Duterte Used Epithet in Reference to President. VIENTIANE, LAOS (AP) - President Obama called off a planned meeting Tuesday with new Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, seeking distance from a U.S. ally's leader during a diplomatic tour that has put Obama in close quarters with a cast of contentious world figures. It's unusual for one president to tell another what to say or not say, and much rarer to call the other a "son of a bitch." Duterte managed to do both just before flying to Laos for a regional summit, warning Obama not to challenge him over extrajudicial killings in the Philippines. [continues 479 words]
From Nick Meo in Hua Phan Province, Laos SINCE doctors confiscated Kua Ya's pipe in February the septuagenarian grandmother has been forced to stop using opium. She used to smoke six pipes a night, to help her to sleep and ease her aches. At the same time officials pulled up poppy plants growing on the hillsides of her village in northern Laos, part of a Communist Party programme to eradicate the drug by next year. They have been largely successful. The UN says that Laos, from being the world's third biggest source of opium, has reduced poppy production by 73 per cent in the past five years. This has won the Government plaudits, notably from the US. [continues 421 words]
The sight of villagers weighing out opium is becoming increasingly rare. The opium poppy that has long bloomed across the mountains of northern Laos has almost been wiped out by the government's drastic eradication campaign. But what is being hailed as a victory by the international anti-narcotics agencies has also spawned a humanitarian crisis, due to the massive displacement of hill tribes and their loss of economic livelihood. The campaign was spearheaded by the US government, with support from the European Union. [continues 809 words]
The opium poppy that has long bloomed across the mountains of northern Laos has almost been wiped out by the government's drastic eradication campaign. But what is being hailed as a victory by the international anti-narcotics agencies has also spawned a humanitarian crisis, due to the massive displacement of hill tribes and their loss of economic livelihood. The campaign was spearheaded by the US government, with support from the European Union. Such was its success that the authorities in Laos claim the country has achieved its 2005 deadline to become an opium-free country. The UNODC (the UN Office for Drugs and Crime) has confirmed that Laos had achieved a poppy reduction of 73% since 2000. [continues 780 words]
AFTER about 200 years of opium poppy cultivation, the Laotian government last month declared their country "opium-free", winning acclaim from international drug suppression agencies for a major victory in the war on drugs. The United Nations drug and crime control agency UNODC confirmed a drastic poppy reduction of 73 per cent during the past five years in their most recent opium survey, ending the country's reputation as the world's third-largest producer. But while many benefits have come from the initiative to tackle the illicit trade, not least Laos' relations with the West, others suggest the eradication of the opium crop has brought new problems to the most vulnerable parts of the population. [continues 586 words]
Drugs police in Laos said they confiscated 20 kilogrammes of heroin and 200 kilogrammes of raw opium last year, state-run Radio Vientiane said. Anti-drug squads carried out 110 raids against drug suspects in 2001 and arrested 2,007 people, it said. Five of the people arrested were foreigners, three from Thailand and two from Burma. Police also confiscated 720,000 amphetamine tablets, the radio report said. [end]
Illicit drugs from Thailand and Burma are crossing Lao borders instead, said the man running Laos' anti-drugs effort. ``Our territory is being used to send illicit drugs to our neighbouring countries,'' Soubanh Srithirath told the 4th Lao-Thai meeting on drugs held in Luang Prabang. The minister attached to the Lao President's Office, who chairs the Lao National Commission for Drug Control and Supervision, said trafficking of methamphetamines had increased rapidly as a result of crackdowns in Thailand and Burma. [continues 160 words]
Measures to eliminate trafficking and production of illegal drugs along the border will be the focus of a meeting today in the Lao city of Luang Prabang, a senior Thai drug official said. Chartchai Sutikorm, deputy secretary of the Narcotics Control Board, said the meeting was an opportunity to exchange information. "Measures on how to deal with the new drug situation and efficiently unite in a common front against drugs will also be raised," he said. The meeting will be jointly chaired by Thammarak Issarangkura na Ayutthaya, PM's Office minister in charge of drug suppression, and Soubanh Srithirath, who supervises the Lao commission for drug control. Joint border patrols may also be agreed on. Many drug production plants are reported to have shifted from the Burmese border area to the Lao border as a result of heavy suppression by the Third Army in the North. [end]
BANGKOK, Thailand -- The opium yield in communist Laos, a major world producer of the illicit drug, has dropped by an estimated 30 percent this year, the Lao state news agency reported. The yield for the 2001 growing season was estimated to be 117.5 tons, compared with 167 tons in 2000, the Khao San Pathet Lao agency reported in a dispatch received in Bangkok on Saturday. One ton of opium is sufficient to produce about 220 pounds of heroin. According to the report, the reduction was due to "the attention of the local authorities, and the awareness of local people in combination with climatic changes." [continues 92 words]
The government will introduce the death penalty for serious drug offenses similar to penalties in some other Southeast Asian nations, an official newspaper reported. Major drug trafficking routes pass through Laos. Seth Mydans (NYT) [end]
VIENTIANE, Laos (AP) -- Laos, one of the world' s leading opium producers, will soon introduce the death penalty for serious drug offenses, an official newspaper reported Wednesday. The National Assembly of the communist state approved an amendment to the penal code Tuesday before ending its current parliamentary session. Previously, serious drug trafficking and possession offenses carried a maximum 10-year jail sentence. The tougher penalties are a way to " halt the potential danger to the youth in the future and to the safety and security of the country, " said a parliamentary resolution quoted by Vientiane Mai newspaper. [continues 210 words]
The lure of illicit pleasure spreads a web that entangles Laos VANG VIENG, Laos-Western travelers of every ilk are whispering about the latest Shangri-la, a remote hamlet shrouded by sawtoothed mountains and dotted with enough opium dens to satisfy an army of drug-seeking tourists. Indeed, if not for opium, Peter Wu would probably never have come to Vang Vieng, 250 miles over a mountain road from the capital city of Vientiane. A was hoping for a place where a bunch of old-timers lay out on mats puffing away," said Wu, 32, who travels to Southeast Asia when not writing advertising copy in Lo Angeles. [continues 1208 words]
Opium Is Cheap and Plentiful, but Reality Can Bite in a Rat-Ridden Prison Cell By Saturday, March 20, 1999; Page A26 MUANG SING, Laos—The dealers hang around the edge of an open-air restaurant bustling with backpacking tourists, most of whom spent two days getting here over barely passable mountain roads. They know why the foreigners have come. The least eye contact triggers a pantomimed puff on a pipe and insistent sales pitch: "Oh-pee-um! Oh-pee-um!" [continues 1216 words]
The dealers hang around the edge of an open-air restaurant bustling with backpacking tourists, most of whom spent two days getting here over barely passable mountain roads. They know why the foreigners have come. The least eye contact triggers a pantomimed puff on a pipe and insistent sales pitch: "Oh-pee-um! Oh-pee-um!" Opium, at 50 cents a dose. One by one, the tourists -- Americans, Canadians, Europeans, Australians, Japanese -- head off to smoke their fill through a bamboo pipe under a tree or at a makeshift den. [continues 951 words]
MUANG SING, Laos (AP) The dealers hang around the edge of an open-air restaurant bustling with backpacking tourists, most of whom spent two days getting here over barely passable mountain roads. They know why the foreigners have come. The least eye contact triggers a pantomimed puff on a pipe and insistent sales pitch: "Oh-pee-um! Oh-pee-um!" Opium, at 50 cents a dose. One by one, the tourists Americans, Canadians, Europeans, Australians, Japanese head off to smoke their fill through a bamboo pipe under a tree or at a makeshift den. [continues 1175 words]
Travel: Authorities in most Southeast Asian nations have yet to crack down on this branch of the international narcotics trade. Muang Sing, Laos- The dealers hang around the edge of an open-air restaurant bustling with backpacking tourists, most of whom spent two days getting here over barely passable mountain roads. They know why the foreigners have come. The least eye contact triggers a pantomimed puff on a pipe and insistent sales pitch: "Oh-pee-um! Oh-pee-um!" Opium, at 50 cent a dose. [continues 953 words]
Drug Tourism / In Laos, English Menus and New Opium Dens VANG VENG, Laos---With a ring of opium grease starting to bubble around the pinhole on the end of his pipe, the emaciated old man reclining on a pile of dirty white pillows nods slightly to signal the liquid will soon vaporize. His twig-thin arm slowly rotating the hollow metal pipe over an oil lamp flame will produce the steady flow of smoke that has sustained his half-century of opium addiction. [continues 1070 words]
Inside Laos
