Work resumes on Dasu Hydropower Project built by Chinese company in Pakistan

Four Pakistani nationals had also died in the attack.The Dasu Hydropower Project in Pakistan has resumed work, Chinese daily Global Times quoted Zhao Lijian, spokesperson for Chinas Foreign Ministry, as saying on Thursday.The attack soured ties between the all-weather allies and a key meeting on the CPEC was postponed after the attack.

The stalled work on a major hydroelectric project constructed by a Chinese company in Pakistan has resumed, days after Islamabad agreed to pay compensation to 36 Chinese nationals who either died or were injured in a terrorist attack in the restive Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province last year.

On July 13 last year, 10 Chinese nationals, mostly engineers, were killed and 26 others were seriously injured after a suicide attack on a bus that was ferrying them to the worksite of the Dasu Hydropower Project in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province.

The 4,320-MW Dasu Hydropower Project is being constructed by China Gezhouba company with funding by the World Bank and is not part of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a multi-billion-dollar scheme launched in 2015.

The Chinese company had stopped construction of the Dasu Hydropower Project in Pakistan’s Upper Kohistan district after at least 10 Chinese workers were killed in the terrorist attack in July last year. Four Pakistani nationals had also died in the attack.

“The Dasu Hydropower Project in Pakistan has resumed work,” Chinese daily Global Times quoted Zhao Lijian, spokesperson for China’s Foreign Ministry, as saying on Thursday.

The attack soured ties between the all-weather allies and a key meeting on the CPEC was postponed after the attack. The Chinese contractor also stopped the work on the project and demanded a compensation of USD 37 million.

The decision to resume work came as Pakistan agreed to compensate the 36 Chinese nationals killed and injured in the attack.

The Express Tribune reported on Tuesday that Pakistan worked out four different compensation amounts ranging from USD 4.6 million to USD 20.3 million, despite there being no legal or contractual obligation on the government.

It is not yet clear what is the exact amount being paid to the victims.

The Pakistan government had initially tried to downplay the terror attack, by terming the incident as gas leakage.

But later Islamabad acknowledged that it was a terrorist attack. China had also sent a group of experts to probe the attack.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)