"CHINESE CITY" HAS LAOTIANS SCARED AND ANGRY

A high rise "Chinatown" being erected near Vientiane, Laos has citizens of the Asian country both scared and angry, and demanding answers from the communist Laos government. Citizens of Laos fear the northern giant is moving to engulf the tiny nation. The rumblings are being heard even among some government officials, and foreign organizations operating in Laos are being told to refer to the venture as a "New City Development Project" rather than a "Chinese city." Even some of the population's aging revolutionaries are critical of the government, saying they fought to keep out the United States and others during the Vietnam War and now are seeing their own government opening the floodgates to foreigners.

"The Lao people are not strong so they are afraid the Chinese will come in and expand their numbers and turn our country into China. We will lose our own culture," said Sithong Khamvong, a middle-class Vientiane resident and former Communist Party member.

"Lao journalists would like to write about this but they cannot. There is no protest except in coffee shops — in our 'coffee parliaments'"

Laos fears Chinese Footprint

Two questions are raised by this development? Is Laos heading the way of Tibet? And will Laos now have a Chinese restaurant every two blocks?