No time to sit back 无暇停歇

(May 15th 2008) China has shown up Myanmar's generals. But it is not too late for outsiders to help the Burmese

中国给缅甸军政府上了一课，而外界要为缅甸人提供援助还为时不晚

IT HAS taken another catastrophe, this one in China, to show the generals who run Myanmar how better to respond to a natural disaster. Ten days after a cyclone struck Myanmar (formerly Burma) on May 2nd, the xenophobic junta there had managed to ensure that aid from abroad was still only trickling in and most of what had arrived was not being distributed to those who needed it. The United Nations' estimates for the dead and vulnerable were rising dramatically. It was then that a devastating earthquake struck western China. President Hu Jintao at once mobilised soldiers and other workers in an all-out rescue effort. The prime minister, Wen Jiabao, arrived in the region within a few hours, making no attempt to play down this “severe disaster” and saying China would gratefully accept international help (see article). The contrast with Myanmar was telling.

又发生了一起大灾难，这次是在中国，不过也正好让缅甸的将军们看看作为政府应该怎么应对灾情。缅甸的热带风暴灾害起于5月2号，排外的缅甸军政府在灾难发生的10天后仍不愿意接受外国援助，即便是好不容易运抵缅甸的些微国际救援物资，也没能发到需要救助的人民手上。联合国估计死伤人数在急剧增加。也就是在那时，一个毁坏巨大的地震重创了中国西部。胡锦涛主席动员士兵和其他工作者竭尽全力进行援救。温家宝总理也在数小时内抵达灾区，他们没有对民众隐瞒灾情，同时宣称中国将十分感激国际援助。中国的情况正好与缅甸形成鲜明对比。

So was the contrast with the China of 1976, when an even deadlier earthquake struck the city of Tangshan. The full awfulness of that event—at least 250,000 people died—was not revealed for months, and offers of foreign help were spurned.

中国这次的表现与其1976年的做法也形成了对比。那一年，一次更致命的地震击中了唐山，而事件当中最恶劣的是——至少为250000的死亡人数——被隐瞒了数月，而且外国援助也被拒绝。

China's rulers are still proud and sometimes prickly, but for reasons good and bad they have changed. They got a nasty shock, for instance, in 2003 when an outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome, SARS, showed how a virulent new plague, if uncontained, might impose huge costs on a modernising economy. This taught them that burying bad news is not always sensible. A fierce freeze-up this January showed how the weather could also bring paralysis, less economically damaging perhaps but awkward all the same over a great national holiday. This showed them the merits of occasionally admitting imperfection, and even of offering a prime-ministerial apology. Since then they have learnt that beating up their Tibetan citizens may not be wise just as they are trying to impress the world with an Olympic extravaganza.

虽然中国的领导人仍旧骄傲而敏感，但无论如何他们变了。呼吸道疾病（SARS）在2003年爆发，使中国领导人震惊，如果不对这种新的致命瘟疫加以控制，就会因此在经济现代化过程中付出高昂的代价。非典使领导人们明白了将坏消息掩藏起来并不总是明智的选择。今年一月的强烈冰冻也显示了气候造成地区瘫痪的巨大力量，即便没有造成多大经济损失，但这场在国家假日期间发生的灾害也足以使人难堪了。领导人们从中明白了偶尔地承认不足，或是甚至让部级领导出面道歉的价值。之后，他们又明白了，仅仅因为藏族人想以奥林匹克荒诞剧来博得世界的同情而教训他们，也是不明智的。

Such lessons have helped China respond more openly to the country's latest natural disaster. But no similar enlightenment is in store in Myanmar, certainly not soon enough to save the 2m people whose lives may be at risk if they do not receive more help. These people might be surprised to learn that in 2005 a World Summit of the UN endorsed the principle of an international responsibility to protect oppressed people from their persecutors (see article). True, any action taken would require Security Council approval and, true, the principle was adopted with armed oppression in mind. But “crimes against humanity” were specified and, if, say, a third of the 2m now struggling to survive in Myanmar were to die in the coming weeks from hunger and disease because their government refused outside help, that surely would be such a crime.

这些教训使中国能够更公开地对这场最近的自然灾害做出反应。而缅甸却依然我行我素，如果得不到更多援助，有2百万缅甸人民就将生活在危险中。这些人听到以下消息可能会吃惊，联合国在2005年的一个世界峰会中通过了一项准则，即国际社会有责任保护那些处于迫害之中的人民。

It would certainly be a stain on the world's conscience, one indeed to rival the genocide in Rwanda, which claimed 700,000 lives. So what can be done? Legally, probably nothing. China and Russia would veto any resolution in the Security Council. Politically, too, any action that defied the generals would be controversial. Myanmar's neighbours are too morally insensible even to rebuke it in the councils of the Association of South-East Asian Nations. So the main task would probably fall to America, France and Britain, the only powers with ships nearby and able to act quickly in defiance of the generals.

缅甸的行为必定会给世界的良知留下不光彩的一笔，因为它现在要赶超夺去70万生命的卢旺达大屠杀。那么，世人应该做些什么呢？从法律上讲，基本上什么也做不了，因为中国和俄罗斯会在安理会否决一切决议。从政治上来看也是一样，任何忤逆缅甸将军的行为都将引发争论。缅甸的邻邦们过于道德麻木，甚至在东盟会议上也没有对缅甸的做法提出谴责。因此，美国、法国和英国的援助任务注定失败，即便它们是仅有的几个在缅甸附近有军舰而且能无视缅甸军政府的力量。

As for the practicality of any action, that too is fraught. Unless, heaven forfend, an attempt were made to take over the administration of Myanmar, which would involve an armed invasion, the action would be confined to air drops. One difficulty is that the aircraft doing the dropping might be fired on unless they had military escorts, and that might lead to more fighting than anyone should want to see in a disaster zone. Another difficulty is that the effort to get food and medicines to people without the generals' consent might provoke them to halt even the pathetic flow of aid they are letting in.

任何实用的行动都会让人难过。除非，但愿事情不会是这样，像武装入侵一样空投兵队推翻缅甸军政府。这样做有一个麻烦，实施空头作业的运输机可能会被袭击，除非它们带上武装护卫，而这又将导致许多任何人都不愿意在灾区看到的武装冲突。另一个麻烦是，如果外界不经军政府同意就为缅甸人民提供食物和药品，军政府可能会一怒之下把现在准入的援助细流都掐死。

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