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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Laos
Index
Relations with China have traditionally consisted of
trade and
aid, largely in road construction in the northern
provinces of
Laos, without directly challenging the interests of
Thailand or
Vietnam in the central and southern regions. However,
Vietnam's
invasion of Cambodia in December 1978 to unseat then prime
minister
Pol Pot, provoked China into a limited invasion of
Vietnam--
approximately nineteen kilometers deep--to "teach Vietnam
a
lesson." Laos was caught in a dangerous bind, not wanting
to
further provoke China, but not able to oppose its special
partner,
Vietnam. The Laotian leadership survived the dilemma by
making
slightly delayed pronouncements in support of Vietnam
after some
intraparty debate and by sharply reducing diplomatic
relations with
China to the chargé d'affaires level--without a full
break. The low
point in Sino-Laotian relations came in 1979, with reports
of
Chinese assistance and training of Hmong resistance forces
under
General Vang Pao in China's Yunnan Province
(see Internal Threats and Resistance Movements
, ch. 5).
This hostile relationship gradually softened, however,
and in
1989 Prime Minister Kaysone paid a state visit to Beijing.
In 1991
Kaysone chose to spend his vacation in China rather than
make his
customary visit to the Soviet Union. Diplomatic and
party-to-party
relations were normalized in 1989. Trade expanded from the
local
sale of consumer goods to the granting of eleven
investment
licenses in 1991--including an automotive assembly plant.
Following
the establishment of the Laotian-Chinese Joint Border
Committee in
1991, meetings held during 1992 resulted in an agreement
delineating their common border. China's commercial
investments and
trade with Laos have expanded quietly, but not
dramatically, in
1993 and 1994.
Unlike its other neighbors, China has not historically
dominated the Laotians. In the final analysis, China
represents the
most powerful remaining communist state to which Laos
might turn
for support against Thai or Vietnamese hegemony.
Data as of July 1994
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