Why do I need to use these nasty comments in C# / .Net code?

Why do I need to use these nasty comments in C# / .Net code?

I'm building application and one of requirements is to use a comments like
this one:
/// <summary>
/// Creates new client.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="uri">The URI.</param>
/// <param name="param">The param.</param>
/// <returns></returns>
I understand that it's easy for various kind of tools to generate the docs
based on these xmls. But it significantly decreases code readability, and
that's exactly what we, humans, trying to achieve.
Could this approach be replaced by any other technique in .Net? And what's
the better way to improve code readability and cleanness?