Social development
Don Sahong dam critical for development of southern Laos
The government regards the Don Sahong hydropower project as the key driver for socio-economic development and poverty reduction in southern Laos. Deputy Minister of Energy and Mines Mr Viraphonh Viravong told Vientiane Times on 2 November that the power generated by the US$500-million dam will be used ...
UN chief hits out at Myanmar election ‘hate speech’
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon hit out on Monday at “extreme elements” in Myanmar who are sowing hate speech and bigotry towards religious minorities, days before the country votes in landmark elections. Myanmar heads to the polls on 8 November in what observers are hoping will ...
Burma’s Minorities Fear USDP Election Victory
During nearly seven decades the villages of the Karen have been torched, their men summarily executed and their women raped as the ethnic minority battled Burma’s military regime in the world’s longest-running insurgency. Their homeland has been called the “hidden Darfur,” where some 350,000 people ...
Released documents detail Rakhine State persecution
Broadcaster Al Jazeera on 29 October released a cache of documents detailing the persecution of Muslims in Rakhine State, including an internal UN memo and confidential military training manuals. Keep reading ...
Vietnam training classes lacking students
As of August, only 15,000 of the 330,000 people eligible for unemployment allowances had enrolled in vocational training programmes, according to the Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs. The unemployed will receive a maximum monthly vocational training allowance of VND1 million (nearly US$45) per person ...
Ratanakkiri official defends disputed land
A Ministry of Interior immigration official at the centre of a long-running land dispute in a gem mining district of Ratanakkiri spoke out for the first time on 29 October, just days after 200 villagers protested what they termed their illegal eviction. The villagers from Bakeo ...
Lao Ministry to deploy teachers to wipe out illiteracy
The Ministry of Education and Sports is sending over 20 volunteer teachers to educate illiterate rural areas around the country early next year to replicate an earlier successful Saravan province pilot programme. The teachers will come from the Physical Education Teacher Training College, Dongkhamxang Teacher Training ...
UN investigator questions if Myanmar poll can be free and fair
A United Nations rights investigator raised concern on 28 October about whether Myanmar’s election next month could be considered free and fair because dozens of candidates had been disqualified and hundreds of thousands of people denied the right to vote. Yanghee Lee, UN special rapporteur on rights in ...
Ground broken for new Lao hospital with Thai support
Bokeo provincial authorities held a groundbreaking ceremony on 27 October for a new hospital including inpatient as well as maternal and child healthcare facilities in Huayxai-neua village,Huayxai district. Actual construction work on the new hospital building commenced in June and it is expected to be completed in ...
Rights report decries Thai sugar firm’s tactics
Asia’s largest sugar producer, Mitr Phol, is responsible for violating the rights of hundreds of villagers in Oddar Meanchey who saw their land grabbed, homes destroyed and livestock killed to make way for plantations, according to the National Human Rights Commission of Thailand (NHRCT). The Thai ...
