Don't let Burma down again

Zalmar Khalizad, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, in an address to the Security Council Friday, quoted the challenging words of a Burmese exile who spent 15 years in the "hell" of the military regime's prisons: "The world was not watching in 1988 when thousands were killed by the guns of the regime. They are watching now. The people of Burma must not be let down."

The world failed the Burmese people in 1988. At least 3,000 peaceful protesters were slaughtered. It is not an acceptable excuse to say that because there were no vivid video clips of the massacre and no urgent Internet messages the major nations did not know what was going on. The problem then, as it is today, was that the leaders of the democratic, civilized world did not know what to do to stop tyrannical generals from unleashing deadly violence on innocent people. The problem is compounded by the shocking truth that major nations with long histories of repression don't want to offend a kindred regime.

Indignation at the sight of troops shooting into crowds of unarmed protesters may be greater this time because the brutality of the generals could be watched, but the methods used by the military to retain power and crush the nonviolent opposition were to be expected.

Ambassador Khalizad was not telling the diplomats at the U.N. anything new when he said that the U.S. was appalled by the brutal repression and that "it should be unacceptable to powers with influence over Burma, to regional states, and, indeed, to all of us in this room."

The bland answer of Wang Guangya, China's ambassador to the United Nations, was that "the situation in Myanmar is calming down recently" and that it "does not pose any threat to international or regional peace and security" that would call for Security Council action. That view was echoed by Russia.

Most of the brutality is now out of sight following the Internet cut off. Hundreds of monks have been rounded up and imprisoned along with civilian protesters. On Monday a BBC correspondent who spent three days undercover in Rangoon met two fugitive monks and was told that the army had disposed of the bodies of monks killed during the crackdown by burning them in the local crematorium.

The world has watched all this, but have consciences been touched by the horror? Ambassador Khalizad appealed to the United Nations to stand with the people of Burma and help achieve a transition from dictatorship and repression to reconciliation and democracy. If the Burmese regime does not respond constructively, said the ambassador, the Security Council must impose additional sanctions. "We must all be prepared to consider measures, such as arms embargoes to incentivize the regime to cooperate" he said.

Now the world is watching the United Nations, fearing that its collective nature will mean that it will again fail the Burmese people.