Archived press release

Damn the dam! Ilisu protest hits corporate AGM

9 May 2000

The campaign over the Ilisu Dam scandal steps up a gear today, with protests at BICC(Balfour Beatty)'s AGM.

Present will be:

* “investigative comedian” Mark Thomas
* the Kurdish Human Rights Project
* Friends of the Earth
* Kurdish singers

The Ilisu dam is planned for the Kurdish region of Turkey. It is to be built by an international consortium including Balfour Beatty, which is seeking up to £200 million in credits from the Export Credit Guarantee Department, an agency of the Department of Trade and Industry[1]. Following direct intervention from No10, and despite strong objections from the Foreign Office, Trade Secretary Stephen Byers announced before Christmas that he was “minded”to approve the credit.

The dam would:

* forcibly evict 25,000 people, without proper consultation or compensation
* destroy towns and villages, including the world historic town of Hasankeyf, which dates back 10,000 years and is the jewel in the crown of Kurdish culture
* threaten conflict with Syria and Iraq over water flows on the Tigris river. Dam campaigners have commissioned expert legal advice which shows that Turkey has broken international law by failing properly to consult its neighbours over the project.

Dam campaigners have also written to Balfour Beatty's major shareholders warning them of the risk to the company's reputation and finances from association with the Ilisu Dam project. They have also drawn attention to the company's prosecution in Lesotho for alleged

corruption related to contracts for another dam project.

The AGM will see moves by the board to change the name of BICC - Balfour Beatty's holding company. Mr Thomas has suggested that a good alternative name would be“Balfour Bastards”.

Commenting, Tony Juniper, Policy Director of Friends of the Earth said:

“This is the ethical foreign policy issue that refuses to go away.

The Ilisu Dam project is a disgrace. It will damage the environment, ruin the lives of thousands of Kurdish people, and threaten regional security. By any reasonable criteria, this is not a project that should be supported with British Government money. Yet Mr Blair and Mr Byers have blithely backed Balfour Beatty in their destructive and dangerous plans.

We will make this project a test case for the Government in the run-up to the next Election. New Labour promised to judge such projects on environmental, human and social grounds. They have broken this promise over the Ilisu Dam. And if Balfour Beatty shareholders want their company to have good reputation and a secure future they must force the management to drop the Dam.”
ENDS

[1] The ECGD is a secretive agency with few if any social or environmental criteria governing its decisions. It has backed numerous destructive projects from arms deals to dictatorial regimes to nulcear power plants in developing countries. 95% of the debt owed by Third World countries to Britain is export credit debt - and the poor end up paying the bills.

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Published by Friends of the Earth Trust