Laos prohibits the construction of new casinos in certain areas

Laos is preparing to reorganise Boten, a region in the north of the country characterised by special economic autonomy and managed by Chinese investors.
A casino in that region has recently been turned into a mall for security reasons.
Indeed, there were serious suspicions of criminal activities within the institution.
The restructuring of Boten will allow the country’s authorities to tackle social problems more effectively and to better guarantee security, instead of leaving the task of solving these issues to the Chinese investors.
So far the autonomous regions with special economic powers were almost completely open to Chinese influence, with ideograms everywhere, transactions in yuan and clocks set to Beijing time.
Moreover, the government has decided that no new facility housing gambling activities will be built in this area, which accommodates numerous grandiose Chinese projects – still not complete or already completed – that are of concern for the authorities.
Some analysts even believe that the authorities of Laos might lose some control over the future of the country.