China has suspended shipping on the Mekong river, days after 13 sailors were killed on two cargo boats in an apparent hijacking by drug smugglers.

The official Xinhua news agency said the shipping ban extends to passenger vessels as well as cargo ships.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Weimin said the two boats came under attack Wednesday in the Golden triangle of the Mekong – a region notorious for illicit drug trade that includes Burma, Thailand and Laos.