Earlier this month, Pakistan's planning minister Ahsan Iqbal told Reuters in an interview that "Pakistan expects China to fund" the project.The Diamer-Bhasha Dam is a project that both the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) have refused to touch because India objects to its location, which is in the Gilgit-Baltistan region. India claims the region is a part of Kashmir . And last November, the ADB too declined to fund what's said to be a $14 billion project.Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif last December approved "in principle" the financing plan for the 4500 megawatt Diamer-Bhasha dam. He told his Water and Power secretary to begin preparations to start work on the dam before the end of next year.The Diamer-Bhasha Dam was first announced in 2006 and the foundation stone for it was laid in 2011.Pakistan envisages the dam project will generate 4,500 megawatts of electricity, Reuters reported earlier this month. A vast new reservoir is also expect to regulate the flow of water to farmland that is vulnerable to increasingly erratic weather patterns, the news agency added.

Source: Economic Times June 20, 2017 10:18 UTC