Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi was yesterday to help inaugurate Afghanistan’s biggest hydroelectric dam in a sign of warming ties between the nations.
The Salma Dam, first planned in 1976, is finally finished after construction started again following decades of fighting.
The US$290 million dam in Herat province bordering Iran is to boost Afghanistan’s installed power capacity by about 10 percent and irrigate an area roughly the size of New York City.
Photo: EPA
The project highlights India’s growing links with Afghanistan’s government, which is fighting an insurgency with Taliban militants who have found refuge in rival Pakistan.
India has invested about US$2 billion in Afghanistan since the Taliban regime was toppled by US forces in 2001, including the nation’s new parliament building.
“India is playing an important soft power role in Afghanistan given the security and geopolitics of the region,” former Afghan ambassador to Canada and France Omar Samad said in an e-mailed statement. “The vast majority of Afghans view India as a historically friendly country with limited security-related interests.”
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani was scheduled to be at the ceremony to join Modi, who later yesterday was to head to Qatar. Situated on the upper reaches of Heray Rud River, the 107m-high dam is to generate 42 megawatts of power and irrigate about 80,000 hectares of land by next year, according to the fact sheet issued by the president’s office.
Construction on the project stopped in 1981 after the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan. It only restarted after the US overthrow of the Taliban led to a government that was friendly with India.
Indian engineers were transported via helicopter from Kabul once per month to visit the dam site, the Afghan government said.
All the materials and equipment for the project were transported through Iran to avoid Pakistan — India’s main rival.
Modi and Ghani were in Iran last month to sign a three-nation agreement to develop the Iranian port city of Chabahar. The deal, described by Iranian President Hassan Rouhani as partly political, is designed to increase ties between the three nations.
Tensions between Afghanistan and Pakistan are rising as Taliban fighters resist peace talks aimed at ending the 15-year conflict. A US drone last month killed the Taliban’s leader while he was traveling in Pakistan.
In March, the Taliban attacked the Indian-built parliament building three months after its inauguration.
The strike only caused minor damage.
Afghanistan imports much of its electricity needs from neighboring nations, such as Uzbekistan. Ghani vowed during his election campaign to lead the nation toward energy self-sufficiency.
The Salma Dam is a “momentous step” toward that goal, his office said in a statement.
OPTIMISTIC: A Philippine Air Force spokeswoman said the military believed the crew were safe and were hopeful that they and the jet would be recovered A Philippine Air Force FA-50 jet and its two-person crew are missing after flying in support of ground forces fighting communist rebels in the southern Mindanao region, a military official said yesterday. Philippine Air Force spokeswoman Colonel Consuelo Castillo said the jet was flying “over land” on the way to its target area when it went missing during a “tactical night operation in support of our ground troops.” While she declined to provide mission specifics, Philippine Army spokesman Colonel Louie Dema-ala confirmed that the missing FA-50 was part of a squadron sent “to provide air support” to troops fighting communist rebels in
ECONOMIC DISTORTION? The US commerce secretary’s remarks echoed Elon Musk’s arguments that spending by the government does not create value for the economy US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick on Sunday said that government spending could be separated from GDP reports, in response to questions about whether the spending cuts pushed by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency could possibly cause an economic downturn. “You know that governments historically have messed with GDP,” Lutnick said on Fox News Channel’s Sunday Morning Futures. “They count government spending as part of GDP. So I’m going to separate those two and make it transparent.” Doing so could potentially complicate or distort a fundamental measure of the US economy’s health. Government spending is traditionally included in the GDP because
Two daughters of an Argentine mountaineer who died on an icy peak 40 years ago have retrieved his backpack from the spot — finding camera film inside that allowed them a glimpse of some of his final experiences. Guillermo Vieiro was 44 when he died in 1985 — as did his climbing partner — while descending Argentina’s Tupungato lava dome, one of the highest peaks in the Americas. Last year, his backpack was spotted on a slope by mountaineer Gabriela Cavallaro, who examined it and contacted Vieiro’s daughters Guadalupe, 40, and Azul, 44. Last month, the three set out with four other guides
Sri Lanka’s fragile economic recovery could be hampered by threatened trade union strikes over reduced benefits for government employees in this year’s budget, the IMF said yesterday. Sri Lankan President Anura Kumara Dissanayake’s maiden budget raised public sector salaries, but also made deep cuts to longstanding perks in a continuing effort to repair the island nation’s tattered finances. Sri Lanka’s main doctors’ union is considering a strike from today to protest against cuts to their allowances, while teachers are also considering stoppages. IMF senior mission chief for Sri Lanka Peter Breuer said the budget was the “last big push” for the country’s austerity
RSS