Radio Free Asia

Exile Lao human rights groups on Friday pressed the Vientiane government to investigate the death in custody last month of Lao villager who had been detained since 2011 over a land protest in the country’s Salavan province.The government has been silent so far on the ...

The Lao government has disciplined more than 200 officials involved in taking bribes or embezzlement in recent months as part of a bid to crackdown on rampant corruption in the Southeast Asian nation, but few have been held criminally accountable for their actions.Earlier this week, ...

The government of Laos has vowed to enforce a ban on the granting of land for new banana plantations and punish local officials who violate it, amid a controversy over the illegal overuse of pesticides that residents say are causing pollution and destroying their livelihoods.Concerns ...

At least 140 families from eight villages in the Khong district of southwestern Laos’ Champasak province are refusing to sell their land or relocate to make way for a special economic zone planned for their area.Despite this, developers have begun the hasty construction of an ...

Villagers in Laos displaced by the Don Sahong Dam under construction near the border with Cambodia are still going without jobs and income three years into the project despite promises from the government to help them.Construction on the Mekong river dam, backed by a Malaysian ...

Thailand, China and Laos will sign a memorandum of cooperation on a new bridge for a railway across the Mekong River during Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-o-cha’s Beijing visit this week, a Thai foreign ministry official said Tuesday.The bridge would link Thailand’s northeastern Nong Khai province ...

Police in Laos this week arrested three Chinese nationals for trying to buy holiday clothing with counterfeit bills that a shopkeeper had noticed were marked by smeared ink, causing her to contact authorities, sources in Laos said.The suspects, two men and a woman, had recently ...

UPDATED at 3.45 P.M. EDT on 2019-04-18Three U.S. citizens held in Laos since last week on suspicion of disseminating bibles and Christian material without government approval have been released and deported to neighboring Thailand on Thursday, their organization told RFA’s Lao Service.The volunteers for the ...

UPDATED at 7 P.M. EDT on 2019-04-12Lao authorities have arrested three U.S. citizens in Luang Namtha province’s Sing district for distributing bibles and other evangelistic materials, a Christian organization in the United States told RFA’s Lao Service on Friday.Identified by their organization only by their ...

Laos’ Boten Specific Economic Zone (SEZ) is enjoying strong interest from Chinese investors as the Lao-China railway nears completion, but local villagers are fearful of the rapid change. They say that the development will be good for the Chinese, but not for the Laotians who ...