A meeting of a grassroots-level Party organisation

Building grassroots-level Party organisations should go with the political system building as they are the foundation of the Party, the political nucleus and the bridge between the Party and people, Truong Thi Mai, Politburo member and Secretary of the Party Central Committee said at a national conference on July 22.

Mai, who is also head of the Party Central Committee’s Organisation Commission, delivered a thematic report on enhancing the consolidation and building of Party organisations at the grassroots level and improving the quality of Party members in the new period, at the national conference that looked into resolutions adopted at the fifth plenum of the 13th Party Central Committee.

She emphasised that building pure, strong grassroots-level Party organisations and improving the quality of Party members is an important, regular, continuous and long-term task which contributes to the building and rectification of the Party and the political system, and raising people’s confidence in the Party.

The official also stressed the need to strengthen the combatant capacity of Party organisations and create conditions for Party members to improve their morality, lifestyle and political mettle.

According to Mai, as of December 31, 2020, the country counted 51,988 Party organisations and more than 5.2 million Party members.

Lauding the Party organisations for fulling their tasks, she said such outcomes are significant to Party building and rectification and driving back the manifestations of degradation, “self-evolution,” and “self-transformation” within the Party.

She, however, pointed out limitations regarding the quality, leadership and combatant capacity of some Party organisations, the observance of the principle of democratic centralism, self-criticism and criticism, and the inspection work.

During the 2016-2020 tenure, up to 664 Party organisations were disciplined, up 114 as compared with the previous term, mostly for violations of the Party’s resolutions, directives, regulations and conclusions, the State’s policies and laws, and working regulations and the principle of democratic centralism.

Last year, disciplinary measures were imposed on 223 Party organisations, of which 159 received reprimands and 64 got warnings.

The fifth plenum of the 13th Party Central Committee, which took place in Hanoi last May, adopted Resolution No. 21 on enhancing the consolidation and building of grassroots-level Party organisations, and improving the quality of Party members in the new situation./.

                                                                    Mekong river

Vietnam has ratified a United Nations treaty on transboundary rivers, and it is time for other Mekong countries to do the same.

On May 19, Vietnam became the 35^th country to ratify the 1997 UN Convention on Non-navigational uses of International Watercourses (UNWC). This is an important global milestone because the treaty required 35 ratifications to enter into force. It will now come into effect on August 17, 2014.

Vietnam’s decision also sends an important message to the Mekong region. While the Mekong River is already governed by an international treaty – the 1995 Mekong Agreement – it has been wrongfully misinterpreted at times by Laos and other governments in the region as meaningless and unbinding.

The UNWC sets out the rules for how governments are expected to share transboundary rivers in a fair way, balancing the rights of upstream and downstream governments. These rules come from decades of international practice across the world. Using various mechanisms such as prior consultations, these rules provide a way to resolve the tensions that can arise when an upstream governments wants to use the river in a way that potentially causes significant harm to downstream governments.

In other words, the UNWC provides a possible way around the gridlock facing the Mekong River Commission.

Indeed, the Mekong Agreement is explicitly based on the draft UNWC. When the Mekong Agreement was drafted, the governments took almost all of the language directly from the text that would later become the UNWC. Unfortunately, the Mekong River Commission has stepped away from using the UNWC as a beacon for how to interpret the Mekong Agreement. If you examine the international law underlying the words that were carefully chosen to be included in the Mekong Agreement, the treaty’s requirements are clear. However if one ignores the underlying international law, as the MRC has done at times, then the treaty appears ambiguous and open to the misinterpretations that have been offered by Laos.

What this means in practice has become alarmingly apparent through the handling of the Xayaburi Dam, the first project to be submitted by Laos to the Mekong River Commission (MRC) for Prior Consultation (PNPCA) under the Mekong Agreement. Instead of responding to the requests from neighboring countries to conduct further studies, Laos moved forward unilaterally with the Xayaburi Dam, beginning construction while Cambodia and Vietnam continued to voice strong concerns about the transboundary impacts. By November 2012, the implementation of the project had advanced so far that Cambodia and Vietnam had little remaining leverage to raise concerns. And yet there has still been no official resolution to the PNPCA process.

Xayaburi Dam has set a dangerous precedent for future cooperation in the Mekong, which urgently needs to be addressed, particularly given the rapid progress towards construction of the Don Sahong Dam. While the 1995 Agreement aims to create an even playing field for upstream and downstream countries, in practice Laos continues to misinterpret the Mekong Agreement and international law, demonstrating a lack of real commitment to shared regional interests.

Vietnam has been steadfast in raising concerns about the impacts of both the Xayaburi and Don Sahong dams. During the PNPCA process for the Xayaburi Dam, Vietnam called for a moratorium on all dam building on the Mekong River for a period of 10 years, as recommended by the MRC’s Strategic Environmental Assessment. However, despite steadily voicing concern within the consultation process and now calling for the Don Sahong Dam to also undergo Prior Consultation, Vietnam has been hindered by regional politics and delicate diplomatic relationships as well as perceived ambiguities in the 1995 Mekong Agreement.

By ratifying the UNWC, Vietnam is making a public call for change, for improved governance and more equitable decision-making in the Mekong, and sending an important message that international rivers must be managed by and for all riparian nations, not just one.

At the second MRC Summit held in Ho Chi Minh City in April, the Prime Minister of Vietnam urged Cambodia, Vietnam and Laos to also sign on to the Convention. We hope that the Lower Mekong countries will follow Vietnam’s example for the sake of the Mekong River, its future and the people who depend on it. Through this action, Vietnam has offered a fair and equitable solution to the Mekong conflict. We hope that the other countries will listen.