Dawei Port Project
[4] The project is also set to include a 160 kilometer-long two lane super highway that connects the zone to the Thai-Burma border.
A large amount of infrastructure is required to be built as well, so a high-speed railway, an electric grid, a dockyard, a deep sea port, and oil and gas pipelines are slated for construction.
[5][6] Thailand and Burma signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to develop the Dawei Special Economic Zone (ထားဝယ်အထူးစီးပွားရေးဇုန်) in 2008.
[6][8] Burma initially granted Italian-Thai Development PCL (ITD) a 75-year concession in 2008 to construct the project, and attract investment, as a part of the first memorandum of understanding.
[1] Following this suspension and Max Burma Conglomerate's pullout, the Burmese and Thai governments both took 50% stakes in the project, and looked to attract international investors.
[12] Thailand and Burma proposed involving Japan as a third-party investor, but the Japanese government declined to invest in the project.
It was revealed that they will hold equal partnership to Thailand and Burma in the Dawei Special Economic Zone Development Co, and intend to provide technical and financial support for the project.
[17] On the same day, Rojana and ITD announced that they will sign an agreement in March 2015 to develop the initial phase of the project, which is estimated to cost US$1.7 billion.
Thai Deputy Prime Minister Pridiyathorn Devakula said that during this first phase of construction, they aim to complete a small port, a reservoir, a telecoms network, and other basic infrastructure projects in the next five years.
[19] This special economic zone project has been criticized extensively for its human rights abuses of local villagers.
There is significant opposition from local populations, due to alleged land seizures, forced evictions, insufficient compensation for confiscated farmland, and denial of their right to sufficient food, and adequate housing.
[5] U Tin Maung Swe, chairman of the Support Group for the Deep Sea Port and Special Economic Zone, responded to concerns by telling the media, "People have criticized this project because of the chemical industries and their fears of the effect on the environment and the social structure.
"[5] According to U Phone Shwe, Deputy Minister for Social Welfare, Relief, and Resettlement, residents, who have in total lost over 6,000 acres of land to the project thus far, have received US$33 million in compensation.
[22] The DDA called for a freeze on the special economic zone in 2014, in hopes to prevent it from resuming at a large scale without human rights abuses being attended to.
[22] The DDA also called for The National Human Rights Commissions of Thailand and Burma to conduct a full investigation on human rights abuses in the mega-project, as a part of a report that they released, titled Voices From the Ground: Concerns Over the Dawei Special Economic Zone and Related Projects, which evaluated the abuses.
[25] Upon receiving the report, Thai officials deflected the blame onto the Burmese government, whose own National Human Rights Commission has not offered the DDA an audience.
[26] The report describes how the Dawei Special Economic Zone project has undermined local agricultural and fishing livelihoods, through the confiscation of land, restriction of coastal access, and destruction of farmland.
[26] In another report, they found that people near the proposed site had a loss in income, which forced many of them to send family members to Thailand to work.
[27] Five weeks after Our Lives are Not for Sale was published, U Phone Swe, a Deputy Minister in the Tanintharyi Regional Government, organized a public demonstration in support of the special economic zone.
