Bad-boy Myanmar centres in Asean ministers meet
Saturday, July 19, 2008
THE Association of South-East Asian Nations (Asean) has had little to brag about with its handling of bad-boy member Myanmar over the past 11 years.
Myanmar, also known as Burma, joined the club in 1997 and has been a constant embarrassment since, to the extent of raising serious questions about the relevance of Asean as a regional-problem solving forum.
Then came Cyclone Nargis on May 2-3, which devastated Myanmar's central coastal region, including the rice-rich Irrawaddy Delta and the former capital of Yangon, leaving some 140,000 people dead or missing.
Myanmar's military junta, in their inimitable style, turned the natural disaster into a diplomatic one, by initially blocking the free-flow of international aid and aid workers to the devastated areas while pushing ahead with a national referendum designed to cement their political dominance over any future elected government.
The international community was outraged, the United Nations was frustrated, humanitarian organizations furious, and Asean, arguably for the first time it is history, actually took the initiative.
Surin Pitsuwan, Asean's newly appointed secretary-general, held an impromptu meeting in Singapore in the wake of the cyclone calamity and pushed through a tri-partite mechanism including Asean, the UN and Myanmar government that essentially created a "diplomatic umbrella" under which an emergency relief operation could operate despite the junta's knee-jerk distrust of the international community.
Under the Asean initiative, a tri-partite core group of Asean-UN-Myanmar bureaucrats has met regularly in Yangon since June to deal with on-the-ground issues affecting the relief work and over the past six weeks has compiled an assessment report of the amount of damage wrought by Cyclone Nargis that will be presented at the Asean foreign ministers meeting in Singapore on July 21-24.
The announcement of the Post-Nargis Joint Assessment (PONJA) report will hopefully lead to an outpouring of donor contributions to the UN's revised flash appeal for 480 million over the next year in emergency relief for the million-plus people whose lives and communities have been affected by the cyclone.
The situation today is a lot different than what it was in mid-May, when international aid workers were warning of a second catastrophe of starvation and epidemics if relief supplies and international expertise was not allowed in soon.
Over the past two-and-a-half months the World Food Programme (WFP) has successfully delivered 20,924 tons of food to some 684,000 beneficiaries, much of it through an emergency air cargo hub at Bangkok's Don Muaeng Airport.
Since the tri-partite core group got started, access to the hardest-hit areas was essentially eased, although getting official permission for travel still accounts for 90 per cent of the logical hassles, according to aid workers.
UN officials closely involved in the cyclone relief effort from day-one attribute this relative success to the Asean initiative.
"It's been the make or break issue on the response," said one UN official who required anonymity. "I think it provided a convenient solution for everyone."
For the UN it provided access to Myanmar's advice-adverse military rulers, for the regime it provided a face-saving way to change its initially disastrous approach to the disaster.
For Asean it may have provided a new mission in life.
DPA
Myanmar, also known as Burma, joined the club in 1997 and has been a constant embarrassment since, to the extent of raising serious questions about the relevance of Asean as a regional-problem solving forum.
Then came Cyclone Nargis on May 2-3, which devastated Myanmar's central coastal region, including the rice-rich Irrawaddy Delta and the former capital of Yangon, leaving some 140,000 people dead or missing.
Myanmar's military junta, in their inimitable style, turned the natural disaster into a diplomatic one, by initially blocking the free-flow of international aid and aid workers to the devastated areas while pushing ahead with a national referendum designed to cement their political dominance over any future elected government.
The international community was outraged, the United Nations was frustrated, humanitarian organizations furious, and Asean, arguably for the first time it is history, actually took the initiative.
Surin Pitsuwan, Asean's newly appointed secretary-general, held an impromptu meeting in Singapore in the wake of the cyclone calamity and pushed through a tri-partite mechanism including Asean, the UN and Myanmar government that essentially created a "diplomatic umbrella" under which an emergency relief operation could operate despite the junta's knee-jerk distrust of the international community.
Under the Asean initiative, a tri-partite core group of Asean-UN-Myanmar bureaucrats has met regularly in Yangon since June to deal with on-the-ground issues affecting the relief work and over the past six weeks has compiled an assessment report of the amount of damage wrought by Cyclone Nargis that will be presented at the Asean foreign ministers meeting in Singapore on July 21-24.
The announcement of the Post-Nargis Joint Assessment (PONJA) report will hopefully lead to an outpouring of donor contributions to the UN's revised flash appeal for 480 million over the next year in emergency relief for the million-plus people whose lives and communities have been affected by the cyclone.
The situation today is a lot different than what it was in mid-May, when international aid workers were warning of a second catastrophe of starvation and epidemics if relief supplies and international expertise was not allowed in soon.
Over the past two-and-a-half months the World Food Programme (WFP) has successfully delivered 20,924 tons of food to some 684,000 beneficiaries, much of it through an emergency air cargo hub at Bangkok's Don Muaeng Airport.
Since the tri-partite core group got started, access to the hardest-hit areas was essentially eased, although getting official permission for travel still accounts for 90 per cent of the logical hassles, according to aid workers.
UN officials closely involved in the cyclone relief effort from day-one attribute this relative success to the Asean initiative.
"It's been the make or break issue on the response," said one UN official who required anonymity. "I think it provided a convenient solution for everyone."
For the UN it provided access to Myanmar's advice-adverse military rulers, for the regime it provided a face-saving way to change its initially disastrous approach to the disaster.
For Asean it may have provided a new mission in life.
DPA
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