By The Associated Press

From: World Tibet Network News, Monday, July 17, 1995

About 15,000 people are working on the Three Gorges Dam and a highway leading to the construction site. The number is expected to climb to 20,000 when construction hits a peak in 1997. Completion is scheduled for 2009.

Along the new highway, workers chisel rock by hand, carry buckets of cement on shoulder poles and use trowels to mortar rock retaining walls.

Building the dam itself, however, will require skilled labor using heavy machinery, project engineers say. Already, 45 million cubic yards of earth and stone have been excavated.

Human Rights Watch-Asia warned in a report earlier this year that Hubei, where the dam is being built, and neighboring Sichuan, where part of the reservoir will lie, contain religious and political prisoners in labor camps.

The rights group said prospective foreign lenders should investigate on their own to avoid dealing with the penal system.

Yuan Guolin, vice president of the state-run China Yangtze Three Gorges Project Development Corp., says labor will be supplied by companies that successfully bid for contracts based on international standards. He said no prison labor or prison-made material will be used.

"We're using materials from the top companies in China," he said. "Companies using prison labor can't produce that quality."