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Most of the major rivers in South Asia start their journey in Tibet. They connect China with the subcontinent.
South Asia is a region hit heavily by poverty, which has remained unchanged for decades.
Over the weekend, the seven South Asian nations drew a roadmap for regional co-operation for change.
The seven countries resolved to lift the region out of poverty in the next 10 years.
At its closing session on Sunday, the South Asian Association for Regional Co-operation (SAARC) included Afghanistan as its eighth member and China and Japan as two observers to the regional grouping.
It augurs well for relations between China and the South Asian countries.
China shares borders with India, Nepal, Bhutan, Pakistan and Afghanistan.
China has been active in co-operation and exchanges with regional groups in Asia, such as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).
In its role as an observer to SAARC, China is pushing for significant advances on its relations with this part of Asia.
China has been maintaining the momentum. Sino-Pakistani ties were described in a joint communique as "exemplary" last year when President Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan paid an official visit to China. Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao's visit in April to India, the very core of South Asia, brought about a strategic shift in Sino-Indian relations, enhanced mutual trust and benefited booming bilateral trade.
The geographic position lays bare the importance of a close link between China and the subcontinent.
Some parts of China, such as Sichuan and Yunnan provinces, have been actively engaged in subregional economic co-operation and development with India and Bangladesh.
What China has been doing with ASEAN and other regional groups is a good indicator of its relations with South Asia.
This is a region that China has never been extraneous to.
In the past two decades, prejudices of past and internal conflicts were blocking any meaningful progress of the group.
South Asia lags behind its larger Asian neighborhood, in terms of economic and social advancement.
The region is home to about 1.5 billion people, more than 400 million of whom live on less than a dollar a day.
The November 12-13 SAARC summit in Dhaka was convened under the shadow of the two biggest natural disasters in the world over the past year - the Asian tsunami and the Kashmir earthquake. The two calamities killed over 100,000 people in South Asia.
To achieve the goals set out, the subcontinent has many mountains to climb.
In the summit declaration the seven nations agreed on a range of joint strategies aimed at tackling economic issues and combating terrorism.
China has a crucial role in dealing with an important question that affects the lives of people in the subcontinent - the frequent flooding of its eastern parts.
China plays an important role in the management of Brahmaputra's waters that devastate eastern India and Bangladesh every year. India and China already exchange hydrological data on the Brahmaputra every year.
Still, formal co-operation between China and SAARC will help end political anomalies. Bhutan is the only country in South Asia that China does not have diplomatic relations with.
The annual summit of SAARC will offer a ready vehicle for a substantive engagement between China and Bhutan.
The inclusion of China and Japan, though as observers, will add dynamism and a cutting edge to the economic integration in the subcontinent.
The co-operation should not be held hostage by the divisions of history and politics.
(China Daily November 15, 2005)
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