By Christine Khamis

Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

 

BEIJING, China –

The Chinese government has decided to relocate over 9,000 villagers from their homes in Guizhou province as it continues to build the world’s biggest radio telescope. The telescope is designed in part to observe signs of extraterrestrial life but will also gather significant amounts of data on space phenomena.

The relocation of the villagers, who live in one of the poorest provinces in China, was announced on Tuesday. 2,029 families are being moved in order to ensure an optimal electromagnetic environment for the telescope. The people being moved are those who were within a three mile radius of the telescope location in Pingtang and Luodian counties in Guizhou. Villagers do not appear to be resisting the move at this point.

Chinese authorities plan to compensate each person being moved with $1,800 from its eco-migration bureau. This is not the first forced mass relocation ordered by authorities to make room for a project, and there have been many complaints among citizens about the move and the compensation offered by the government. Millions have been displaced to make room for infrastructure or “poverty alleviation” projects. Work on the Three Gorges Dam displaced more than a million people living on the Yangtze River, for instance.

Work on the telescope is set to conclude in September of this year. Chinese authorities say that the location of the telescope in an isolated area of Guizhou make it an ideal place to receive extraterrestrial messages. The telescope is just one piece of China’s plans in regard to space exploration. China has also aspired to put an astronaut on the moon and a space station in orbit as part of its space program.

Wu Xiangping, director-general of China’s Astronomical Society told state-run news source Xinhua that the telescope will help scientists to “search for intelligent life outside of the galaxy”.

 

For more information, please see: 

HNGN – China Telescope To Be World’s Largest, Will Displace 9,000 – 19 February 2016

Business Insider – 9,000 Chinese villagers are being displaced to build this massive radio telescope in search of alien life – 17 February 2016

The New York Times – China Telescope to Displace 9,000 Villagers in Hunt for Extraterrestrials – 17 February 2016

The Guardian – China Uproots 9,000 People for Huge Telescope in Search for Aliens – 16 February 2016