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On Myanmar,
Questions of Lack of UN Training and of Ethnic Cleansing of Karen, R2P?
Byline: Matthew
Russell Lee of Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED NATIONS,
May
14 -- The areas hit by Cyclone Nargis and which Myanmar's authorities
are
barring foreign aid workers from entered include "Karen areas," UN
humanitarian coordinator John Holmes told the press on Wednesday. The Karen
ethnic group has been targeted by the military government for
decades. Inner
City Press asked Holmes if the UN is concerned that ethnic
discrimination may
be playing a role in the response to the cyclone. Holmes ascribed the
"fear of foreigners" to just that, fear of foreigners.
Video here,
from Minute 28.
Inner City Press asked Holmes about reports
that international -- that is, foreign -- aid groups might recruit
Myanmar
nations and train them in Thailand. Holmes said he's heard the reports,
that he
"hopes it won't be necessary because international staff will get
in." But why not train countries' own nationals in the skills of
humanitarian response? While Holmes are first said that this takes
place, in
the context of Disaster Risk Reduction, he later described UN national
staff as
"not trained," working in "other development" projects as
"office workers." Video here,
from Minute 36:46.
Why not have trained these office
workers? The UN Development Program, for
example, has
bragged of its extensive national staff in Myanmar. Have they not, as
Holmes
said, been trained? Why not do so, going forward, in other countries
with UN
local staff?
After Nargis, Siemens, BNP, Suzuki, POSCO and
R2P not shown
An even less-covered aspect of the
response to the cyclone is that Myanmar's military government has been
eying
the Irrawaddy Delta for some time to develop ports. Rebuilding efforts,
and
land seizures, will have to be watched going forward.
On the corporate front, Hong
Kong-based Hutchison Whampoa, which along with owning in the UK
Superdrug, 3 Mobile and luxury properties, operates a large port in
Myanmar,
has still not responded to written questions about its response to
Cyclone
Nargis. Nor have certain other companies reported profiting from
Myanmar,
including Japan's Suzuki, Germany's
Siemens, Denmark's Novo Nordisk, and South Korea's POSCO Steel. This
last
company, which has a joint venture in Myanmar, is not a member of the
UN Global
Compact; Inner City Press had wanted to ask Secretary-General BAN
Ki-moon about
it last week, but it was said that BAN could only take three questions
before
leaving the hour-long briefing. Later Wednesday, BAN will meet with
ASEAN and
"major donors." We'll see.
Legal footnote:
while the UN's expert on the "Responsibility to Protect" doctrine,
Edward Luck, earlier this week told Inner
City Press that R to P, as he calls
it, does not apply in this case because it does not fall into the
four triggers
of the responsibility, the Karen / ethnic cleansing angle might, for
some
advocates and even governments, change that. Ethnic cleansing, along
with war
crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity, triggers the
responsibility to
protect. Watch this site.
* * *
These reports are
usually also available through Google
News and on Lexis-Nexis.
Click
here for a Reuters
AlertNet piece by this correspondent
about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click
here
for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali National
Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an
undefined trust fund. Video
Analysis here
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