March 13, 2008
BANGKOK - PM Samak Sundaravej Samak is scheduled to discuss two major energy projects between Myanmar and Thailand during the visit, spokesman Wichianchot Sukchotrat said.
Thailand is one of the biggest investors and trading partners in Myanmar, spending billions of dollars a year to tap into the country's natural gas and hydropower resources to power its own growing economy.
PTTEP, has joined forces with state-run Myanmar Oil and Gas Enterprise to search for new natural gas reserves in the offshore M-9 block in the southwestern Gulf of Martaban.
Thai energy firm MDX Group also holds a stake in a controversial hydro-power dam project in Myanmar.
The Tasang dam in eastern Shan State is to be built on the Salween River, the longest undammed river in Southeast Asia.
Environmental activists say the Tasang dam could prove disastrous to the Salween's delicate ecosystem. They accuse Myanmar's junta of using it as an excuse to evict thousands of ethnic Shan minority villagers from their land, according to AFP.
Samak is scheduled to leave early Friday to fly to Myanmar's remote new capital of Naypyidaw, where he will pay a courtesy call on junta chief Than Shaw and hold talks with his counterpart Thien Sein, according to AFP.
He will leave Naypyidaw for Yangon to preside over the opening of a new Thai embassy, before visiting the famed Shwedagon pagoda and returning to Bangkok.
