Vietnam steps up relocation for dam reservoir

Vietnam has started relocating 14,000 more people to build the country's largest hydro-electric dam reservoir in a northwestern mountain region near Laos, officials said Tuesday.

The group, many of them from the Hmong and Thai ethnic minorities, are the second large group to be resettled for the 2.6-billion-dollar dam project, set to start operating by 2015, after about 25,000 people were earlier moved.

Pham Thi Dao, a provincial official in charge of the relocation programme, said a ceremony was held in Son La province Monday to mark the start of the new resettlement phase, and that in total more than 90,000 people would be moved.

Construction for the dam project started in December 2005, and the reservoir area is set to be flooded in 2010. A 215-metre (700-foot) dam wall will create a reservoir covering 18,000 hectares (45,000 acres), officials say.