Guest guest Posted May 23, 2002 Report Share Posted May 23, 2002 Governments decline comment on NGO report - The New Straits Times news KUALA LUMPUR, May 21. - Neither the Governments of Australia and the United States nor Wisma Putra wished to be drawn into allegations that US activists had helped to finance a campaign against the RM9 billion Bakun hydroelectric dam project. Spokesmen for the Australian High Commission and the US Embassy here, and that of Wisma Putra declined to comment. Speaking on condition of anonymity, they said that the matter had nothing to do with the Governments of the three countries as the statements released by an Australian non-governmental organisation (NGO) were not official nor given through diplomatic channels. " We have nothing to say at the moment and have referred the matter to higher authorities for their attention and action, " said one of the spokesmen. Asked if any action would be taken against the particular Australian NGO for making such allegations, they added that it was " an internal matter and not for public consumption " . When pressed further, the spokesmen neither wished to deny nor confirm the contents of the Press report carried by Bernama last Sunday. The allegations were levelled by a leading Australian public policy think-tank, the Institute of Public Affairs (IPA), which claimed that opponents of dam projects in Malaysia were receiving money from US activists. The report said Global Green Grants had channelled some US$9,500 (RM36,000) to opponents of dam projects in the country but did not name the local NGOs who benefitted from the money. IPA executive director Dr Mike Nahan, who released the report, also suspected that the dam project opponents were receiving bigger amounts of money from European sources. A Malaysian NGO, Sahabat Alam Malaysia (SAM), yesterday denied receiving money from US activists to help finance its campaign against the Bakun hydroelectric dam project. SAM representative Thomas Jalong said he was not aware of any fund being received from US activists, including the Global Green Grants scheme, which is a project of the California-based Tides Foundation. Dismissing the report as baseless, Jalong said as far as SAM was concerned, the (IPA) report was irrelevant. Some 10,000 ethnic people were displaced by the Bakun project. About 9,000 had been resettled at the Sungai Asap Resettlement Scheme while 200 refused to be resettled. The Bakun project, which covers an area the size of Singapore when completed, is capable of generating up to 2,400 megawatts of electricity. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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