(April 17, 2010) Chinese Deputy Foreign Minister Song Tao told participants in the Mekong River Council Summit in Hua Hin, Thailand on April 5 that China is willing to promote cooperation with downstream countries in mitigating droughts and floods, sharing hydrographic technology and information, exchange and training of hydrographic experts, etc.

(April 5, 2010) China has rejected claims that its dams on the Mekong River are to blame for record low water levels in downstream nations.

(April 5, 2010) Downstream nations along Asia’s Mekong River hailed China’s move to share data on reservoir levels and called for more cooperation as a severe drought heightens concerns that its dams have distorted water flows.

(April 3, 2010) China’s dam-building spree along the Mekong river in south-western Yunnan province has raised fears among several of its neighbours, who say the dams have led to shrinking levels of water downstream.

(April 3, 2010) Experts meeting to discuss Mekong River resources have urged countries along the Southeast Asian river to improve cooperation in developing hydropower.  Delegates also urged China to share more information about its dam building on the Mekong.

(April 2, 2010) Chinese  companies have begun building two large hydropower dams at a combined cost of more than $1 billion to feed electricity-starved Cambodia, officials in Phnom Penh said Thursday.

(April 2, 2010) Farmers and fishermen in countries that share the Mekong River with China, especially Thailand, have lashed out at China over four dams that span the Chinese portion of the 3,000-mile river, despite what appears to be firm scientific evidence that low rainfall is responsible for the plunging levels of the river, not China’s hydroelectric power stations.

(April 2, 2010) Fishermen and farmers in downstream countries are protesting the impact of China’s dams. But experts say that the dams also give China a huge potential for geopolitical influence.

(March 31, 2010) The current drought is now widely declared as a water crisis by government officials in Thailand, Laos and China’s Yunnan province. And it is, but that’s not the whole story.