam plan

AFP | New Delhi

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India said yesterday it had raised concerns with China about a planned mega hydropower dam construction upstream in Tibet, saying it will “monitor and take necessary measures to protect our interests”.

If built, the dam would dwarf the record-breaking Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River in central China -- with potentially serious impact for millions of people downstream in India and Bangladesh.

A report from China’s official Xinhua news agency last month announced the project on the river -- known as Yarlung Tsangpo in Tibet and Brahmaputra in India -- linking it to Beijing’s carbon neutrality targets and economic goals in the Tibet region.

China “has been urged to ensure that the interests of the downstream states of the Brahmaputra are not harmed by activities in upstream areas”, India’s foreign ministry spokesman Randhir Jaiswal said. Jaiswal told reporters that New Delhi “will continue to monitor and take necessary measures to protect our interests”.

India has established rights to river waters and “consistently expressed... our views and concerns... over mega projects on rivers in their (Chinese) territory,” he added.

“These have been reiterated along with the need for transparency and consultations with the downstream countries following the latest report.”

China’s foreign ministry last month said Beijing “has always maintained a responsible attitude towards the development of cross-border rivers”, and said the hydropower project “is aimed at speeding up the development of clean energy and addressing climate change”.