(TibetanReview.net, Oct09, 2010) Touted as a project to further develop Tibet, the Lhasa-Shigatse extension of the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, for which China began the actual building work on Sep 26, raises a host of technical, socio-economic, environmental, and geopolitical issues, according to The Economist Online (UK) Oct 7.
The report began by saying that in going ahead with the decision to build the railway line, the authorities appeared to have been undeterred by the problems that the railway had already brought to Lhasa where a tourism boom and a flood of immigrants from China’s interior contributed to an explosion of unrest among embittered Tibetans in Mar’08.
On the technical difficulties in building and maintaining the extension line, the report said that nearly half of it will go through tunnels or over bridges (96 of them). That it will cross areas prone to earthquakes, landslides and sand storms. And while the Golmud-Lhasa line had to traverse unstable permafrost, the Lhasa-Shigatse extension will be challenged by geothermal fields with hot springs. All this at an oxygen-starved altitude of 3,550-4,000 metres.
Even without the extension line and the upcoming airport, the opening of the Lhasa railway in 2006 led to the the number of tourists who visited the Tibetan side of Mt Everest, located in Shigatse, had almost doubled to 27,476 in 2007 from the preceding year. This has the environmentalists are worried.
The extension line is also a matter of concern to India, given the railway’s role in transporting troops and military equipment. It will also give China more leverage and influence over Nepal. China’s long-term plans to further extend the railway network to Nyalam on the border with Nepal and to Dromo near Bhutan and the Indian state of Sikkim and to Nyingtri, located close to the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh, claimed by China as southern Tibet, will only worsen the situation. Besides, Nepal has been repeatedly urging China to bring the railway right up to Kathmandu.
Shigatse itself is already a Chinese overwhelmed city. The report cited Tibet Business News, published from Lhasa, as saying that the majority of traders in Shigatse, Tibet’s second city, were already migrants from beyond Tibet. It was reported to cite a woman from neighbouring Sichuan Province as saying the railway would cut her costs of doing business in Shigatse by half. More Chinese like her will surely beeline for Shigatse and neighouring Tibetan towns as the Lhasa-Shigatse railway line progresses.
source: www.tibetanreview.net
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