It wasn't long before world media attention shifted from the horrors at sea off southern Europe, with packed boats of the smuggled masses of Africa being condemned to drowning deaths, to a similar tragedy in the works in Southeast Asia. In the news at hand, ethnic Rohingyas are fleeing their homeland across parts of Myanmar neighboring Bangladesh, where they are oppressed and/or impoverished, to reach Muslim economies like Malaysia and Indonesia where they might have a chance to breathe. The trafficking is not new but was illuminated when Thailand began cracking down on the land-borne flow in its midst.
With the numbers (6,000 at sea alone?) such that Asia's refugee plight is now gathering world attention, the "regional architecture," as diplomats like to refer to multilateral government arrangements, is once again in view. In much of Asia and in ASEAN (Southeast Asia) particularly, this is not a pretty picture--made worse by the fact that, unlike in Europe's case, the source of the current misery is one of ASEAN's own members. The fact is that mass privation, and often discrimination, barely cracks the conversation in the elite realm where big business gets done in such places. Having just traveled there for 10 days, I can attest. At least when societal plagues such as pollution come up, there is the possibility of money being made in the remediation. With human suffering in transit, who can see the gain in relief?
(To try some blue-sky thinking: What would be the prospects for widescale employment contracting and placement, a kind of supranational job and resettlement bank? With adequate subventions, and a decent amount of scrutiny, might this be a surmountable prospect for NGOs or even some commercial enterprises?)
Asians have been migrating for centuries, and as everywhere such movement is often out of necessity and only grist for inspiring tales after some find their way to a better life. Many never make it, or spend years--even lifetimes--in penury. The recent earthquake in Nepal, wrenching as that has been, served to remind us how many Nepalese are long out of the country seeking desperate opportunities in places like the Arabian Gulf. Australia, a rare if inconsistent voice of conscience in the neighborhood, has been fending off refugees for years, including from distant Near Asia. Even with their own heritage of redemption and renewal, Aussies of late have had their popular fill.
The political point now is that, even as Europe goes through fits to deal with its latest onrush of the hopeful--and everyone knows the extended debate in the U.S. over Latin American immigration--Asia is now in the cross-hairs with little time to show the beginnings of a social infrastructure. Starting with Japan, South Korea and now with China, modernization has brought great physical infrastructure in the last two generations. The humanitarian element is also called for. Perhaps the smug moralists of the realm who so often tweak the West by touting "Asian values" can lead the catch-up exercise.
