May 17, 2008
The Cyclone Is Not The Only Disaster
The Nation: Much Needed Aid and Supplies Are Being Confiscated By Myanmar's Military Junta
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Play CBS Video Video Myanmar's Deepening Misery Nearly two million people in cyclone-stricken Myanmar are homeless or in desperate need of water and medicine. More than 60 thousand are missing or feared dead. Kelly Wallace reports.
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Video Burma Aid Too Little, Too Late Aid has begun to reach the areas worst-hit by Cyclone Nargis, but it is too little. And aid workers are beginning to fear that for growing numbers of victims it may be too late. Allen Pizzey reports.
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Video Push For Myanmar Aid In an effort to reduce the strain on cyclone-ridden Myanmar, the United Nations is pushing for aid relief. CBS News Foreign Affiars Analyst Pam Falk weighs in.
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Myanmar cyclone survivors wait in line for rice donations on the outskirts of Yangon, Myanmar, Friday, May 16, 2008. (AP Photo)
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Photo Essay Left In Cyclone's Wake Countless people in Myanmar left homeless by deadly storm.
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Photos Cyclone Crashes Into Myanmar Aftermath of devastating and deadly storm that slammed into a densely populated delta.
The catastrophe unfolding in Burma may have been precipitated by an act of nature, but its root causes and current dimensions are man-made. In the wake of Cyclone Nargis, the military junta that rules the country has made a series of reprehensible decisions, bringing death, disease and destruction to a people it is entrusted to protect. As we go to press, the UN estimates that up to 102,000 Burmese have perished; some 220,000 are missing; and close to 2.5 million are in dire need of clean water, shelter, food and medical treatment. Yet, fearful of an alliance between pro-democracy forces and foreigners, the Myanmar regime initially rebuffed offers of assistance and so far has allowed in only a trickle of emergency supplies and almost no relief workers. Much of the aid that has gotten through has been confiscated by the military and distributed to its members or sold on the black market, and the government has even blocked some of its citizens from distributing rice.
Tragically, long before the storm, the people of Burma were enduring a humanitarian disaster brought about by political means. Since 1962 successive military regimes have dismantled Burma's once enviable healthcare system - today the state spends just 3 percent of its budget on healthcare while devoting 40 percent to its armed forces. The result: Burma's health sector ranks 190 out of 191 nations; it has one of the highest TB rates in the world; and a third of its children are chronically malnourished. Moreover, as part of a recent crackdown, the junta imposed rigid travel restrictions on aid workers, forcing the Global Fund to Fight AIDS and Médecins Sans Frontières to withdraw from the country. Other groups, like the International Red Cross, were ordered to close field offices.
The acute nature of the crisis and the regime's intransigence and corruption create an agonizing humanitarian dilemma. Students and an association of Burmese monks, as well as the National League for Democracy, the party of imprisoned Nobel Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, have called on foreign governments to intervene immediately - without the consent of the junta, with or without U.N. authorization. Humanitarian intervention in Burma may be justified by the Responsibility to Protect doctrine, adopted by the UN General Assembly in 2005, which obliges the international community to step in when a state can't or won't protect its people from crimes against humanity. Efforts to put the matter before the Security Council have been stymied by China, patrons of the junta, but the United States has yet to put its full diplomatic weight behind a resolution. It should do so now. The specter of UN action might cause the junta to relent; and a resolution would at least force Chinese officials, ahead of the Beijing Olympics and on the heels of the devastating Sichuan earthquake, to rebuke the Myanmar regime or vote publicly to deny lifesaving aid.
Absent U.N. authorization, the United States and other countries should initiate airdrops of rations, although it's a flawed compromise that can't provide aid workers or medical treatment. A coalition of nations including the United States, preferably led by regional states, could also act independently - but that should be considered only after every U.N. option has been exhausted. Any kind of intervention, U.N.-led or not, risks retaliation from the junta, which could endanger aid distribution. To guard against this and to distinguish this intervention from cases like Iraq that used humanitarianism as a fig leaf, any relief efforts should be strictly confined to providing aid in the delta region. The Burmese are looking to the skies and shores for help. It is politics - not nature - that imperils them now.
The Editors
Reprinted with permission from The Nation.
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editorialstaff net: Franklin D. Lomax writes: Pax American Coalition (PAC), largely comprised of the English speaking peoples, are being harried for not doing enough in the third world, and will be cursed as empire builders, when the Burma junta is exterminated by a covert force''''s raid, allowing the elected leader of Burma to get on with bringing her peoples into the Free World''''s family of nations. Those whiners crying that PAC is not doing enough in Africa, or to free Burma, or is doing too much to free Afghanistan, Iran, or Iraq, will, after the raid, agree that extermination of the Burmese dictators was precisely what they richly deserved, for the recent mass murder of 3000 of their subjects. The Junta demands cash money aid, no strings attached, whilst holding their enslaved peoples hostage to death by thirst, hunger, disease, and a gathering cyclone. Their cold blooded decision comprises mass murder, of up to a million more victims, unless we enrich and enable the Junta. They are supported by the Sino-Russian resources alliance that is invading all the abandoned colonies, with no strings cash infusions, and buying up the world%u2019s resource wealth, for chump change. British SAS perfected the covert operators who now comprise the magnificent covert anti-terror units used by the free nations to assert adult supervision over ****-ant dictators. Our dark angels must be allowed to do their work, now, for the angels.
in, than GW Bush, McBushSame, and cheney/Rove will
decide to bring them peace and democracy, you know
liberty! Just like the neo cons did to Iraq.
Lew
THE COMMENT BEFORE MINE HAS SAID IT ALL
NO NEED TO ADD MY 2 CENTS TO IT
GOOD JOB LEWISTON 14
TKTK53
AID HAS BEEN TURNED AWAY BECAUSE HALLIBURTON IS CONTRACTED TO DELIVER IT!
THANK GOD FOR ONE COUNTRY WITH CHARACTER IN THIS WORLD!
AMERICANS DEMAND WAR CRIMES TRIALS....
STAND UP OR SHUT UP!
Absolutely. What these people need immediately is food, water filters or tablets, mosquito netting, and plastic tarping. All of it is waterproof. Just toss out the aid packages and give the locals some relief.
- by lewiston14 May 17, 2008 1:29 PM EDT
- It seems to always be Russia, China or both. Somebody always has to say no. What are we going to do drop rice, tents and nets on the military. The UN is quickley becoming a usless none issue. I hope they move it to china.
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