A quick round-up of events in and around the subcontinent, courtesy of Robi Sen and Nitin Pai of The Acorn
- India: Desipundit captures two sides of the debate of whether or not two American bloggers were right in responding to India's assistance to the victims of Katrina with sarcasm. And The Acorn's recommendation on what India must do about Iran's nuclear programme.
- Bangladesh: Rezwan writes that terrorists hate Bangladesh's democracy, development and empowerment of women, achieved in part due to efforts by NGOs. In response, Wamy finds the conduct of some NGOs questionable.
- Pakistan: Gen Musharraf may have boasted on turning Pakistan around, but Onlooker at the Glasshouse has a very different reading. Raven at the Reality Cafe takes the General to task for making some distasteful remarkes about Pakistani rape victims.
- Sri Lanka: The government and the Tamil Tigers find a peace plan elusive -- but Sri Lankan bloggers have proposed one of their own. With elections round the corner, India.ca lays out the options before the voters.
- Nepal: Blogdai smells some changes in the political air in Nepal while the folks at United We Blog wonder if the Maoist ceasefire will lead to peace.
- Maldives: PINR observes growing signs of unrest in the archipelago
- Myanmar: Jeff Ooi reports that a Canadian trade union has prevailed upon Coca-Cola to stop procuring merchandise sourced from Myanmar. The chances that this will bring down the ruling junta is almost exactly zero.
I'm still proud of the Canadian trade union (geez, did I just say that?). It isn't possible to deal with Myanmar without lining the pockets of the SLORC junta, thus giving them more resources to spend on their quasi-totalitarian state.
"Qasi?"
Darnit ... I meant "Quasi?"
Joe,
The junta makes money from a lot of activities, including smuggling, drug production and trafficking, running internet companies etc. Coke's pulling out is sure to make a dent in the junta's pocket, but it will deprive hundreds of ordinary Myanmarese with a source of livelihood.
I'm an advocate of a no-nonsense policy towards Myanmar's dictators (as I am of their Pakistani counterparts) at a government level. But I don't think corporate social responsibility can succeed in regime change unless there is concerted efforts by the world's governments.
Nitin: Coke's pulling out is sure to make a dent in the junta's pocket, but it will deprive hundreds of ordinary Myanmarese with a source of livelihood.
Many hundreds of Myanmarese are deprived of their freedom and dignity through forced labor, and anybody who does business with them is doing business with a fascist slave state.
I'd say something worse, but Burma has a Post-Colonial License to Kill ™ and I don't want to get the postmodernists all bent out of shape.