The UCLA International Institute will hold a series of speaker
events starting today on issues the media and public may be missing
with regard to the South Asian earthquake and tsunamis, including
the impacts and reconstruction efforts that will last years beyond
the initial wave of donations, as well as the global context of the
disaster.
Speakers say the relief effort may result in warmer relations
between the United States and a corrupt Indonesian military, and
one expert plans to talk about possible reasons the press and
nonprofit charities ignore some human rights disasters.
Titled “The Tsunami and its Aftermath ““
Understanding and Helping,” the first session will lay the
groundwork for upcoming forums, including ones on nonprofit groups
based in South Asia and artists’ response to the crisis.
“There are a lot of cameras in place … but what’s
missing from most of the coverage is the sort of context that UCLA
is uniquely positioned to provide,” said Clayton Dube,
assistant director of the Asia Institute.
Speakers can give insight into subjects like civil wars raging
in two of the regions hit hardest by the tsunami, Dube said. Prior
to the disaster, the minority group Tamil Tigers were pitted
against Sri Lanka’s Sinhalese majority in a decades-long
conflict that has claimed tens of thousands of lives. Dube said
those two groups seem to be working together to help people in the
days after the tsunamis.
But Geoffrey Robinson, associate professor of history, suspects
that in the Aceh province of the Indonesian island of Sumatra,
government forces that are fighting islanders who want independence
may be impeding the flow of aid to those who need it, an issue he
will address today.
The military atmosphere has bred distrust between civilians and
soldiers who killed their loved ones, and resulted in a lack of
infrastructure for coping with crisis. When the tsunami hit, there
was no disaster preparedness in Aceh ““ no journalists, no
humanitarian groups, said Robinson, who also directs the UCLA
Center for Southeast Asian Studies.
“It seemed so unjust, that here was a place that really
has suffered so much. … What came to my mind was, “˜What did
they do to deserve this?'” he said. “Aceh has
suffered enough.”
Robinson added he fears foreign governments sending in forces to
collaborate in relief efforts may strengthen their relationships
with the Indonesian military.
The United States, which sent troops in to help, severed ties
years ago with the Indonesian military after reports of atrocities
troops committed against civilians. These points cannot be
overlooked when discussing the current disaster, Robinson said.
“If you know the situation, you’re simply more
informed as a citizen about what you ought to be doing. … Giving
money is important, but we can also be, for example, asking our own
government to be very careful in restoring ties with a very corrupt
military,” he said. “We can keep our eyes open to the
political and human rights consequences that are going to unfold
down the line.”
Robinson, who studied South Asia in graduate school after
traveling to the region, has been to Aceh several times. He last
visited in 2002, and was in touch with friends and colleagues there
before the tsunamis occurred.
He said he is pondering flying to the battered region to help in
relief efforts. If he goes, it will be in part to find out what
happened to those close to him.
“Cell phones and e-mails have been down,” Robinson
said. “I’m slowly getting information from various
friends and contacts who are making a list of those who are alive.
And I see some of my friends on the list, but some not. So I guess
this is just too early to know what’s become of
them.”
So far, Robinson said he feels he is of more use promoting
awareness in the United States of the situation in Indonesia than
on the ground in Aceh. He said while press and public attention
focused on the tsunamis in past weeks, coverage is already waning,
and he fears it will disappear once the immediate crisis is
over.
Associate professor of history Vinay Lal believes that in
addition to ignoring long-term crises, media and others, including
non-profit groups, tend to be repelled by tragedies considered
controversial.
With individual governments pledging as much as half a billion
dollars to tsunami victims, Lal, chair of the South Asia Studies
interdepartmental degree program, said politicians also
discriminate in their giving. He pointed to Secretary of State
Colin Powell’s reaction to areas ravaged by the tsunamis as
an example.
“He said, “˜Well, I have never seen (such)
devastation before,'” Lal said. “But frankly, I
believe that is bullshit, because that is a guy that was in
Vietnam. And in Vietnam, there was wholesale
destruction.”
Similarly, Lal said, many groups posting links on their Web
sites for those who want to donate to tsunami victims have no
similar mechanism for people killed and hurt by the war in Iraq or
other events. He calls this the “politics of disaster
aid,” and will speak on the subject Thursday.
Lal said he believes factors including affluence and geography
impact responses to catastrophes. For example, many European
tourists were in Southern Asia at the time of the tragedy, which
may have attracted the camera lens and the outpouring of donations
worldwide.
Lal said he also plans to speak on the nature of contributions,
whether from individuals or nations. The United States upped its
initial donation to disaster areas by a factor of 10 after being
called stingy. The United States ranks near the bottom of the list
of industrialized nations in its percentage of annual per capita
spending on foreign aid.
“There’s just no way to evade the data on this one
unless you have some private data that nobody else has access
to,” Lal said.
The tsunami and its aftermath must be addressed in a global
context, in relationship to human tragedies that go ignored, Lal
said.
“To bracket this off, it seems to me, is to evade the real
consequences of speaking about something like a tsunami,” he
said.