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Home : Media : News : News Article View

# United States and Laos Host Disaster Response Seminar

By   Staff ReportEmbassy of the U.S., Laos

The Lao PDR, in partnership with the United States, hosted the Lower MekongInitiative Disaster Relief Exercise and Exchange (LMI DREE) in Vientiane,starting on September 22.  The LMI DREE is an annual civil-military disasterpreparedness and response initiative between the governments of Lao PDR,Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand, Viet Nam, and the United States. Each year itbrings together both military and civilian experts in one of the six memberstates.

“Floods, storms, and other natural disasters do not respect nationalborders.  In this deeply connected region, cooperation to help the victims ofnatural disasters is essential,” said the Honorable Daniel A. Clune, U.S.Ambassador to Laos PDR.

“The United States is committed to working with our partners in the Lao PDRand the other countries in the Lower Mekong region to help them meet theseshared challenges,” Clune added.

This year’s exchange, took place over four days, and featured presentations,problem- solving sessions, and a site visit. It also included a tabletopexercise which focused on flood response in the Lower Mekong region, with aspecific emphasis on impacts to the agriculture, health and transportationinfrastructure sectors. 

“The exercise ensures that the U.S. has a good understanding of not onlynational response protocols in the Lower Mekong countries but also regionalprotocols like ASEAN (Association of southeast Asian Nations) in particular,should we need to provide assistance during a flood,” said Justin Pummel aGeographer with the Institute for Water Resources, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers,and the exercise planner.

The activities leading up to the tabletop exercise provided a greatopportunity for participants to share flood-related experiences and bestpractices and develop plans for dealing with future events, which is one of themain goals of the exercise.

“Flooding can happen every year, in this workshop we all came together,different ministries and different countries to discuss and plan the steps inresponding to a flood, so we can better help our people and save lives,” saidMs. Vilavanh Xayaseng, Department of Communicable Disease Control, Laos PDRMinistry of Health.

During the DREE, participants also took a field trip to Hadsaifong District,a site east of Vientiane prone to flooding to share how local authorities heredeal with flooding. 

If there is flooding along the Mekong River it will likely affect more thanone LMI state. DREE participants now know who to talk to and have andunderstanding of how each other’s preparation and response systems work, whichshould lead to more efficient and effective disaster response.

The LMI DREE is part of U.S. Army Pacific’s Pacific Resilience program.Pacific Resilience is a series of Humanitarian Assistance/Disaster Reliefengagements between USARPAC and several host nation forces.

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