China's soft  diplomacy has  far reaching  consequences  for the region's  eco-system

China is the only country that has built Mekong mainstream dams aimed at generating electricity to foster domestic socioeconomic development in Tibet and Yunnan, southwestern provinces which have yet to experience the same levels of economic growth as the eastern provinces. China's interest in beefing up its energy sector is strategically tied to the Mekong. The government devised the Western Regional Development Plan as part of its 10th five-year bid to meet local and international demand.

Since the 1980s, China's dam-building initiatives in the Yunnan have transformed the shape of the river. Three hydroelectric dams are already in operation; two more are due for completion in 2012 and 2017 respectively. By 2030 there could be a cascade of eight dams in Yunnan. In addition to improving electricity grid capacities, China is eyeing Southeast Asia as a potential marketplace for Chinese goods. In 2000, China signed an agreement with Myanmar, Thailand and Laos to improve navigability along the upper stretches of the river by blasting rocks in rapids. China has a greater incentive to use its advantageous geographical position to enrich itself and exact deference from the Lower Mekong countries rather than bind itself to comprehensive river cooperation as reflected in its refusal to join the Mekong River Commission, the only regional intergovernmental organisation dedicated to basin-wide sustainable management and regulation of the river. China has the advantage of being able to regulate the cascade at will, reducing the floods of wet seasons and raising water levels during the dry season.

It has paid little attention to complying with binding multilateral MRC rules, preferring to engage in bilateral cooperation in an informal and market-drive manner.  It has many rivers: 15 mainstreams and more than 40 tributaries in total. To China, the Mekong is not a special river. It prefers to engage itself with GMS (Greater Mekong Subregion) talks, where discussions are based on economic development rather than environmental sustainability.

Indeed, China has continued to pursue large-scale plans to dam its section of the Mekong River in the Yunnan province as well as finance dam construction in Laos and Cambodia. It comes as no surprise that Vietnam has been an active member of the MRC, calling for binding water use principles and veto rights for downstream countries. Although China did take part in the first Mekong River Commission Summit and International Conference in April 2010, it has since chosen to remain an observer despite standing invitations.

At the conference, lower Mekong countries blamed Chinese upstream dams for contributing to a drought this past year in southern China and Southeast Asia that dropped the Mekong River level to a record 50-year low. Vietnam has been a particularly vocal critic of Chinese dams. The Vietnamese Thanh Nien newspaper, the journal of the Ho Chi Minh City Communist Youth Federation, has given wide coverage to complaints that China's dams are playing a role in the drought. In response, China provided some data on water flows from its dams for the past few months. However, it remains to be seen whether they are committed to providing regular information on its operations or plans for additional dam construction.

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