8PM: TWO NEW DOCUMENTARIES ABOUT MEKONG DAMS, presented by director Tom Fawthrop - Laos is hellbent on building more dams at a time when climate change and existing dams in China have delivered drought to the Mekong countries. THE GREAT GAMBLE ON THE MEKONG (2015, 30 min)) is more relevant than ever in documenting the follies of hydropower and the great losses of food security and water flow faced by downstream coun-tries especially Cambodia and Vietnam. This film has been screened at film festivals in Malaysia, the Human Rights film festival in Myanmar and even screened at a Kunming forum in China last year.

After the recent landslide election victory for pro-democracy forces in Myan-mar, a key issue facing the new NLD government led by Aung San Suu Kyi, is what to do about delivering energy to over 65% of the population, still without electricity - the lowest rate of access in the Asean region. The new govern-ment has also promised to pay more attention to green energy - solar power and wind turbines. The new government has also promised to listen to de-mands of ethnic peoples and their armed groups in a process that might final-ly lead to a peace settlement. MEGA-DAMS ON THE SALWEEN (2015, 29 min) explores how new dams could disrupt this fragile peace process.