The Myanmarese Generals’ reported opposition to a proposed Western-orchestrated air-drop of food over their country at the height of the recent storm devastation which claimed lives in the thousands, may draw an empathic response from some sections in Sri Lanka for whom memories of the Indian-initiated 1987 food air –drop over Northern Sri Lanka may be dying hard, but the truth is that the Generals opened themselves to charges of ‘fiddling’ while their countrymen pathetically perished.

Coming fresh on the heels of Kosovo’s Unilateral Declaration of Independence, which was backed by sections of the West, and the storm of protest it has raised in particularly separatism-hit states, the proposed food-drop over Myanmar by the West is likely to trigger new fears in nationalist sections in this part of the world that the West is gearing to ride rough shod over Myanmar’s sovereignty, brazenly brandishing the R2P ‘weapon’. Anxiety on this score among opinion in Sri Lanka may be needed to be treated with some sensitivity because the Indian food-drop was a violation of Sri Lanka’s air-space and bore all the resemblance of external interference in the affairs of a sovereign country. A case could not be made out in the latter instance that the state was grossly neglecting its citizenry and abandoning it to conditions of extreme deprivation.

However, Myanmar begs to be different. Tens of thousands are reported to have perished in the turbulence unleashed by cyclone Nargis and multitudes have been rendered destitute, hungry and homeless. Ideally, Myanmar’s rulers should be allowed to fend for the country’s citizenry. They should not be dictated to either. But what choice has the international community if the country’s rulers are seen as being coldly indifferent towards the sad lot of the people? What is to be done if the Generals give every impression of turning a Nelsonian eye on the gruelling travails of the Burmese citizenry? What if the people are left at the mercy of the proverbial ‘wolves’? The conclusion is inescapable that the world should intervene positively to alleviate the hardships of the people with or without R2P.

Therefore, the rulers have no choice but to see reason and allow international relief workers to enter Myanmar and fend for the storm-affected citizenry, if they lack the capacity and means to do so themselves.

Myanmar poses a huge, troubling question: could the world stand idly by when rulers prove inhumanly insensitive to the suffering of their citizens or blithely neglect their obligations towards them? Not so long ago, the horrific bloodshed in Rwanda-Burundi testified to the staggering costs of inaction by particularly the UN, in the face of endemic lawlessness which had, apparently, grown beyond the control of Rwanda’s rulers. More recently, Kenya very nearly approximated the conditions which compel international humanitarian intervention.

These issues are both problematic and not amenable to simple solutions. By virtue of the fact that a state is a member of the UN family, it is obliged to adhere to, both in letter and in spirit, the UN conventions and agreements it enters into and ratifies. These norms apply in particular to conventions and agreements concerning the well being of citizens. What is more, ratification of these conventions means that a state is obliged to be monitored by the UN.

This is the price of UN membership. A state cannot opt for UN membership and say no to the obligations which attach to such membership. On the other hand, if a country’s power elite opts to remain outside the UN system and govern almost at will, it will be on its own and perhaps court the status of an alien or a ‘pariah’- a situation in which white supremacist South Africa found itself in for a great many decades.

What compounds the crisis in Myanmar is its military rulers’ obsession to perpetuate their diktat, come what may. This accounts for their decision to go ahead with a referendum on a new constitution for the country, despite the depths of suffering to which Myanmar was plunged amid the cyclone. While hundreds perished, those Burmese who were lucky to be alive were expected to vote in the controversial referendum. These disconcerting developments pose the question: what should take precedence for our ruling elites? Power or the well being of the people?

It would interest readers to know what is going into the new constitution. Its more controversial provisions are these: A dominant role for the military in politics, immunity from prosecution over offences said to be committed by it, allocation of quarter of seats in Parliament for the military and a guarantee that the President would always be from the military.

The existence of military-dominated regimes such as these could be considered a challenge to the world’s conscience. Certainly, the internal affairs of Myanmar cannot be meddled with. But is not the world expected to exercise moral pressure on such regimes to ensure the people’s well being is not dismissively cast aside by a state’s ruling elite for the sake of power aggrandizement?

The world’s democracies in particular need to ponder on these things very deeply. An essential requirement today is both accountable and democratic governance. To the degree to which accountability is abandoned by power elites, they come under the scrutiny of the world community and if the states concerned are UN members they simply cannot avoid being accountable to the UN, in some form or other.

These considerations lead us to the reflection that ‘democratic’ opinion anywhere cannot rush to the defence of states which subject their peoples to abuses. "Sovereign’ states owe it to their people to continually ensure their well being. If they do not do this they risk being seen as defending the ‘sovereignty’ of only their parasitic ruling elites.