No great hopes for China's Mekong release

Though praised by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, China’s release of Mekong River water from the Jinghong dam on March 15 is unlikely to bring much relief to downstream countries like Cambodia, water experts said yesterday.

The impact of increased flow volume diminishes with distance and Cambodia is thousands of kilometres downstream from the Jinghong dam, said Bun Hean, the secretary of state at the Kingdom’s Ministry of Water Resources and Meteorology.

“If the volume [of discharge] at the dam is 100 per cent, we will maybe see 10 per cent,” said Hean. While this will not be enough to alleviate the water shortages across multiple provinces, he added, “it is better than 0 per cent”.

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