Friday, December 31, 2004
Tsunami notes. posted by Richard Seymour
While people across the world charitably empty their pockets to contribute in some small way to ameliorating the horrendous situation facing survivors of the tsunami, the Indonesian army has resumed its war on Acehnese rebels. Bear in mind that:The Indonesian death toll from the tsunami is nearly 80,000 people, with most of the fatalities in Aceh, and the government expects the figure to head towards 100,000 as rescue workers reach remote towns and villages.
Perhaps the Indonesian army thinks, with the Reverend Fred Phelps , that there is a message from God in all this, and are acting accordingly. Or perhaps they don't much care, just like every major Christian fundamentalist outfit in the United States .
Meanwhile, what of the 'global aid' situation? According to The Guardian, the best the whole world has managed - including governments and private donations - is £259m. When hurricanes hit the southeastern United States earlier this year, President Bush managed to find $13.6 billion without having to be cajoled, as the US appears to have been this time. Even the UK's comparatively generous donation (£50m from the government) was prompted by a massive flow of money from the British public - £32m, which rather made the government's initial pledge of £15m look mean. (Incidentally, the excellent Media Citizen calculates that the $35m pledge from the US government so fwould cover about 3.5 hours of their occupation of Iraq; although now that this pledge has mysteriously been increased ten-fold , it actually accounts for approximately a day and a half of occupation).
This isn't surprising. The response to the flooding in Mozambique in early 2000 was similarly pitiful , as was the mean-spirited, tetchy response to appeals for aid when the Montserat volcano erupted. Cynically, one might allow that this would all be fair enough if only the US and Britain did not seek so assiduously the mantle of the humanitarian. But, after all, the major economic powers all cost the developing world a fortune in 'debt repayments' each year, a situation which they have deliberately engineered . Indeed, the devastating imperialist subventions of the West rank right up there with tsunamis, earthquakes, volcanoes and floods as the greatest disasters to be visited on humankind. So, while it might be a miserable hope, it is not an unreasonable demand to expect our leaders to live up to their self-revering phrases just once.
For those who need information or would like to help with the tsunami, I can recommend no better source than the The South-East Asia Earthquake and Tsunami blog . Check out those sitemeter numbers, by the way - without any apparent mainstream media referrals, the traffic is enormous.