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The Mekong River, Laos's main thoroughfare, feeds the fertile lowlands of the Mekong valley. Two decades of civil war followed independence from France in 1953, and Laos was bombed heavily during the Vietnam War. The communist Lao People's Revolutionary Party (LPRP) has held power since 1975. Market-oriented reforms began to be introduced in 1986, while power was handed to a younger generation within the LPRP in the 1990s.