Lao National Unexploded Ordnance Programme (UXO LAO)
Making Laos Safe,
One Step at a Time
Join our mission to clear unexploded ordnance and build a safer future for Laos.
Latest Activities
Stay updated with the most recent efforts of the UXO Lao, including ongoing clearance operations, community risk education, and survey missions across affected areas. These activities focus on removing unexploded ordnance, improving public safety, and supporting local communities to safely use land for agriculture and development.
The Most Bombed Country
The Lao PDR has the unfortunate distinction of being the most heavily bombed country in the world in terms of the number of unexploded ordnance per capita. The bombs dropped include more than 270 million cluster munitions (as the Lao people call them “bombs”), which were released from cluster munitions.
When was The Bomb dropped?
The Lao PDR is the most heavily bombed country in the world. After the end of the Indochina War of 1964-1973 and more than forty years later, unexploded ordnance (UXO) remains a major humanitarian and socio-economic challenge for the country, causing injuries and deaths, limiting access to productive land use, and adding significant costs to the development process.
In excess of 270 million
Estimated number of sub-munitions (bombies) from cluster bombs and 30% remains as unexploded ordnance, with approximately 80 million UXOs.
Up to 25 percent
of the country’s 10,000 villages blighted by the presence of these remnants of war
Over 22,000 people
have fallen victim to UXO and bombies, almost half of whom died
Around 69 annually
over the years, the number of people killed or injured has dropped to about 69 people annually from UXO from 2008 until now
UXO Contamination Today
The Lao PDR today is the most cluster munition and UXO affected country in the world. UXO hidden everywhere. UXO can be found in rice fields, school yards, on hillsides, in rivers, along roads and paths and even in the centres of provincial towns.
UXO LAO operates in 9 of the most UXO impacted provinces in the country:
Houaphan
Xiengkhouang
Khammuane
Savannakhet
- “Click on each province or the corresponding number t to view more information.”
Areas of Operation