[2008.05.17] No time to sit back 干预措施，刻不容缓

Disasters in China and Myanmar
中国和缅甸的灾难
No time to sit back
干预措施，刻不容缓

May 15th 2008
From The Economist print edition

China has shown up Myanmar’s generals. But it is not too late for outsiders to help the Burmese
中国已经使缅甸的将军们感到难堪,但对于外界人员而言,救助缅甸民众为时未晚

IT HAS taken another catastrophe, this one in China, to show the generals who run Myanmar how better to respond to a natural disaster. Ten days after a cyclone struck Myanmar (formerly Burma) on May 2nd, the xenophobic junta there had managed to ensure that aid from abroad was still only trickling in and most of what had arrived was not being distributed to those who needed it. The United Nations’ estimates for the dead and vulnerable were rising dramatically. It was then that a devastating earthquake struck western China. President Hu Jintao at once mobilised soldiers and other workers in an all-out rescue effort. The prime minister, Wen Jiabao, arrived in the region within a few hours, making no attempt to play down this “severe disaster” and saying China would gratefully accept international help (see article). The contrast with Myanmar was telling.
又一场灾难告诉缅甸将军们如何应对自然灾害,这次灾难发生在中国.在五月 二号缅甸遭受热带风暴袭击的十天后，伊外的军政府成功地确保外部援助如同细水般流入，并且其中大多数没有分配给灾民们．联合国就死亡与受伤人数的估计急剧 上升．就在这时一场毁灭性的地震袭击了中国西部．胡锦涛主席立即动员士兵和其他人员全力组织营救．温家宝总理在几小时之内赶赴灾区，没有试图掩盖这场＂严 重灾难＂并且声明中国愿意接受国际援助．中国与缅甸政府高下立判。

So was the contrast with the China of 1976, when an even deadlier earthquake struck the city of Tangshan. The full awfulness of that event—at least 250,000 people died—was not revealed for months, and offers of foreign help were spurned.
这同样可以与1976年的中国形成鲜明对比，那一年一场更为可怕的地震袭击了唐山市．严重的灾情－－至少造成25万人死亡－－被封锁长达数月之久，并且政府拒绝国外救援．

China’s rulers are still proud and sometimes prickly, but for reasons good and bad they have changed. They got a nasty shock, for instance, in 2003 when an outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome, SARS, showed how a virulent new plague, if uncontained, might impose huge costs on a modernising economy. This taught them that burying bad news is not always sensible. A fierce freeze-up this January showed how the weather could also bring paralysis, less economically damaging perhaps but awkward all the same over a great national holiday. This showed them the merits of occasionally admitting imperfection, and even of offering a prime-ministerial apology. Since then they have learnt that beating up their Tibetan citizens may not be wise just as they are trying to impress the world with an Olympic extravaganza.
中国的统治者仍然很骄傲，有时让人感到很棘 手．但因为一些或好或坏的原因，他们已经做出了改变．比如说，2003年他们遭受了严重的打击．那一年非典（SARS）爆发，这样一种新型传染病起初未被 加以控制，结果现代化经济为之付出了巨大的代价．这让政府意识到封锁坏消息并不明智．今年一月一场严酷的雪灾说明天气也可以带来社会瘫痪．这场雪灾虽然经 济损失不大，但适逢春节，仍然显得很尴尬．中国政府也认识到承认自身的不完美，甚至做出总理级别的道歉有一定的好处．从那时起他们也知道了，当他们试图以 一场奥运盛会令世界刮目相看时，殴打西藏公民并不合适．

Such lessons have helped China respond more openly to the country’s latest natural disaster. But no similar enlightenment is in store in Myanmar, certainly not soon enough to save the 2m people whose lives may be at risk if they do not receive more help. These people might be surprised to learn that in 2005 a World Summit of the UN endorsed the principle of an international responsibility to protect oppressed people from their persecutors (see article). True, any action taken would require Security Council approval and, true, the principle was adopted with armed oppression in mind. But “crimes against humanity” were specified and, if, say, a third of the 2m now struggling to survive in Myanmar were to die in the coming weeks from hunger and disease because their government refused outside help, that surely would be such a crime.
以上教训促使中国在应对最近这场自然灾害时 更加公开．但缅甸却没有任何即将觉醒的迹象，至少不足以挽救200万民众，而这些人如果不能得到更多的帮助，生命安全就得不到保障．这些民众也许不知道， 2005年全球高层会议上，联合国已经认同了各国有责任保护受压迫人民免受其独裁者迫害这一原则．的确要采取任何行动必须经由安理会批准．并且，通过这一 原则时很多人心存不满．但联合国已经明确了什么时＂危害人类罪＂．如果现在挣扎着求得生存的200万缅甸民众中有三分之一的人将会在未来几周内由于饥饿或 疾病死去，而这一切仅仅是因为缅甸政府拒绝外界援助，那么政府毫无疑问犯了＂危害人类罪＂．

It would certainly be a stain on the world’s conscience, one indeed to rival the genocide in Rwanda, which claimed 700,000 lives. So what can be done? Legally, probably nothing. China and Russia would veto any resolution in the Security Council. Politically, too, any action that defied the generals would be controversial. Myanmar’s neighbours are too morally insensible even to rebuke it in the councils of the Association of South-East Asian Nations. So the main task would probably fall to America, France and Britain, the only powers with ships nearby and able to act quickly in defiance of the generals.
这一定会成为世界良知的一个污点，和造成70万人死亡的卢旺达种族屠杀一样臭名昭著． 我们能采取什么措施？法律上，可能什么都做不了．中国和俄罗斯会否决掉安理会的任何一种解决方案．政治上同样如此，任何对抗军政府的行动都极易引起争论． 缅甸的邻国在道德问题上都不敏感，甚至不愿意在东盟会议上指责缅甸政府．因此主要任务就落在了美国，法国，英国的身上，他们在附近拥有船只，并且有能力迅 速对抗军政府．

As for the practicality of any action, that too is fraught. Unless, heaven forfend, an attempt were made to take over the administration of Myanmar, which would involve an armed invasion, the action would be confined to air drops. One difficulty is that the aircraft doing the dropping might be fired on unless they had military escorts, and that might lead to more fighting than anyone should want to see in a disaster zone. Another difficulty is that the effort to get food and medicines to people without the generals’ consent might provoke them to halt even the pathetic flow of aid they are letting in.
至 于各种行动的可行性，同样令人担忧．除非通过军事入侵推翻缅甸政府，当然希望不至如此，否则救援行动只能局限于空投．一个问题是，为了防止执行空投任务的 飞机被击中，必须由战机护航，但这又会导致在受害地区发生任何人都不愿意看到的冲突．另一个问题是，未经军政府同意向灾民发送食品和药品的行为可能激怒他 们，从而导致现有的可怜的一点援助也停止．

Let them eat words?
让他们承认错误？

Still, unless the generals relent, the attempt is worth making, because air drops might still save some lives, even though many are doomed. The first step should be a resolution in the Security Council. A veto would rob the action of strict legality, but paradoxically, by exposing the cynicism of the junta’s apologists, help to gain it legitimacy. Then the drops should start.
但是，除非军政府最终妥协，这样一种尝试是值得的．虽然很多人难逃厄运，空投仍然可以救活很多人．第一步，安理会要提出一个解决方案．否决会剥夺这个方案的合法性，但同时揭露了为缅甸军政府辩护的人的虚伪面目，从而使解决方案获得合理性．然后空投就可以开始了．

More storms are forecast for Myanmar. If thousands more people are to die in the coming weeks, let those who oppose any action now, however modest its effect, then explain why they favoured a policy of doing nothing. And let them try to describe the circumstances in which the new-found responsibility to protect might actually be invoked if it is not just to join the UN’s scrapheap of dashed expectations, broken promises and dismal betrayals.
据预计缅甸可能遭受更多风暴．如果在未来几周内数千人可能死去，请那些反对采取行动的人，不管他们的反对多么 温和，解释一下为什么他们支持一种什么都不做的政策．让他们说说，到底在什么情况下才应该动用这项新确立的责任去保护人民；还是说这个所谓责任也不过是联 合国许许多多落空的期望、无法达成的承诺和令人心冷的背叛之中的一个。

译者： xsj191 　　http://www.ecocn.org/forum/viewt … 1421&extra=page%3D1