Protect our migrant workers

In 2015, we witnessed the ghastly experiences of thousands of Bangladeshi migrants, rescued from the death traps set by the human traffickers in the Bay of Bengal. After the rescue of thousands of trafficking victims and the discovery of corpses of ill-fated Bangladeshis and Rohingya people in Thailand and Malaysia, the issue finally drew the attention of the national and international media. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), International Organisation for Migration (IOM), the UN's Human Rights body, the USA, the UK and many other organisations and countries put a strong emphasis on the need to hunt down the traffickers and dismantle the Southeast Asian anti-trafficking network.

Unfortunately, our government seems to have forgotten that trafficking has ruined the lives of thousands of migrants and their families in Bangladesh. Traffickers from Bangladesh, Myanmar, Thailand and Malaysia have allegedly been running their activities in the sea routes based in the Bay and Andaman Sea. They have been targeting unsuspecting jobseekers from poor countries like Bangladesh and Myanmar to realise ransoms from their families. The traffickers use any means possible to compel the victims and their families to pay ransoms -- by confining them under the platforms of wooden boats floating in the seas or in the dark jungles in Thai-Malaysia borders.

Traffickers have been running this slave trade for several years with the assistance of government officials of the Southeast Asian countries. A BBC reporter found that people of almost all sections in South Thailand were directly or indirectly involved in trafficking. (Courtesy of The Daily Star)

Lessons From -- Surprise -- Burma

As the holiday lull ends and American presidential campaigns ramp up, it's a good time to look at the example of a leader in another part of the world: Burma.

Why Burma? Burma (renamed Myanmar by military rulers), is where Aung San Suu Kyi is preparing for her party to assume leadership in Parliament in March. Her National League for Democracy swept an astonishing 78 percent of the seats in fall elections.
One can only imagine the joy, relief and exhaustion the Nobel laureate must have felt, having led the struggle against military rule since 1989. She spent 15 of those years under house arrest.
It's instructive to note some of the first things the democracy leader did after the election victory:

First, she spent time meditating. She took time to calm her thoughts and restore her energy after months of expending herself on the campaign trail. Leaders who are pulled a hundred different directions by advisers, supplicants and commentators need time to think deeply and "fill the well." They seldom get the time. They should insist on it. (Courtesy of Huffington Post)