Recent World Events, Part 1

I'd like to take a little time to comment on some recent world events, as a lot has been happening lately. So much in fact that I probably won't be able to give any one event the attention it may deserve. Instead I'll just offer a few thoughts on each that come to mind.

One major event that may already be fading from the minds of many in Taiwan and the US, assuming they were ever aware of it at all, is the recent revolution in Kyrgyzstan. Perhaps I am being a bit cynical (me, cynical? no way!), as at least on many online news sites the unrest and the overthrow of the country's president Kurmanbek Bakiyev made major headlines, and even now it still gets a fair amount of attention (in part because the situation is still not settled). However, I have a suspicion that even if the news was featured on the TV newscasts that most people get their news from, it probably just registered as more violence in some country they'd never heard of. Even now, I doubt that more than a small percentage of people in either the US or Taiwan could find Kyrgyzstan on a map, and many probably couldn't even come close. Admittedly even I (hey, not only I am I not cynical, I'm modest as well!) occasionally have trouble keeping Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan straight (though I did spell them all correctly without looking them up!). But that doesn't mean these places are unimportant or that we shouldn't pay attention to them.

In the case of Kyrgyzstan, the obvious significance to the US is the fact that it is leasing an airbase there that it uses to support its troops in Afghanistan. This base briefly made the news last year, as Bakiyev, encouraged by Russia, threatened to throw the Americans out of it and only relented when they agreed to drastically increase the rent they paid. But being overly pragmatic in this regard, i.e., focusing solely on the base as its only major practical interest in Kyrgyzstan, may conversely turn out hurt the US, as comments by the opposition at the time of Bakiyev's overthrow show that they took note of the Americans' failure to put any real pressure on Bakiyev to be more democratic, instead solely concerning themselves with making sure the base remained available to them. This is yet another example of how it pays to show genuine support for democracy and human rights (particularly the latter, though why democracy is actually much less important than civil rights is a topic for another day).

It was already fairly evident that Bakiyev needed some pushing in the human rights department, as various incidents such as the murder of a leading opposition journalist showed that he was rather lacking in that regard. Ironically, he himself came to power on a wave of popular support, but like many similar leaders in developing countries, he seems to have degenerated into an autocrat. The reason this kind of corruption is more obvious in the developing world is explained by Lord Acton's famous statement that "power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely." It isn't that leaders in the developed world are necessarily better people or that those in the developing world are worse, but that in most developed countries there checks against leaders' power, while in the developing world their power is often virtually absolute. Bakiyev wasn't even necessarily the worst in his region. Turkmenistan's recently deceased president created a cult of personality so absurd that the days of the week were renamed after him and members of his family. Some years ago the leader of Uzbekistan bloodily suppressed protests against him, killing an unknown number of civilians (soon afterward he went on a state visit to China, which congratulated him for its handling of the affair). Even Kazakhstan's Nazarbayev, who is a little less blatantly autocratic, has shown no sign of letting any real opposition challenge him or of paying more than lip service to human rights, democracy or anti-corruption efforts (he also shows no sign of planning to relinquish the position he has held since his country became independent 19 years ago).

Of course the situation in Kyrgyzstan isn't resolved yet, as Bakiyev hasn't resigned but has only fled to a part of the country where he retains more support. While he doesn't seem to have enough support to launch a civil war to reclaim power, the fact that he is free and still holding onto his claim to the presidency will make things difficult for the new government. As for the latter, based on a few quotes from an interview she gave a reporter, the new interim president Roza Otunbayeva seems fairly sensible. Of course a few quotes isn't much to go on, and given enough time in power she may end up like Bakiyev.

Speaking of problematic presidents in Central Asia, Karzai, the president of Kyrgyzstan's neighbor Afghanistan, has also made the news for some rather idiotic remarks recently. After being forced into a runoff because the independent, foreign-dominated election commission threw out huge numbers of obviously fraudulent votes for him and his international backers (including the main one, the US) pressured him to accept this (though in the end the runoff didn't take place as his challenger withdrew), he recently tried to replace the foreign members of the commission. When the legislature blocked him, he evidently became a bit unhinged, as earlier this month he claimed that foreigners had committed fraud in the election (a rather amazing claim, when it obviously was his supporters that did so), and that if the lawmakers didn't go along with his attempts to stuff the election commission with his supporters he would consider joining the Taliban. Considering that he would not be where he is without the support of the US and other countries, and his government is still highly dependent on the US both financially and militarily, these comments were odd to say the least. Also oddly, US senior officials have recently played down the dispute. One can only hope that this is because Karzai privately apologized and said it wouldn't happen again, but I haven't heard anything to this effect. The bright side is the Afghan legislature's defiance of Karzai's efforts, which perhaps is not altogether surprising considering the famously independent nature of the Afghans.

Another major news story, of course, was the death of Polish President Lech Kaczynski, along with many other major political figures and Poland's top military officers in a plane crash. There is little to be said about the incident itself, other than it was tragic (though not necessarily more or less tragic than an accident killing a hundred less powerful people) and that it may have significant effects on Poland's political scene. But what was ironic, as indeed many reports pointed out, was that they were traveling to Russia to commemorate the massacre at Katyn of 20,000 (!) Polish military officers and intellectuals by the Soviets in 1940.

As reports on the plane crash reminded us, the Katyn massacre was a major sore point in Russian-Polish relations for many years. It wasn't until Gorbachev's day, a half century after the event, that the Soviet Union even admitted that it had been responsible, and it seems that many Russians even now don't believe it happened. Of course there are always people who because of their own particular prejudices refuse to believe in historical events that are well documented, such as those that deny the Holocaust ever happened. It's even worse when, like was the case with the Soviet Union, the government actively pushes a false view of a historical event for propaganda reasons. Unfortunately this sort of thing is all too common, whether it is Turkish denial of the Armenian genocide, Japanese playing down of the Nanjing massacre or the use of "comfort women" in WWII, or Chinese denial of the Tiananmen massacre or their mistreatment of Tibetans. Some credit must be given to Putin (who is otherwise an undemocratic autocrat and nationalist) for attending a ceremony at Katyn with the Polish prime minister before this plane crash. There is no excuse for a nation failing to admit to the crimes it committed in the past; it is only after such a full admission of fault that a healing process has hope of beginning. With some effort on Russia's part, this plane crash will be the last tragedy associated with the Katyn massacre to trouble Polish-Russian relations. [Update: For a look at the incident from the hopeful angle, see this piece by Polish-born former US Secretary of State Zbigniew Brzezinski: http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20100415/wl_time/08599198193000]

There are still a number of recent world events that I want to comment on, but as this entry is already fairly lengthy, I will split my observations into two parts, and discuss the other events in the second part. Stay tuned.