Washington Week: Student Voices (O)

COLUMN: Waking up the giant
By Reagan Parlan
The California Aggie (UC-Davis)
10/16/2007

(U-WIRE) DAVIS, Calif. — Monks are symbols of peace, but the reign of brutality and violence in Burma in suppressing democracy has transformed that representation into a profoundly perturbing state. The images alone are gruesome and shocking. A couple of weeks ago, a smuggled picture of a dead Buddhist monk floating face down on a muddy river emerged to the vigilant international community. The picture serves as a reminder of the atrocity of the military crackdown against the peaceful monk spearheaded protests that turned into bloodshed. Despite this, Burma's closest ally, China, is not that enthusiastic about stopping the massacre of monks, or at least the suffering of the Burmese people.

The United States and the 27-nation European Union have already expressed their revulsion to the recent repression by tightening the existing economic sanctions on Burma. Despite such actions from these rich economies, the military junta continues to rule and refuses obstinately to allow change in Burma's form of government.

In fact, the U.S. sanction, which dates back to 1996, proved useless as manifested in the ever-increasing incidents of human right violations, political killings and, of course, the continued house arrest of pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

It is not enough that India and Russia, which have strong trading relations with the military regime, joined the alliance to persuade, if not to pressure, the paranoid generals in the ruling junta to change course toward a democratic Burma.

What it takes to at least turn that goal into possibility is to push China to interfere in the issue. China, being Burma's biggest neighbor, plays the most crucial role in compelling the military government to turn over the power to civilians for a legitimate democratic governance.

But why does China continue to support the military regime despite world consensus against the oppression? The answer is clear: China benefits from it. By remaining neutral about the impasse while everyone in the international community condemns and imposes sanctions left and right on the Burmese government, China could eventually gain hold of Burma's resources and trade. The country's massive oil and gas reserves make it difficult for China to isolate Burma, considering the latter's enormous demand for energy resources. Being Burma's largest trading partner, a threat of sanction by China will be sufficient to pressure the generals to change direction.

However, China believes that Burma is not a substantial threat to regional security and international peace. Moreover, the communist country asserts that interference to Burma's internal matters will not solve the problem. It is no wonder that it incessantly blocks any attempt by the UN to impose sanctions on Burma.

The country that brought us Tibet and Tiananmen Square, and possibly Darfur, has turned a blind eye to the violent acts of the junta. How many more bodies of dead Buddhist monks must float on the river for China to realize that the Burmese junta is a danger to the region?

This is the time for us to push China and also other countries that protect the junta and sustain the Burmese economy to join the United States and European Union in sending the message that it is time to give Burma back what she truly deserves — democracy.

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