Aju Business Daily

SEOUL -- South Korean President Moon Jae-in ordered the quick dispatch of a state-led relief team to a flooded area around a dam construction site in Laos as civic groups called for a thorough probe into the disaster that left an unknown number of villagers missing.

Moon instructed the government to provide strong relief measures and dispatch an emergency relief team to Laos, his office said. "We have yet to know what caused the accident, but as our corporations are involved in the construction of dams, the government should actively participate in relief efforts," he was quoted as saying.

Under a state program to support the construction of infrastructure at poor countries, South Korean firms including SK Engineering & Construction were involved in the construction of the Xepian-Xe Nam Noy hydropower plant in southern Laos.

There have been local news reports that torrential rains caused the collapse of an auxiliary dam, but SK E&C insisted that the upper part of the 730-meter-long auxiliary earth dam was partially washed away at 9 pm (local time) on Sunday.

The company said it had asked local government authorities to evacuate villagers and discharged water through an emergency waterway at the main dam, but the overflow of water went downstream, which had already been flooded, causing more damage. SK E&C president Ahn Jae-hyun and senior company officials left for the Southeast Asian country to assess the scope of damage and support rescue operations.

South Korean civic groups called for a government probe into the exact cause of the disaster to see if there was any mistake in design or construction.

The 410MW hydroelectric power project on the Bolaven plateau southeast of Vientiane includes the construction of dams along the Mekong River. It consists of a large storage reservoir to store about 1,043 million cubic meters of water.

Construction began in February 2013 and commercial operations are expected to begin in early 2018.

It was the first major power investment in Laos by South Korean firms. SK E&C was awarded an engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract while Korea Western Power (KOWEPCO), a public enterprise for power generation, is responsible for operation and maintenance for 27 years.

KOWEPCO CEO Kim Byung-sook told a parliamentary committee Wednesday that one of the five auxiliary dams built to form the reservoir began subsiding on July 20 and its upper end subsided about one meter three days later, leading to the evacuation of villagers.