Law and judiciary
Police break up drug ring on Vietnam-Laos border
Authorities in the north-central province of Quang Tri busted on 23 November an illicit ring that supplied drugs and unlawfully organized gambling near the Vietnam-Laos border. Quang Tri border guards, in coordination with police in Laos’ Savannakhet Province and relevant agencies, launched a raid on the ...
Yangon authorities losing the battle against betel
It’s enough to make you want to spit. Efforts by Yangon city authorities to control the “undisciplined” ejection of crimson betel juice are just not working, officials say. First they tried placing plastic boxes filled with sand at junctions and bus-stops. Their latest scheme is the ...
Laos drives home pertinent road safety message from international conference
Delegations from multiple continents are meeting in the capital of South America’s most populous country Brazil for the 2nd Global High Level Conference on Road Safety, a two-day international symposium aiming to keep traffic safety efforts on the agenda at a time when there are ...
Law changes delayed after MP urges sex worker protections
Draft changes to a law outlawing prostitution have been sent back to committee after an upper house MP objected and argued that the law should be amended to protect, rather than punish, sex workers. Yangon Region parliamentarian U Phone Myint Aung urged MPs to look past ...
Thailand believed to have deported 2 Chinese activists
The UN refugee agency criticised Thailand on 17 November for deporting two refugees who were about to be resettled in a third country. Rights groups identified the two as Chinese pro-democracy activists, although the Bangkok office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees did not give their ...
FIFA ethics committee bans executives from Nepal, Laos
The ethics committee at world soccer body FIFA has banned two officials from Nepal and Laos for taking cash during elections, it said on 16 November. Keep reading ...
Four die in southern Thailand bombing
A bomb blast at a village checkpoint in Thailand’s far south killed four people and wounded four others, police said on 13 November, in the latest deadly attack to strike the insurgency-plagued region. The bomb exploded late on 12 November evening in Khok Pho district of Pattani, ...
Bokeo police confiscate over 100,000 amphetamine pills
Bokeo provincial police confiscated over 100,000 amphetamine pills and arrested two drug traffickers in Phonthong village, Paktha district, last week. Head of the Bokeo provincial Public Security Headquarters, Colonel Lamphai Yotpaphai, told Vientiane Times on 11 November that police received a tip off about illegal drugs being ...
Overpass mulled as solution to Vientiane's traffic snarls
Officials are wrestling with the problem of identifying a long-term solution to Vientiane’s chronic traffic jams and some are suggesting that an overpass might ease the situation. While no such scheme currently exists, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility to imagine that overpasses will ...
Nearly 170 Chinese ‘scammers’ deported
Early morning on 10 November, 168 Chinese nationals were deported from Cambodia, following their arrest last month for allegedly using the Kingdom as a base from which to extort money from victims in China, police said. Keep reading ...