April 12: On a hot April morning, wearing rich traditional costumes, over 160 villagers from a village called Weigyi on the Thai-Burma border, gathered at the Salween River bank to conduct the annual traditional land veneration ceremony.

They chose the ceremonial site opposite the point where the Thailand electrical power organization, Electric Generating Authority of Thailand (EGAT), plan to construct the dam wall for the Upper Salween Dam, in order to supply electricity to Thailand and other ASEAN countries.

Whilst mumbling prayers, the community elders prayed to the land spirits to help them protect their land and river from destruction. The participants also believe that through praying to the land spirits, they will be protected from harm within their community.

Lae Wah, an elder member of Salween Eyes (SEE), explained that he came to take part in the ceremony opposite the EGAT planned dam site and pray to the land spirits, because these spirits helped his ancestors in the past and he has faith that they will also help him and his people now.

“Now I know that our community alone can not stop the dams being built. Only God has the power to do this,” he said.

However, most of the villagers are very aware of the potential devastating impact that a state run dam project on the Salween river, involving drastic changes to the local water infrastructure, will have on their community.

Saw Maung Wah, a goods trader from Burma said, “I can not imagine what the living conditions will be like for my family if the dam is built”. He predicted “severe starvation within the community”, as the reality he faces now is already very difficult, with both his family and other poorer families in the community struggling for survival, often without food. However, he added that they have been able to survive so far because of the rich biodiversity found on the Salween River.

Maung Wah also said that the river- bank communities are mainly dependent on dry rice farming, fisheries and basic needs trading. They work up and down river along the Salween, struggling for their survival

Dah Mu, a head of Kyaw Shaware Der ― a village on the bank of Thailand said, ” I am sure that rich men have enough money to build these dams for their own profit and that they do not care about the livelihoods of people living along the river.” Dah Mu expressed feelings of helplessness, pleading that the international community raise their voices in the name of local people ― people who will be severely affected by the Salween dam.

The opposition to the Salween dam plans is gaining momentum with diverse people and groups including environmentalists, human rights activists and advocates of ethnic groups based in Thailand and Burma, voicing concerns about the serious impact of the dams.

Last year, the Karen River Watch produced an intensive report called “Damming at Gun Point”, which highlighted the military and psychological warfare that the Burmese military junta has waged against ethnic minority groups in Burma, killing, raping, and forcibly displacing ethnic people along the border, particularly targeting Shan communities living inside Burma.

Moreover, Human rights groups have also documented the Burmese military’s use of forced labour as well as the destruction of people’s homes and farmland, particularly near the Ta Sang dam in order to clear the area for dam construction.

Although there have been many campaigns against the dam, research for its construction and that of high way infrastructure for transportation, are continuing everyday in Burma and Thailand. According to villagers living on the Salween river bank, Thai researchers have been measuring the water everyday at points where dam construction is planned, since last month.

Moreover, to make way for Wei Kyi and Dawing dams along the border, the military government boosted troop presence in the proposed areas for dam construction.

The Karen National Defence Organisation (KNDO) battalion (1) commander, Major Maung Wah stated that about 1400 soldiers (one division) came to Kho Kya Kho ― a military junta controlled area, which is near to the proposed Dawing dam site.

The state military Junta, State Peace and Development Council (SPDC) has proposed the building of three dams on the Salween river – which serving the survival of the military with the combination supports from Thai Prime minister, Thaksin Shinawatra, who declared his support for the dams after visiting Burma in February 2003, also recently announced that the Salween dams were an essential component of ASEAN plans to develop a power grid; therefore stating that Burma should proceed with the dam plans despite concerns about the possible environmental and social impacts they will have.

Due to a lack of knowledge about modern technology, one of the local villagers asked “how can people dam the river because the river flow is very fast and strong”; most of the villagers are very curious as to how the dam will be constructed.

However, they fear the loss of their property inherited from their parents and have no aspirations to leave their lands. With strong faith, the participants prayed to the land spirits and at the end of the ceremony they chanted “no dam, we want no dam; dam killing us”.