Gilgit-Baltistan residents are enraged by the Chinese in overexploitation of natural resources . The region supplies Pakistan with over half of its drinking and irrigation water .
Pokhara, December 7: Pakistan's continued attempts to keep the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) operational are enraged among the Gilgit-Baltistan (GB) residents, who claim to be shielded by the Chinese in their overexploitation of natural resources, according to IFFRAS, but the situation in GB is much the opposite.Despite its small size, this area has been the most backward and underutilized area since its inception.GB Chief Minister Khalid Khurshid Khan accused Islamabad of halving the development budget for the region to PKR 23 billion, a deliberate move to push the area backwards, according to a think tank.Work has been launched in GB on mega dams, oil and gas pipelines, and uranium and heavy metal extraction under the name of CPEC.
GB supplies Pakistan with over half of its drinking and irrigation water, which is important.According to IFFRAS, Chinese mega projects are having a negative effect on the local ecosystem, resulting in unexplained pollution and irreversible depletion of aquatic ecosystems.Many accuse the China Roads and Bridges Corporation, a Chinese company, of using destructive environmental tactics in their expansion of the Karakoram highway in Gilgit-Baltistan.Despite this, the Chinese companies refused to share profits from resource exploitation with them. Though Islamabad earns billions in revenue each year from trade and transit, water resource extraction, trophy hunting, eco-tourism, mineral exploration, and direct and indirect federal taxes, the bulk of this income is not allocated to the region's growth.The autonomous region is little known in mainstream media, but it is quickly losing traction as protests erupt.