1972

mercoledì, maggio 14, 2008

Birmania. I sommersi e i braccati. Se le parole salvassero vite l'ultima tragedia birmana sarebbe già acqua passata (appunto). Negli ultimi giorni ha guadagnato terreno il dibattito sulla fattibilità di un'invasione umanitaria volta a superare le barriere erette dalle giunta militare. Oggi si è scomodato perfino Robert Kaplan sul NYT per soppesare pro e contro di un possibile intervento: approfittando degli effettivi americani attualmente impegnati in un'esercitazione militare in Thailandia, una gran quantità di aiuti potrebbe essere trasferita alla popolazione via mare senza la necessità di penetrare in profondità in territorio birmano. Ma si tratta al momento di una discussione meramente accademica, con scarse probabilità di applicazioni concrete: anche volendo escludere l'ipotesi di un conflitto armato, è certo che una soluzione di forza provocherebbe un'alterazione degli equilibri (se così vogliamo chiamarli) politici interni tale da richiedere un prolungato impegno delle nazioni coinvolte nella fase del post-intervento. Insomma, un prezzo troppo alto per riscattare qualche milione di birmani.
Intanto il governo sigilla il delta dell'Irrawaddy, zona off-limits per stranieri e media. Ma anche i locali sono costretti a posti di blocco e perquisizioni continue mentre il materiale da loro donato è generalmente confiscato dalle autorità. E anche tra i wishful thinkers c'è già chi getta la spugna:

Another UN body, the International Organisation for Migration, says it may already be too late to save the many victims who are in need of aid.
"Maybe we should already be looking at rebuilding projects instead of emergency relief," said the IOM's Chris Lom.
"There's been an opportunity lost - in terms of immediate response, maybe we're too late for that."

Si dice che la prima vittima della guerra sia la verità. La Birmania colpita dal Nargis è di fatto una zona di guerra ed il controllo dell'informazione è la priorità dei padroni del pensiero che la tengono in ostaggio. Si è aperta quindi una vera e propria caccia al giornalista o al semplice testimone. Nessuno deve sapere:

Images of the dead keep trickling out of Myanmar. The most moving are those of children who died when Cyclone Nargis tore through the populous Irrawaddy Delta.
Among those e-mailed to Inter Press Service (IPS)is one showing a row of six children, girls in faded dresses, a boy in shorts and an orange shirt, and another in a blue sarong. There is an image of a child, face down, stuck between branches of a bush. And there is another of a man, shock on his face, holding a dead baby in his arms.
Yet the photographer does not want to be named. He knows the risks he faces if he is identified in a country ruled by a military that has known no limits to its oppression since coming to power following a 1962 coup.

Informare è un'attività clandestina ed ogni volto straniero è sospetto. Gli inviati in incognito sono sorvegliati, ascoltati, pedinati, fermati, espulsi:

Many telephones are tapped. People who take photographs are at risk. While one AP reporter in Burma was talking to an editor in Bangkok, he said he heard loud tick-tick-tick sounds on the telephone, an indication of a tapped phone. That day, the reporter had been informed the government it was not pleased by unflattering details about the junta in one of his stories.

Since the cyclone, a few foreign reporters have managed to get into Burma, concealing their satellite phones, battery packs and generators needed to operate in the cyclone-hit areas where electricity is down and there is no cell phone coverage.

"Myanmar [Burmese] authorities are now searching hotels outside the capital looking for Westerners. The authorities were going room to room in a number of hotels," the London-based aid group PLAN said in a statement, citing accounts from journalists in the country.

Di Dan Rivers avevo parlato qui:

CNN reporter Dan Rivers hid under a blanket in the back of a van at one checkpoint after sneaking into the country and being informed by a local contact that his TV reports had made him a marked man. Police at one point questioned him and demanded his passport, alarming Rivers, who has covered hotspots around the world.
After five days in Burma, he returned to his base in Thailand, thinking, "I'd used my nine lives up, and it was time to get out of the country."

Rimane solo un manipolo di giornalisti birmani, spesso corrispondenti improvvisati, a sfidare la censura:

Despite the hazards, many local journalists have braved the cyclone story. Some rushed to the delta immediately after the disaster and ferried back video footage to international news agencies that couldn't access the area for days. Many local journalists asked for nothing in return except an outlet to let the world know what the junta was hiding.

I sommersi e i braccati. Avventura di un reporter della BBC:

I had done something foreign correspondents do not normally do in Burma. I had put my name and face on the TV while I was still in the country.
The government was obviously furious. And so I had seemed to become state enemy number one.
They suspected I was hiding in the hotel because a few hours earlier they had deported the other two members of my team - producer, Annie Phrommayon, and cameraman, Arito Go.

postato da enzreale | permalink |

A Fabio. A Luisa.