HRW Report: Underwater: Human Rights Impacts of a China Belt and Road Project in Cambodia

Completed in 2018, the Lower Sesan 2 dam ultimately resulted in the displacement of nearly 5,000 people, mostly Indigenous peoples and other ethnic minorities—Bunong, Brao, Kuoy, Lao, Jarai, Kreung, Kavet, Tampuan, and Kachok—who have lived in villages along the Sesan and Srepok Rivers for generations.

In addition, the project impacted tens of thousands of other people upstream and downstream of the dam who depended on the rivers’ fisheries for food and income. The project has also likely contributed to decreases in fishery yields across the entire Mekong River system, which is significant since tens of millions of people in Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand, and Laos depend on fish caught in the Mekong system for food. For average Cambodians, fish makes up 60 to 75 percent of the protein in their diet.

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