Bangladesh Donates to Katrina Relief
As it Battles Terrorism, Extremism at Home
by Michael Coleman
Of all the world’s inhabitants, few can empathize as deeply with the victims of Hurricane Katrina as the people of Bangladesh.
The South Asian nation is one of the most natural disaster-prone places on earth, having lost hundreds of thousands of lives to floods and cyclones, droughts, tidal surges, tornadoes and even cold spells.
So when Shamsher M. Chowdhury, Bangladesh’s ambassador in Washington, first heard of the devastation that Katrina inflicted along America’s Gulf Coast, his first impulse was empathy. His second was generosity.
Chowdhury and Bangladeshi Prime Minister Begum Khaleda Zia quickly announced the donation of $1 million to the Hurricane Katrina relief fund, no small change for one of the poorest nations on the planet. Perhaps more important, the trusted U.S. ally also offered its expertise in the actual recovery work, making military doctors and construction engineers available for the relief and rebuilding efforts in New Orleans and elsewhere.
“We are not the richest country, but the important thing is that we, having suffered so many catastrophes of this nature ourselves, know what it really takes to provide relief,” Chowdhury said in a
recent interview. “This is really something we thought we should do.”
The most recent cyclone to devastate Bangladesh, in 1991, killed about 140,000 people, many of them women and children. In 1988, a devastating flood left millions of Bangladeshis homeless. One of the cruelest natural disasters in modern world history, a 1970 cyclone, killed an estimated half-million Bangladeshis. In fact, the nation endures an average of 16 cyclones per decade.
Although Bangladesh has certainly suffered, it has also reacted. The nation of 144 million has been singled out by international relief agencies as having made terrific progress in dealing with natural disasters.
The 2002 World Disasters Report, compiled by the Red Crescent Societies and International Federation of the Red Cross, singled out Bangladesh for praise. It said the construction of cyclone shelters and drastically improved evacuation techniques have made it much less likely that scores of Bangladeshis will be wiped out by the next natural disaster.
Chowdhury said he was in Miami visiting a major annual gathering of Bangladeshis who live in the United States when he first got news of Katrina’s wrath. In addition to coordinating the official $1 million gift from his government, he urged his countrymen in attendance at the conference to give as well.
“I told them the American people have helped us in the past when we have suffered in huge ways, and it’s time we return some of that with gratitude,” Chowdhury recalled. “I told them cough up whatever you have.
“I didn’t set a figure but asked for whatever they could give.”
Chowdhury, a former military officer who fought in Bangladesh’s war of independence and later entered the Foreign Service in 1975, also offered words of encouragement for those affected by the Katrina disaster. “Never lose hope; this cannot be the end of the world,” he said. “This is a very bad experience, suffering of this magnitude. But have faith in God and have confidence in yourself, and I’m sure this society will bounce back from this.
“With the kind of determination and character the American people have, and indeed with the government’s support, they will bounce back,” Chowdhury said.
And the career diplomat had one final piece of advice for Americans regarding the disaster on the Gulf Coast: Don’t waste too much time assigning blame for the less-than-impressive initial disaster relief, at least until after the suffering has been ameliorated.
“One shouldn’t hurry into judgment on these things because it is always difficult to respond to a calamity of this magnitude to the satisfaction of everyone affected,” Chowdhury said.
Bangladesh itself fortunately hasn’t been in the news for cyclones or floods lately, but it has been victimized by another scourge: terrorism. On Aug. 17, more than 400 small bombs exploded almost simultaneously in just about every district of the country. Two people were killed and more than 100 were injured in the attack on the world’s third-most populous Muslim nation.
Police in Bangladesh arrested a well-known Islamic cleric, Moulana Fariduddin Masud, in connection with the bombings. Masud was once head of the state-run Islamic Foundation. Authorities also detained more than 150 other suspects in the attacks.
“Bangladesh is a moderate Muslim country and there is no scope for practicing extremism in the name of Islam,” Prime Minister Zia said shortly after the bombings.
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