Day: February 3, 2024

Speculation that the historic Lao town of Luang Prabang could be stripped of its World Heritage status because of a massive dam planned upstream is worrying local residents.

Although the Lao government denies there is cause for concern, a former senior UNESCO official has reportedly warned that it’s a real threat hanging over one of the country’s main tourist attractions.

Luang Prabang was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1995 for its “unique, remarkably well-preserved townscape.”

It’s known for its daily parade of monks collecting alms, vibrant night market, well-preserved Buddhist temples, including the 16th-century gilded Wat Xieng Thong, and colonial-era architecture. 

Nearly 780,000 foreign and domestic visitors in the first nine months of 2023, according to Lao tourism figures. 

Questions about the town’s status arose after Minja Yang, a former deputy director of the UNESCO World Heritage Centre, told Nikkei Asia in January that Luang Prabang was at risk of losing its status because of increasing development related to a hydropower dam project about 25 kilometers (16 miles) upstream on the Mekong River. 

In March 2023, UNESCO issued a report recommending that Laos continue efforts to ensure that the Luang Prabang Dam would not have a negative impact on the town’s heritage sites, and take measures to regulate tourism-related activities and infrastructure development.

The US$3 billion, 1,460-megawatt dam project on the Mekong mainstream is located between the upstream Pak Beng hydropower project and the downstream Xayaburi Dam, and will provide power for export to Thailand and Vietnam after completion in 2027.

It is one of many dams the Lao government is building along the Mekong River in the country’s quest to become the “battery of Southeast Asia.”

The U.N.’s Paris-based cultural agency requested that Laos submit to the World Heritage Centre an updated report on the state of conservation and the implementation of the measures by Feb. 1, 2024, to preserve the city’s “outstanding universal value.”

“If the second dam is indeed constructed, I believe Luang Prabang should be delisted,” Yang told Nikkei in an email.

“Without the World Heritage status, ill-conceived projects of shopping malls and casinos aimed for certain categories of tourists that we have so far succeeded in stopping over the past 20 years, will now cave into various vested interests,” Yang told Nikkei. “So, I can only imagine what the future of the town will be.”

RFA could not reach Yang or officials in UNESCO’s Bangkok office for comment.

Mixed reactions

An official from the World Heritage Department of the Lao Ministry of Information, Culture and Tourism,  who wanted to be identified only by his first name Pheune, told RFA on Feb. 2 that Luang Prabang would not be delisted and that UNESCO officials had expressed concerns outlined in the March 2023 report.

Pheune also said that construction of the Luang Prabang Dam would not affect the town’s World Heritage status because the site is far from the city.

A Luang Prabang province official, who like the other sources in this report requested anonymity for safety reasons, agreed. “To delist the town of Luang Prabang is not easy,” he said. 

“Yes, many Chinese are leasing buildings and transforming them to hotels and restaurants, and some of them might not be complying with the rules and regulations of UNESCO, so our city officials should be aware of those issues and should step up the control,” he said.

But other Lao officials and city residents say they are concerned that Luang Prabang might be at risk because of too many Chinese-backed developments, as Chinese investors lease more buildings and turn them into hotels and restaurants.

A Lao businessman in the city said he heard about the delisting rumor, but believes that Luang Prabang is still preserving its heritage, culture and tradition, especially in the city center. 

The development is occurring mainly in the suburbs, and builders must receive permission before erecting structures, he said. The man cited the example of a Chinese company that wants to build a cable car line near the town, though city authorities have not yet given it the green light.

But a town resident was not so optimistic, noting that Chinese investors in various businesses are not interested in preserving local tradition and culture.  

“I heard that Luang Prabang could be stripped of its World Heritage status because there are too many Chinese businesses here,” he told RFA. “Don’t forget, getting World Heritage Site status is not easy. Our government should be careful because Luang Prabang as a World Heritage Site attracts a lot of tourists from around the world. We, the residents, enjoy better living conditions because of that status.”

Another resident raised concern about the future dam. 

“What would happen if the dam broke in the future?” he asked about the fate of Luang Prabang, which lies in a valley at the confluence of the Mekong and Nam Khan rivers. “Certainly, that break would wreak havoc on our town and people.”

Phakhanxay Sikhanxay, director general of the Heritage Department under the Ministry of Information, Culture, and Tourism, issued a statement in December, saying that a rumor that UNESCO would remove the city was unfounded, and that Laos has not received any official documents from about the matter, the Vientiane Times reported. 

Translated by RFA Lao. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.

On the eve of the third anniversary of the Myanmar military’s coup d’etat, the opposition National Unity Government and three allied ethnic armies issued a joint statement that outlined six objectives of the Spring Revolution, as the resistance is known, and the principles for establishing a post-junta federal democracy.

Beyond the importance of planning, there is a reason for their bullishness. The military has suffered significant losses, especially since the Three Brotherhood Alliance, which includes the Ta’ang National Liberation Army, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army and the Arakan Army, launched their offensive on October 27th. Opposition forces have seized over 40 towns in Shan, Chin, Rakhine and Sagaing. 

A

lthough the military is preparing to launch a counter-offensive to retake Sagaing’s Kawlin town, the military is spread too thinly, across multiple battle fronts, to retake most of what it lost. 

Three years after ousting the National League for Democracy, the military’s effective control is dwindling. Infighting amongst the senior leadership has escalated amid the economic and military setbacks, while defections are mounting. 

The military has lashed out in anger, bombing lost cities and townships, but that’s insufficient to retake them. 

On the third anniversary of the Feb. 1, 2021 coup, Senior Gen. Min Aung Hlaing vowed to crush the opposition, a pledge the junta chief made for three years, with less and less to show for it.

The National Unity Government (NUG), made up of ousted members of the elected government and other public figures, has held a broad coalition of pre-existing ethnic resistance organizations together through the promise of a federal democracy. The Jan., 2023 statement reinforces that pledge.

New constitution

The statement’s six objectives can be summarized: “To overturn the usurpation of state power by the military, and to terminate the involvement of the armed forces in politics,” while ensuring full civilian control over the military. 

The military-drafted 2008 constitution will be abrogated, and a new charter that “embodies federalism and democratic values, garnering the consensus of all relevant parties” in order to establish a “new federal democratic union” will be drafted. Finally, they seek to institute a transitional justice mechanism.

The joint statement outlines nine positions to address complex wartime and post-conflict challenges. 

The first two are on the military’s illegal usurpation of power, which violated their own constitution.  

The third position makes clear that there is no going back to the status quo ante. Remember, the coup was staged on the eve of the parliament being seated after Aung San Suu Kyi’s NLD routed the military-backed United State Development Party in the November 2020 election. 

Moving forward, the elected parliamentarians will not be seated. Instead the November 2020 election will be viewed as a “mandate for revolutionary change and the establishment of a new political system.” 

And as the fifth provision states: “Any election held under the provisions of the constitution of 2008… would merely serve to perpetuate military rule indefinitely.”

While the political bodies established after the coup d’etat, the Committee Representing Pyidaungsu Hluttaw and the NUG, enjoy popular legitimacy and will play leading roles moving forward, the document is clear about the need for “collective leadership.”

Going for broke

The statement says “the stewardship of the nation in the post-revolutionary era shall be entrusted to all relevant parties in the cause of the revolution.” 

This should be interpreted to mean that all the ethnic resistance organizations and entities that joined the Spring Revolution will be given a seat at the table. 

The fourth position makes clear that the NUG and their allies are going for broke, seeking the defeat of the military. They will not negotiate with the military en bloc, though they are pragmatic enough to cut deals with individual leaders. 

But they are insistent that there will be no seat at the table for the military in the deliberations over the country’s constitutional future. There is every reason for them to fear that if the military is given a seat at the table they will claw back their political and economic rights and prerogatives.

The sixth provision states that “a new federal democratic constitution” has to be “formulated with the consensus of all relevant parties,” but does not identify who those are. 

The eighth position was a rejection of traditional political and economic elites and a call for a more inclusive democracy.

The final two positions focused on their commitment to “engage constructively” with the Southeast Asian regional bloc ASEAN to resolve the conflict and to peacefully coexist with its neighbors. 

To that end, the joint statement outlines six action plans towards the establishment of the federal democracy.

Off-ramp 

These include the continuance of military operations. While they accept negotiations with the “responsible leadership of the Myanmar military to terminate military rule and for peaceful transition of power,” they emphasize a key precondition: the military leadership’s “unconditional acceptance of the six political objectives.” 

And that is not possible without continued and sustained military pressure against the junta. If there is to be a negotiated off-ramp for the generals, it has to be from a position of their weakness.

Upon the military defeat and surrender, a phased transitional process at both the national and local level is outlined, as is the role of a transitional government and the drafting of a new constitution. 

A key task will be the redrawing of state borders. Though it was not stated explicitly, there are calls to break up the large ethnic majority Bamar-dominated states. 

It’s important that for all of these, they include “all parties and entities that participated in the revolution against the military dictatorship.”

It appears that the onus for establishing local governments will fall on the ethnic armies, as we have already seen with the Karenni in eastern Myanmar. It is less clear the role that various ethnic armies who did not participate in the Spring Revolution will have in establishing local governance. 

The joint statement concludes with the pledge “to persist in our revolutionary endeavors, maintaining unwavering cooperation and collaboration with our allied revolutionary forces.” 

Concern about non-signatories

But what causes some concern is who did not sign the document. 

The signatories included the Chin National Front, the Karen National Union, and the Karen National Progressive Party. The Kachin Independence Organization and members of the Three Brotherhood Alliance were not signatories, though obviously the door remains open to them.

No reason was given as to why they did not sign. But in the key western state of Rakhine, the Arakan Army does not fully trust the NUG, which they view as being too dominated by ethnic Bamar NLD members. Of all the ethnic armies, they have shown the most desire for independence and are now discussing confederation rather than a federal union.  

If the Arakan Army was not on board with this position paper, it’s understandable that its allies would be in an awkward position if they signed.

There is some speculation that Chinese pressure also had a role in this, though it’s hard to see what would have threatened Beijing’s interests.  

While some will view the joint statement as premature, it’s never a bad time to reinforce the desired end state. 

The closer opposition forces come to defeating the military, the more that the ethnic armies may begin to mistrust the Bamar-dominated NUG. The NUG must constantly reinforce its commitment to a new federal charter that enshrines a substantial devolution of political and economic power. 

Min Aung Hlaing’s vow to crush the opposition is delusional. In three years, the military has not only failed to consolidate power, but it’s lost effective control over much of the country, while the opposition has grown in strength, legitimacy, and unity. They offer the only path forward.

Zachary Abuza is a professor at the National War College in Washington and an adjunct at Georgetown University. The views expressed here are his own and do not reflect the position of the U.S. Department of Defense, the National War College, Georgetown University or Radio Free Asia.