Burma halts Irrawaddy dam | Bangkok Post: breakingnews

Burma's new army-backed government has suspended a controversial $3.6 billion hydroelectric power project following rare public opposition, a government official said on Friday.

The dam is in northern Burma, in Kachin state several hundred kilometres north of Thailand.Opposition to the dam has been building as pro-democracy and environmental activists test the limits of their freedom under the new nominally civilian regime, which is dominated by former military officers.President Thein Sein told lawmakers in the capital Naypyidaw that work on the Chinese-backed Myitsone dam on the Irrawaddy River in northern Kachin state would be halted...