(June 1, 1997) If the Manila-based Asian Development Bank (AsDB) has its way over the next decade, the Mekong and its largest tributaries will be choked by a series of giant hydropower dams, and up to 60 million ethnic minority people could be forced out of the region’s highlands.

(May 15, 1997) A way of life could disappear in meeting the demand of electricity. Having survived the Khmer Rouge terror, deadly diseases and even tiger attacks, stoic peasants in this remote corner of Cambodia now must ponder irrevocable change.

(May 12, 1997) Officials from Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam pledged on Tuesday to cooperate in the development of hydroelectric and other power developments in their region.

(April 1, 1997) The World Bank is preparing to back a hydroelectric dam project in the Mekong region of southeast Asia that will decimate the fisheries, forests, economies, and water supplies of thousands of local people, and threaten endangered wildlife.

(March 6, 1997) The Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand has decided not to purchase power from the yet-to-be-built Nam Theun 2 dam in Laos until at least 2004, according to a report in the Bangkok daily, The Nation. The World Bank is still involved in the project, despite EGAT’s withdrawal, insisting it will not make a decision to finance the dam until the Lao government and the project’s private developers have completed environmental impact and resettlement studies. World Bank official Nina Shapiro, contacted last week, was unaware that the Nam Theun 2 power deal was in jeopardy.

(February 24, 1997) While debate on the controversial Nam Theun 2 hydro-electricity project rages on, residents of Nakai Plateau, the dam’s site which will be submerged as a result, are anxiously waiting to be resettled, hoping for a new and better life.

(February 18, 1997) The Asian Development Bank (ADB) will provide Laos of US $90 million in each of the next three years, an ADB representative said in an interview in Vientiane last week. "We sent Mr. Rajendran and some other programmers to Laos to programme assistance for Laos for the next three years, and we can now say that we will grant about US $90 million to Laos each year for the years 1998, 1999 and 2000W said Mr.Rajat Nag, programme manager of the ADB’s Programmes Department.

(January 29, 1997) Letter of January 6, 1997 in reply to concerns about Canada’s involvement in the hydroelectric development projects in the Mekong River Basin.

(November 1, 1996) Mekong governments have pinned their national economic futures on multimillion dollar exports of hydroelectricity to serve Thailand’s surging demand for electricity.

(October 1, 1996) The Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand has cancelled plans to purchase electricity from the Nam Theun 2 hydro dam, reports the Bangkok daily, The Nation. EGAT’s announcement may be the final blow for the dam’s developers, who have sunk US$30 million into the project so far but have failed to secure either World Bank or commercial financing.

(August 27, 1996) The Nam Theun-Hinboun hydropower project in Laos will cut off the water supply of Asian elephants, tigers, and numerous other animal species and threaten a national biodiversity conservation area, according to a report by Norplan, a Norwegian engineering firm.

(August 21, 1996) Hydro dam will destroy Laotian fishery but companies and aid agencies won’t be held responsible for damage, says report.

(August 8, 1996) Asian Development Bank’s analysis of project seriously flawed