A United Nations review of Laos’ human rights record showed little progress since the last review about five years ago.
In its fourth Universal Periodic Review (UPR) on April 29, Laos received 271 recommendations from other countries, most of which echoed those of past reviews, underscoring the government’s failure to address longstanding human rights abuses.
In line with concerns from rights groups, such as Human Rights Watch, countries reiterated calls for Laos to investigate attacks and enforced disappearances against dissidents, to ratify the International Convention for the Protection of All Persons from Enforced Disappearance, and to promote fundamental freedoms of expression, assembly, and association.
Yet the government has continued to target its critics, including activists Savang Phaleuth, whom police detained in April 2023, and Anousa “Jack” Luangsuphom, who was critically wounded later that month in a shooting that has yet to be investigated.
The continual failure of the government to impartially investigate attacks on critics is exemplified by the enforced disappearance of civil society leader Sombath Somphone in 2012. Despite claiming to be investigating his case, the government has never provided updates to Sombath’s family or to the general public.
Other incidents since 2020 have demonstrated the Lao government’s role in quid pro quo “swap mart” agreements with neighboring governments that have facilitated rights abuses against its nationals across its borders and vice versa, known as transnational repression. In May 2023, unidentified assailants shot and killed the exiled Lao political activist Bounsuan Kitiyano in Thailand. Later that year, Laos forcibly returned Chinese human rights lawyer Lu Siwei to China where he has been sentenced to prison. The government has also failed to investigate other cases of presumed transnational repression that predate its last UPR cycle, including the enforced disappearance and presumed killing of five exiled Thai activists in Laos.
During the UN review, the Lao government emphasized the relationship between a country’s development and its promotion of human rights. But Laos has no excuse for not delivering on its rights obligations to cease arbitrary arrests, enforced disappearances, and extrajudicial killings, and by fully and impartially investigating attacks on Sombath Somphone and other dissidents.
The Lao government has until the next UN Human Rights Council session in September 2025 to signal its intention to support and implement the recommendations made during the latest review.
