BANGKOK -- China's water relations with Southeast Asian neighbors are under strain after Beijing held up the Mekong River's flow at one of its large dams upstream, precipitating a sudden drop in volume for downstream countries that share the region's longest body of water.
"The water levels dropped suddenly since the beginning of January," fumed Niwat Roikaew, chairperson of Love Chiang Khong Group, a nonprofit environmental campaign in Chiang Rai, a northern Thai province where the Mekong flows past. "We all know this happened because China closed the dam."
