China tells India Yarlung Tsangpo mega dam in Tibet will not be at ‘expense of neighbours’
The Yarlung Tsangpo hydropower project has raised concerns it will cause water shortages downstream in India, where it is a vital resource
The project also risks escalating the competition for scarce water resources, with India looking to step up its own dam-building projects, and threatens to undermine recent efforts to reduce tensions between the two countries.
Wang Lei, the charge d’affaires at the Chinese embassy in India, tried to address these concerns last week in a newspaper article where he wrote that critics of the project were wrong to characterise it as a “Chinese weapon”.
“China sticks to the policy of forging friendships and partnerships with its neighbours. It never pursues the maximisation of unilateral interests, let alone benefits for itself at the expense of its neighbours. China does not and will never seek ‘water hegemony’,” Thursday’s article in the Indian Express said.
04:26
Chinese-built dams threaten health of Mekong River, where 1 in 5 fish species face extinction
He added that China had established over 50 water resource management agreements with neighbouring countries and created 10 cross-border institutions to promote cooperative river development and ecological protection.
