Sentence:  To find out , we traveled throughout that part of <WSD>Laos</WSD> still nominally controlled , in the daytime at least , by the Royal Lao Army : from Attopeu , the City of Buffalo Dung in the southeast , to Muong Sing , the City of Lions in the northwest , close to Communist China ( map , page 250 ) . 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  a mountainous landlocked communist state in southeastern Asia; achieved independence from France in 1949