SUNS  4367 Thursday 4 February 1999

Washington, Feb. 2 (IPS/Danielle Knight) -- Human Rights Watch (HRW), the US-based watchdog organisation, has accused the giant Enron Corporation of falsely denying allegations of human rights abuses at a company power plant in India.

HRW and other organisations alleged that Enron paid local authorities who arrested and tortured protestors at the company's Dabhol Power plant in Maharashtra state. In response, an Enron official said that all "problems" at Dabhol had been "put to rest."

"We do not tolerate human rights abuses by our employees or contractors," Kelly Kimberly at Enron's headquarters in Texas told IPS. "Human Rights Watch brings up allegations that have been put to rest over the past four years."

Kenneth Roth, HRW's executive director, said protests had fallen silent in India not because local concerns had diminished but because the local police, paid for by Enron, had outlawed demonstrations.

"This isn't a problem of the past - it's a problem right now," he said. "Villagers who protested against the project are still facing imprisonment on trumped up charges against them."

The $2.8 billion gas-fired Dabhol plant - the largest single foreign investment in India - is designed to generate 2,015 megawatts when it begins operating next month. The plant is owned by the Dabhol Power Corporation, a joint venture between Enron, General Electric Corporation, Bechtel Incorporated, and the Maharashtra government.
Enron owns 50% of the project.

According to Human Rights Watch, protests against the plant began as early as 1994. Local residents feared that since Enron's contract required the state to pay in dollars, the price of electricity would be too expensive for householders.

People living near the area also protested that land and water were diverted to the company away from local consumption. And, residents feared effluent from the plant would degrade local fisheries, said a 166-page HRW report released in January.

According to HRW, local authorities, paid by Enron to provide security, began a major crackdown of protestors near the Dabhol site in 1996 and 199. Demonstrators alleged they had been detained and beaten by police who charged into the crowd swinging lathis - long heavy canes.

"The arrests violate the internationally recognized rights of freedom of expression, assembly, movement, protection under arrest, and detention, and they constitute police mistreatment," said Human Rights Watch.

Amnesty International reported similar abuses of women protestors who were arrested or beaten by the police.

"The police targeted mainly women, some of whom were minors and the arrests were made violently, in violation of legal and humanitarian principles," the group reported.

When these activities were brought to the company's attention, the Dabhol Power Corporation refused to acknowledge that its contractors were responsible for criminal acts and did not adequately investigate, condemn or cease relationships with these individuals, according to the
HRW report.
"The company did not speak out about human rights violations and, when questioned about them, chose to dismiss them altogether," said the report.

"Enron's local entity, the Dabhol Power Corporation, benefited directly from an official policy of suppressing dissent through misuse of the law, harassment of anti-Enron protest leaders and prominent environmental activists, and police practices ranging from arbitrary to brutal," the report said.

The feud involving Enron is the latest incident involving US oil and gas corporations, increasingly under scrutiny by rights groups for investing in countries ruled by oppressive regimes - such as in Burma and Nigeria. Corporate giants, including Shell, Chevron and Mobil, argue however that their investment would help develop the local economy and thereby improve the human rights situation.

But in the case of Enron, Roth says the company had invested in a democratic country, in a region with no significant strife - and human rights abuses there had increased!

"Enron has not made things better for human rights; it has made things worse," he said. "Through misuse of laws and abuse of power, the police have crushed open and organised dissent against the company."

Human Rights Watch and other organisations said the US government also was responsible for the abuses, since State Department and Energy officials lobbied the Indian government in support of the companies.
The US also provided financial backing of the project through two of its agencies.

In 1996, the US Export Import Bank (Ex-Im) and Overseas Private Investment Council (OPIC) put together about $400 million to help the project. Other financial institutions, including the World Bank, refused to help finance the project. Reinforcing local protest sentiments, the bank said the plant was not economically viable.

While they were required to check to see if the project involved human rights violations, State Department, Ex-Im, and OPIC officials said they were unaware of any of the reported abuses related to the project.

"I have never seen any information on human rights violations related to Dabhol and can't say anything about them," Frank Wisner, former US ambassador to India, told Human Rights Watch.

According to the group, it would have been very hard for Wisner, who was responsible for reporting any rights abuses to the State Department, to be unaware of the reported abuses since they regularly appeared in national and local newspapers.

The HRW report said this "suggests a willingness on the part of the US government to discount human rights when commercial interests are at stake."

In October 1997, a few months after leaving his post in India, Wisner was named to the board of directors of Enron Oil and Gas, a subsidiary of Enron Corporation.