ISLAMABAD, May 11: The World Bank has appointed a Swiss professor and civil engineer as neutral expert ‘to address differences’ between Pakistan and India on the Baglihar hydropower project being built on the Chenab River in occupied Kashmir. This is the first time in 45 years of the Indus Waters Treaty that the World Bank has appointed a neutral expert to address a dispute between the two countries.

“After consultation with the governments of India and Pakistan, an agreement has been reached on the appointment of a neutral expert to address differences concerning a hydropower scheme under construction on the Chenab River in India,” the announcement said.

Mr Raymond Lafitte, a professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, will be asked to make a finding on a ‘difference’ between the two governments concerning the construction of the Baglihar project.

Foreign office spokesman Jalil Abbas Jilani welcomed the World Bank decision and said Pakistan was hopeful that the matter would be resolved strictly in accordance with the treaty. He said the decision had vindicated Pakistan’s stand.

The Chenab River is one of the rivers comprising the Indus river system. After the partition of the sub-continent, the Indus Waters Treaty was concluded with support from the World Bank in 1960.

The treaty divided the rivers between the two countries. The bank is a signatory to the treaty and earlier this year was approached by Pakistan to appoint a neutral expert to deal with a difference that had arisen between the two countries.

“Both India and Pakistan have found Professor Lafitte suitably qualified as a neutral expert,” the bank said. His findings will be made known in time. Under the terms of the Indus Waters Treaty, his determination will be final and binding, the announcement said.

The 70-year-old professor has about 17 publications to his credit on dams and hydroelectric power plants and nine publications concerning the structural features of nuclear power plants. He has also worked on special expert reports on dams in Turkey, Iran, Morocco, Algeria, Switzerland, Burkina Faso, Kyrgyz Republic and Tunisia.

Mr Lafitte is a member of the Swiss Society of Engineers and Architects, chairman of the committee on governance of dam projects of the International Commission on Large Dams (Icold), a member of the advisory committee to the president of Icold and Dam Safety Committee of Icold, and a former president of the Swiss Committee on Dams.

The Indus Waters Treaty was concluded by India and Pakistan on Sept 19, 1960. The World Bank is a signatory to it for certain specified purposes. It is not a guarantor of the treaty.

Many of the purposes for which the World Bank signed the treaty have been completed. There are now three remaining responsibilities for the World Bank, relating to the settlement of differences and disputes. The World Bank had provided on April 25 a list of three experts from Australia, Brazil and Switzerland to India and Pakistan to give their choice by May 9.