Work on the Salma dam on the Harirod River has restarted after a three month-break. It is now expected the project will be completed by the end of the year.
Work on the Salma dam on the Harirod River has restarted after a three month-break. It is now expected the project will be completed by the end of the year.Eighty percent of the work has been completed, and the hydroelectric project will go on stream by the coming winter, according to local authorities in Herat. “There is no obstacle in the way of the Salma project,” says an optimistic Sayed Fazlullah Wahidi, governor of Herat.
When completed the 550-metre high dam will produce 42 MW of electricity, and irrigate 75,000 acres of land. Hasan Fazli, the head of Harirod River Water Management, said the project would reduce wastage of water by half around Herat.
But herein lies the cause of friction between Afghanistan and Iran. The dam will cut the flow of the river by 70 percent in Iran. More Iranians are dependent on the river than Afghans. The Harirod River waters the important pilgrim city of Mashhad.
The killing of the pro-dam district governor of Chesht-e-Sharif in 2010 was blamed on Iran. In 2008 in Qalcharkh close to the dam the then head of the police unit guarding the dam, Gulabuddin, had told Killid that he was ambushed and lost 12 men. “The Taleban attacked one of our security posts,” he said. He claimed to have evidence that Iran backed a local Taleban commander.
Two years later there was a falling out between two commanders of anti-government groups leading to the death of 21 people. In April last year, security officials in Herat said they thwarted a Taleban plot to blow up the dam and confiscated 1,300 kg of explosives.
According to Abdul Rauf Ahmadi, the police chief in the western zone, a delegation appointed by the Ministry of Interior Affairs to investigate the charges of Iran’s involvement in dam-related attacks in Chesht-e-Sharif found weapons and ammunition that were made in Iran.
Bone of contention
There is a suspicion that the decision to hire four Iranian engineers with the approval of the then Energy and Water Minister Ismail Khan may be the reason for the delays in the implementation of the project. That Ismail Khan was consulted was confirmed by Engineer Mohammad Akbar who spoke to the media in 2012 when the Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs Jawed Ludin had travelled to Chesht-e-Sharif with the Indian ambassador and his technical delegation.
Azizul Rahman, commander of security at Salma dam for the past two years, said, “Only four Iranian engineers are working on a private contract on the basis of an agreement with the Afghan government. They are on leave now.”
However, Shjaaudin Ziayee, the deputy minister of water and energy who was interviewed by Killid last year had dismissed the allegation, and said, “No Iranian has been employed by us. All these are rumours. Indians are providing the money. If there is a contract it may have been awarded by Indians.”
The project, which is paid for and built by India, has been in the pipeline since the 1970s. The Indian government had allocated 80 million USD at the preliminary stage. Since 2006, when work on the project began again, the budget has swelled to more than 200 million USD. Indian officials have promised to spend whatever it takes to complete the dam project.
“Salma dam will be completed within a year. The dam will start working within a year, and I want to reiterate that the Indian government is committed to this project,” Amarjit Singh, the Indian consular-general in Herat has been quoted saying by TOLOnews last August.
