Laos tomorrow marks 30 years since the capital Vientiane fell to communist forces, an anniversary the regime is expected to use to shore up its legitimacy as the rulers of one Asia's poorest countries.
The event comes in a year when landlocked Laos, long considered a sleepy Asian backwater, hosted a regional political summit, secured an international loan for a major dam project and attracted more tourists.
But while Laos is moving on, the legacy of the Indochina conflict still lingers in the enigmatic, bomb-littered country, where a little-known conflict continues from the days when the Vietnam War spilled across its borders.
Laos was dragged into the conflict when US bombers pounded its jungles to uproot Vietcong allies during the Vietnam War, leaving its forests and rice paddies littered with unexploded bombs to this day.
The communist Pathet Lao took Vientiane on Aug. 23, 1975 -- less than four months after the defeat of the US-backed South Vietnamese regime in Saigon, now called Ho Chi Minh City, and the rise of the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia.
The Lao People's Democratic Republic was proclaimed on Dec. 2, 1975.
"When the Lao communists captured Vientiane, this marked the fall of the `third domino' in Indochina," said Southeast Asia expert Carl Thayer, referring to the US Cold War theory of communist "domino states."
After the Pathet Lao took over, intellectuals and officials associated with the former US-backed government were sent to re-education camps, the economy was collectivized and the small country closed its doors to the West.
It was only in the early 1990s -- after the fall of the Soviet Union and following the example of its larger mentor Vietnam -- that Laos began slowly opening up to the outside world.
In 1997 Laos, now a country of 5.3 million people, joined ASEAN at a time when it also introduced economic reforms and accepted foreign aid, still a mainstay of its economy.
Last November it hosted 15 heads of government of ASEAN, which Laos now chairs, and those of regional giants China, Japan and India. Last month, it again rolled out the red carpet for ASEAN's foreign ministers.
There have been other signs of change. A country which had been off the tourist map until the early 1990s has become a popular destination for backpackers, and bars and hostels have popped up in small towns.
Thai television is seen in almost all homes, communist party cadres are beginning to speak English and the Laotian leaders, long given to looking within, are learning the art of diplomacy.
In March, Vientiane won a vote of international confidence when the World Bank and 26 other financial organizations approved credit for the controversial Nam Theun II hydroelectric project.
Tomorrow the regime will hold a mass rally, to be attended by Lao People's Revolutionary Party leaders.
Thayer said the 30th anniversary will be an "important marker of legitimacy for the Lao People's Revolutionary Party."
"These public events provide an opportunity to demonstrate national unity through slogans, parades and other symbols of the communist regime," he said. "These events are used by the regime to buttress its claims to nationalism."
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