In Laos, in the “capital” of the Golden Triangle, drops of legality in an ocean of crime

LETTER FROM SOUTHEAST ASIA

On the banks of the Mekong, in Laos, facing Thailand, we only see it: the Kings Romans casino, a golden colossus whose points rise up in a corolla towards the sky. Two Rolls-Royces are on display in the entrance. The lawns are manicured. A yellow Lamborghini backfires. During the day in the gaming rooms, we recognize little Chinese bosses on the loose, with tattooed arms and close-cropped hair. It's smoking, it's chic, the impassive Laotian croupiers are dressed in impeccable dresses: we are here in a Macao of the borders, the aptly named “special economic zone of the Golden Triangle”, a piece of communist Laos conceded in 2007 for four twenty-nineteen years to a Chinese gaming tycoon named Zhao Wei.

If it bears this name, it is because the famous Golden Triangle, this vast territory divided between Burma, Laos and Thailand which became the world epicenter of opium trafficking in the 1960s and 1970s, has its center of gravity a stone's throw from the casino, in the middle of the Mekong, at the intersection of the borders between these three countries. On the Thai side, tourists treat themselves to a mini-cruise in a canoe on these lawless waters to give themselves the thrills, or visit the “opium museum”. In the evening, they dine on the terrace, along the river, facing the city of vice – “capital” and largest city in the region – which shines in all its lights.

The Golden Triangle is booming: not only has Burma once again become in 2023, thanks to the civil war, the world's leading producer of opium, but it supplies the majority of synthetic drugs consumed throughout the world. Asia. As for the dirty money flowing through the casinos hastily built for decades in these poorly regulated border areas, it is now flowing freely, in the form of cryptocurrencies, thanks to online games and cyberfraud operations orchestrated by Chinese mafias in Southeast Asia.

The government's blessing

Seventeen years after its founding, it looks great, the new “capital” of the Golden Triangle, mother of all the “crime cities” in the region: a new airport this year allows direct access from Vientiane. From Thailand, it can only be reached by boat – the first bridge over the Mekong being more than 50 kilometers downstream.

Among the ongoing projects, around fifteen towers, between 25 and 30 floors, are growing along the river. In front of the casino, Burmese workers are giving the final touches of paint to a baroque palace which will house “entertainment” along a Venetian canal. Around it, it's like a Chinese city which stretches over several kilometers of blocks of buildings and offices. Between 30,000 and 50,000 people live there. Chinese traders have transposed as is, from their village in Sichuan or Hunan, a mini market, a restaurant: we pay in renminbi for products coming by truck or boat from China.

You have 56.51% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.