News
'Dust dome' to blame for city's haze
The drop in air quality across Bangkok over the past week is caused by an urban “dust dome” over the city, which formed as low atmospheric pressure and high-rise buildings trapped dust and other pollutants from the burning of agricultural waste, says Natural Resources and ...
APINYA WIPATAYOTIN
Asean nations urged to bolster response to pandemic
Laos has pushed for the relevant bodies in Asean countries to accelerate implementation of the Asean initiative to respond to the Covid-19 pandemic and keep the virus in check. Minister of Foreign Affairs Mr Saleumxay Kommasith delivered the message on Thursday when he headed a Lao ...
Times Reporters
Ministry draws up plan to inspect dams every five years
Laos is preparing a nationwide hydropower inspection procedure which will be carried out every five years to ensure safety and the maintenance of standards. Director General of the Department of Energy Management, Ministry of Energy and Mines, Mr Bouathep Malaykham, told Vientiane Times on Tuesday that in ...
Khonesavanh Latsaphao
Vietnam jails environmental activist for seven years
Vietnam has clamped down on freedom of expression ahead of a Communist Party congress by imposing a harsh jail sentence on an environmental activist and blogger for an anti-state campaign. On Jan. 20, the People’s Court of Hau Giang province in the southern Mekong Delta sentenced Dinh ...
UCA News reporter, Ho Chi Minh City
Cambodia’s weather forecast for this year made – hotter days and early rains
The Ministry of Water Resources and Meteorology (MOWRAM) has forecast that the temperature could rise to about 39 degrees Celsius during the 2021 dry season while the rainy season will come in the first week of May. Cambodia’s weather will be influenced by the ENSO phenomena, ...
Parks Dept rejects Karen call to return
The Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation (DNP) has rejected a request by a group of evicted Karen villagers to be allowed to resettle in their ancestral home deep into a forest at the Kaeng Krachan National Park in Phetchaburi. “As long as there ...
APINYA WIPATAYOTIN
Plastic Pollution: We Need To Act Now
The Great Pacific garbage patch is a collection of plastic and floating trash with two enormous masses of ever-growing garbage. The patch consists of finger-sized bits of plastic – often microscopic particles, chemical sludge, wood pulp, and other debris trapped by the northern circulating currents ...
The ASEAN Post Team
ASEAN’s Migrant Worker Clusters
According to think tank, the Institute for Human Rights and Business, across Southeast Asia, an estimated 10 million migrant workers live and work in major destinations such as Malaysia, Singapore and Thailand. Malaysia is home to around two million documented migrant workers, comprising about 15 percent ...
Athira Nortajuddin
Award-winning Thai community continues the fight to save its wetland forest
Srongpol Chantharueang remembers his parents telling him as a boy always to protect the local wetland forest when he grew up. They told him that the ecosystem would be important for his life and that of his community. “I didn’t understand what they meant at ...
Carolyn Cowan
Unemployment In Laos Soared By 20 Percent In 2020
The unemployment rate in Laos skyrocketed to 20 percent in 2020, a 10.6 percent increase compared to the figures for 2017, and the global Covid-19 outbreak was the main factor for the sharp increase in the number of jobless in the country. The pandemic forced thousands ...
Vientiane Times