The recently resumed trial of hapless Bahai’s in Iran, a small, peaceful community, is symptomatic of the tyranny of unstable regimes that fear their own people.
As brazen is the feverish anxiety on the part of the Mynmarese military junta to block every single avenue for anything like a remotely fair and free election, the first in 20 years, in that unhappy country. No firm dates have been announced but the charade is planned for some time towards the end of the year.
Aung San Suu Kyi, leader of the National League for Democracy, who won the last poll by an overwhelming margin, has been barred under a newly announced electoral law that does everything to ensure the poll is rigged in favour of the junta, which has reserved 25 per cent of all elective seats for itself. The Union Solidarity and Development Association (USDA) and the National Unity Party (NUP) are also being desperately propped up to win the remaining ‘popular vote’ as nothing can be left to chance.
On March 8, the junta announced five laws with regard to the election commission, political party registration and related matters under a new constitution that was crudely imposed on the people some months ago in a fraudulent ‘referendum.’
A military caretaker government is soon to take over the reins of administration and the new government may not be formed until several months after the poll so that everything is carefully arranged. The media is on a tight leash so that nothing untoward is said. Meanwhile, plans are reportedly afoot for a military makeover with the older guard retiring to make way for a younger lot, while some cadres are enrolled in the legislatures.
The ethnic minorities pose a problem. The separate ceasefire agreements signed with 17 ethnic groups in effect entailed a tacit live and let live policy for many without any compulsion to lay down arms. For the past several months the junta has been trying to persuade some of these groups to convert their armed cadres into a Border Guard Force, presumably as a step towards bringing them under the discipline of the Burmese Army.
The debate on whether or not the NLD should contest the elections, howsoever loaded the dice, has finally been settled in favour of a boycott. This will further strain the credibility of the exercise.
China too continues to exhibit fears of freedom. Google has pulled out of the mainland to Hong Kong because of censorship and official hacking into and spying on dissidents’ ID accounts. Now ‘Go Daddy,’ the American domain name register group, is thinking of following suit. Beijing is also coming under pressure to revalue the yuan upwards so as to stop subsidising its exports.
Second sun
Tibet constitutes a continuing worry as Buddhism remains a ‘second sun’ in the sky challenging (Chinese) communism. Hence the intimidatory and insidious efforts to undermine the authority of the Dalai Lama by heaping abuse on him as a ‘splittist’ and renegade secretly working for independence. However, His Holiness only seeks economic and cultural autonomy for Tibet under the terms of the 17-Point Agreement of 1951 on which Beijing has reneged.
The Chinese-chosen Panchen Lama is again being built up and many suspect Beijing will select a docile reincarnation in his place after the present Dalai Lama, now 75, passes on. These tactics will not work.
Even as the political drama unfolds, Tibet is caught in the throes of a climate change-induced environmental crisis with the melting of its permafrost and glaciers, the first being in some ways even more important than the second. India and the south Himalayan region in general is already beginning to feel the effects of debris and glacial dams, aberrant river flows with erratic westerly snowfall and attendant sediment surges.
The natural ecology, which is both shaped by and shapes Tibetan weather, is however being degraded by uninformed and unwise Chinese policies. A series of Tibetan papers circulated at the recent Copenhagen climate change summit, outlined a set of looming dangers.
Faulty pastoral practices have been imposed on Tibetan nomads who herd sheep, goats, yaks and horses. Initial insistence on enlarging herds to maximise production for a growing (immigrant) population proved unsustainable. This has now apparently yielded to another mistaken policy to restrict the nomads to confined pastures.
The new policy of ‘closing the pastures to restore grasslands’ has reduced many nomads to ‘ecological migrants.’ This human wrong, compounded by intensive grazing within ‘enclosures’ instead of the traditionally sound practice of extensive but light grazing, is degrading the rangelands.
The delicate balance between pasture lands, permafrost melting, the heat balance, rain and snowfall and their timing and other physical and atmospheric parameters has been adversely affected. The consequence has been greater dust and erosion, dying wetlands, desertification and a lowering capacity for carbon sequestration.
This is a complex process that calls for collaborative international research and careful corrective action. India and the world have stakes in this process, as does China. Tibet’s future is at stake in more than one respect.