Landmines, UXO and de-mining

An excavator operator was lucky to escape with his life on Monday evening after striking a 1970s-era Mk-82 bomb while digging in Ratanakkiri province’s Lumphat district. Chum Touch, police chief of Lbaing I commune, where the unexploded ordnance was found, said the excavator had unearthed ...

Construction of the Laos-China railway in Luang Namtha province has yet to commence as some UXO clearance activities need to be completed before the rail builders can move full steam ahead with the project. The Ministry of National Defence has reported to the Luang Namtha ...

Four people have died and 11people have been injured in UXO-related accidents from January to October 2016, according to a report from the Lao National Unexploded Ordnance Programme (UXO Lao). The report was disclosed on November 25 at UXO Lao’s annual meeting to summarise their work ...

Caches of unexploded ordnance were recovered in both Pailin and Kandal provinces on November 5 in what was a busy weekend for the Cambodian Mine Action Centre. Twelve DK-82 mortar rounds and two B-41 rocket-propelled grenades were unearthed by canal workers digging behind the Pailin ...

The presence of unexploded ordnance continues to have a major impact on the lives of rural people, including their ability to grow crops, with Bualapha district in Khammuan province being one such area. District Governor Mr Khamphao Thongthephahack said Bualapha district was more heavily contaminated ...

The Cooperative Orthotic & Prosthetic Enterprise Centre in Vientiane is continuing its work to raise money to improve conditions for disabled people in Laos, with over 1,000 people in need of the centre’s help. COPE Chief Executive Officer Ms Bounlanh Phayboun told Vientiane Times on September ...

New Zealand will provide US$7.2 million, one of the biggest single contributions made through the United Nations Development Programme, to Laos’ UXO sector. The funding will include trialling innovative New Zealand technology which destroys unexploded ordnance by melting casings without having to dig up or ...

A top Cambodian demining official slammed US President Barack Obama’s widely heralded pledge to increase demining aid to Laos on September 6, faulting the US for what he characterised as its “marginal assistance” to Cambodia’s demining efforts. In a speech at the 2016 ASEAN Summit in ...

Prime Minister Thongloun Sisoulith and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon September 8 inaugurated the Lao PDR’s own national Sustainable Development Goal on unexploded ordnance during the ongoing ASEAN Summits. The SDGs have been drawn up by the United Nations as targets for developing countries. Goal No. 18, which ...

The United States announced on September 6th it would provide an additional US$90 million over the next three years to help Laos clear unexploded ordnance which has continued to kill and injure people since bombs rained down on the country during the Indochina War. The extra assistance ...