Burmese Vice-President Visits Arakan Oil Pipeline

Burmese Vice-President Tin Aung Myint Oo visited Arakan State by helicopter on Monday to inspect construction work at the oil terminal being built on Maday Island.

The island marks the starting point of an oil pipeline stretching through Burma into China's southwest. A similar pipeline for natural gas to China also begins at nearby Ramree Island.

Tin Aung Myint Oo expressed support for the project and thanked the contracted company, South East Asia Pipeline Company Ltd (SEAP), for its charity work providing education and healthcare facilities along the construction route.

The oil terminal on Maday Island is expected to be completed by May 2013. It will be able to accommodate 300,000-ton oil tankers and have an annual capacity of up to 22 million tons of crude oil.

SEAP was founded in June 2009 as a joint venture between majority stakeholder China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) and Burma's state-owned Myanmar Oil and Gas Enterprise. CNPC has been active in Burma since 2001.

CNPC promised millions of dollars of aid to Burma—both directly and through SEAP—last year, and then repeated this pledge in January.

CNPC aid in 2011 amounted to US $4.07 million, SEAP's general manager Zhang Jialin told the visiting dignitary. It led to the construction of 45 schools and 24 medical clinics in the severely deprived west Burmese state, he claimed.

Zhang revealed that the company's shareholders agreed in March 2011 that the annual aid transfers will continue at a rate of one million dollars per year.

Tin Aung Myint Oo said that he hoped the project could be completed on schedule. He repeated assurances made by Lower House of Parliament Speaker Shwe Mann during his visit to Beijing last week.

Construction on the pipelines began in June 2010 and is expected to be completed by 2013. On Feb. 15, SEAP announced that it had completed the pipelines' crossing over the Irrawaddy River.

The Chinese ambassador to Burma, Li Junhua, accompanied Tin Aung Myint Oo on his visit. Their last known meeting was on Jan. 25 when Li hosted the vice-president and his family for dinner on the occasion of Chinese New Year.

A report by the non-governmental organization Arakan Oil Watch from June 2010 brought to light "human rights abuses" by the Chinese construction company which allegedly endangered the livelihoods of the then 2,443 villagers living on Maday Island.

“They confiscated land from us and now I have no place to cultivate my plants,” the report quoted one local. “The police warned me to not create any problems with the Chinese workers,” it quoted another.

The Irrawaddy reported earlier last year that Kyauk Phyu (locally known as Kyaukpru) residents, on Ramree Island where the gas pipeline is being built, estimated 2,000 Chinese nationals were working in the area.

More than 400 Burmese laborers have been employed in construction work on Maday Island, according to report by Chinese news agency Xinhua on Tuesday.

Last May, SEAP said it finalized construction of a 650,000 cubic-meter water reservoir on Maday Island. The oil pipeline will stretch 771 km to the Chinese border town of Ruili in Yunnan Province.