Some Good News from South Asia

First, a major milestone in polio eradication has been reached in India; the country has gone a full year without a reported case of the disease. The Indian government worked closely with local religious leaders to spread the message and increase cultural acceptance of vaccination. The World Health Organization and Sabin Vaccine Institute are hopeful this strategy can be copied in central Asia and in west and central Africa, where polio is still endemic.

But perhaps the even bigger story is the continuing democratic reforms in Burma. The reforms began after elections in 2010. Though there were widespread charges of fraud and the election was boycotted by Aung San Suu Kyi's National League for Democracy (NLD), Burma's military junta ceded some of its power to the new Parliament.

Suu Kyi was freed from house arrest in November 2010 and is running for Parliament in upcoming elections. Laws censoring the press have been relaxed and websites like Youtube have been unblocked. Construction of the controversial Myitsone Dam in northern Burma, which would endanger the Kachin people's cultural identity and (seeing as it's located near a major fault line) their lives, has been suspended. The government has signed a cease-fire with Karen insurgents in the east. Political prisoners, including student protesters from 1988 and Buddhist monks from 2007's "saffron revolution," have been released in two batches, first in September 2011 and then again this month.

The U.S. has been engaging with the Burmese government. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited the country after the first batch of political prisoners was released. After the second, the U.S. announced that it would exchange ambassadors with Burma for the first time since 1990. The Obama Administration should be lauded for how they have handled the situation, though reforms have resulted more from conditions on the ground than diplomatic engagement.

So why has the Burmese government started these reforms? Partly there is a desire to ease Western sanctions, which have restricted travel of prominent members of the regime, frozen their assets, and limited foreign investment in the country. More importantly, argues Marie Lall of the University of London, is the government's desire to chair the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in 2014 and for greater economic integration with the rest of the ASEAN community.

Whatever the reason, let's hope that Burma continues down the path of democratic reform.