QLA and UXO survivors meet with White House Advisor and US Ambassador

Yesterday, QLA’s Exec Director, Thoummy Silamphan and several other UXO survivors attended a meeting to discuss UXO impacts with a senior advisor to the White House, Mr Ben Rhodes and the US Ambassador to Lao PDR, Mr Daniel Clune. The meeting was at the COPE Visitors Centre in Vientiane, in preparation for President Obama’s visit to Laos in September. Channapha Khamvongsa from Legacies of War also attended.
The UXO survivors shared some of their experiences with Ben and Thoummy explained QLA’s work and the challenges of a local not for profit association providing services to help UXO survivors improve their quality of life.
Ben was interested to learn that although the number of UXO accidents has decreased in recent years QLA continues to find UXO survivors who have never sought or received help of any kind.
Ben said that he talks to the President every day and will discuss what was raised at this meeting with him.
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