Laos
What was the nationality of Touby Lyfoung from Dec 1975 to Dec 1976?
Touby Lyfoung Touby Lyfoung ( RPA : Tub Npis Lis Foom , ) was a Hmong political and military leader . Born in 1917 in Nong Het , Laos , he became the first Hmong politician to achieve national prominence . During his long career , which began under French colonial rule and extended to the communist takeover in 1975 , he supported the Royal Lao Government and American involvement in the Secret War . Under French rule . Touby Lyfoung was the son of Ly Xia Foung , a very well respected man among the Hmong community of Laos , and the grandson-in-law of Lo Bliayao , one of the first Hmong to gain leadership position in the Laotian government . Coming from a rich and well known family , Touby was able to attend schools in the lowlands of Laos and sent to study in Vietnam as well . Touby studied at the French Lycée , School of Law , and the Administration in Vientiane . The French were impressed by his education , for he was the only Hmong to have attained such an education in the French colonial empire . Being one of the few Hmong people educated in the French colonial school system,Touby Lyfoung was elected as head ( tasseng ) of the Nong Het sub-district in Xiangkhoang Province in 1939 . The next year , as the only Hmong member of the Opium Purchasing Board , he oversaw the institution of a new tax that was payable in opium for those farmers who were too poor to pay in cash . At the time , many Hmong , like other ethnic minorities in the region , cultivated poppies and sold the extracted opium as a cash crop . The French colonial authorities relied on taxes from the opium trade to fund infrastructure projects and draw revenue from the colonies . Cut-off from their most abundant supply of opium in Afghanistan ( due to conflicts associated with World War II ) , the French looked with favor upon Lyfoung for helping to improve the output of Laos . When the Japanese occupied Laos in March 1945 , Lyfoung was arrested for his associations with the French . He escaped and moved to the mountains where he helped to lead guerrilla attacks against the occupiers with a Hmong militia that included the young future general , Vang Pao . After World War II . Following , World War II , the French colonialists appointed Lyfoung district head ( chaomuong ) , giving Hmong people direct representation at the national level for the first time . The move helped to widen the growing gap between Lyfoung and Faydang Lobliayao , another Hmong leader who had been promised the earlier tasseng position by the French . Lobliayao went on to join the communist/nationalist struggle against the French rulers ( with the Pathet lao ) and later the Royal Lao Government . Lyfoung remained loyal to the RLG and led forces against the Pathet Lao and North Vietnamese between 1946 and 1954 , helping to force them out of Xiangkhoang province . In the 1950s , Lyfoungs role was critical in shaping the newly independent Kingdom of Laos as a nation acknowledging the diversity of its 63 ethnic minorities while being united as one country . Touby Lyfoung was the first Hmong and ethnic minority person to be honored by the King of Laos , when he was appointed Minister to the King , with the title of Phagna Touby Lyfoung . In the 60s and 70s , Lyfoung continued his lifelong fight for the Hmong peoples dignity and freedom in Laos , he took sides with the Royal Lao Government to fight the Communists in Laos and led a Hmong anti-Communist movement against the Pathet Lao Death of Touby Lyfoung . After the takeover of Laos by the communist Pathet Lao in 1975 , Lyfoung decided not to the flee the country despite the threat of retribution for supporting the RLG . Under the new government , he was appointed deputy Minister of Telecommunications but later arrested and sent to Prison Camp Number One in Houaphan Province on the Vietnamese border . This was the same camp where members of the royal family , including King Savang Vatthana , were kept prior to their death . According to another inmate of the camp , Colonel Khamphan Thammakhanty , Touby was kept shackled during the final months of his life but other inmates could hear him singing songs that mocked the new government . It is reported that Touby Lyfoung was shot by a guard in April 1979 and buried locally . External links . - Hmong historical figures presentation - Hmong cultural and resource cente