Platform for a killer
The news that Myanmar's Senior General Min Aung Hlaing will attend the Asean summit in Jakarta is distressing news, not only for the suffering people of Myanmar, but for the credibility -- or what is left of it -- of Asean itself.
By giving this mass murderer a platform at the summit, Asean is giving de facto recognition to a regime that since it illegally seized power on Feb 1 has killed more than 700 of its own citizens, and the bodycount continues to rise.
Prime Minister Prayat Chan-o-cha and Min Aung Hlaing are too much like kindred spirits for anyone to expect Thailand to take a stand on this issue.
But how about Indonesia taking a stand and refusing to allow this tyrant to land on its territory? Or other members of Asean who might have with some some remnants of dignity of propriety left, boycotting the summit.
What should happen is that representatives of the shadow NUG should be invited to the summit. They have far more legitimacy as representatives of the Myanmar people than Min Aung Hlaing.
David Brown
Radiating fear
We live in a nuclear-powered universe and nuclear radiation is all around all the time. There is additional radiation measured in sea water from Fukushima but the levels are extremely low compared to natural sources.
It is important for people to understand that low levels of radiation don't affect us because we're exposed to it all the time. This is a communication problem, not a public health problem. Discharges from Fukushima will not affect anyone healthwise and there are reports that surfers have returned to the area.
It is important to know that prior to 2011, there was already cesium-137 in the ocean remaining from atmospheric nuclear weapons testing that peaked in the 1960s. Today, levels above 2.0 becquerels per cubic metre (Bq/m3) in the surface ocean, indicate additional cesium from the Japanese releases. Levels are still well below regulatory limits of 7,400 Bq/m3 set for drinking water (US EPA).
By my calculations, even if levels increased to 10 Bq/m3, swimming eight hours every day for an entire year, would only increase one's annual dose by an amount 1,000 times less than a single dental X-ray.
The marine biosphere is much less sensitive to radioactive contamination than the terrestrial biosphere. This is due to: (1) shielding by water, (2) the huge mass and volume available for dilution and (3) suppression by non-radioactive isotopes that are omnipresent in seawater in high concentrations. Natural radioactivity, notably from polonium, is a much larger contributor to the radiation dose of sea life and indirectly also to humans.
Tony Margetts
Virtually impersonal
Re: "Familiar places gone but not forgotten", (Roger Crutchley, BP, April 15).
If anything, the new technologies and tools have transformed the music industry to an extent that Crutch does not need to buy anything from any store located in exotic Thai sois. Just opening up a browser and YouTube will open up the infinite world of music and entertainment.
New technologies have diminished physical spaces. Now we need not go to go any shop, just go to the cloud. If anything, the Covid crisis has destroyed everything, the bakery, book and drug stores, record shops and travel agencies.
In the end, our own lives will either be suspended or grounded in the cloud. Sadly, real-life will be filled with virtual spaces.
I am not sure if massage parlours will survive without foreign punters and patrons with fat purses. In normal times we often used the phrase "familiarity breeds contempt" but now the Covid crisis has diminished our contempt and heightened our sense of loss" the loss of proximity, familiarity and human touch.
KULDEEP NAGI
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