Dear China, it’s time to talk!!!

Despite saying it takes multilateral cooperation seriously, China has not yet responded to civil society concerns in Latin America

Giant Dam in Ecuador built by Chinese corporations

At the end of April, 263 civil
society groups from around the world sent a letter
to the heads of various Chinese institutions about financial aid to help
coronavirus-affected projects connected to the Belt and Road Initiative,
China’s global infrastructure programme. They asked for support not to be given
to projects that had posed social, environmental, climatic or financial risks
before the pandemic struck.

Crucially, in …

New Report of Save the Tigris Campaign

The Rivers without Boundaries is proud to announce publication of the first ever comprehensive report on dams in Kurdistan Region of Iraq, prepared by the Save the Tigris Campaign, which we are the happy participants of.

According to the UNDP, the water discharge of the Tigris-Euphrates Rivers is set to decrease by 50% between 2009 and 2025. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) which governs the KRI recognizes water security as a priority. To tackle the issues of climate change, upstream dam construction and mismanagement, the …

The new Sustainable Recovery Plan
released by the International Energy Agency in response to the Covid-19
pandemic and economic crisis being felt across the world has recommended hydropower
and nuclear reactor modernization as one of key policy measures. The plan seeks
to show governments what they can do to boost economic growth, create jobs and
put global greenhouse gas emissions into structural decline. It sets out over
30 policy measures to be carried out over the next three years requiring about
US$1 trillion of additional annual investment (from both the public and private
sectors).

Figure: Annual average …

The tragic failure of the Sardoba
dam has sparked fresh debate around water conflicts and the need for
cooperation between countries in Central Asia

Traumatic memories of Sardoba dam failure…

At 5.55 am on May 1, after five days
of severe storms, a dam wall at the Sardoba reservoir in the region of
Sirdaryo, Uzbekistan, collapsed and water poured through a breach onto cotton
fields and villages.

To reduce water pressure on the
walls of the reservoir and prevent further collapse of dam walls, its gates
were opened. Water spilled into the Southern Golodnostepsky Canal and its
offshoots, with the intention …

A huge flow of diesel has reached
stunning Lake Pyasino in the Arctic after the recent accident at a thermal
power plant near Norilsk, it is believed. This indicates the failure of initial
attempts to contain the toxic pollution, and with the lake linked by the Pyasina
River to the Kara Sea there are now fears much worse is to come. A grim
Krasnoyarsk governor Alexander Uss
said: ‘The fuel has got into Lake Pyasino. This is a beautiful lake about 70
kilometres long.‘But it’s impossible to predict how it will bear this brunt
now. At the moment, …

We warned in vain that hydropower construction should be halted to prevent massive outbreak of COVID-19 at Beloporozhskaya hydroelectric station.

A large outbreak of coronavirus was detected in Karelia, at the construction site of the Beloporozhskaya hydropower station, with number of COVID-positive patients hospitalized from the construction site coming to 79 by the morning of June 4. Two months ago Eugene Simonov –international coordinator of the Rivers without Boundaries coalition published a warning to Karelia authorities insisting that precautions should be taken and construction should not be rushed to meet …