Now, the question facing people in and out of Burma is how to redress the country's climate of chronic abuse. The Tribunal's modest contribution is to highlight two social trends which, although alluded to frequently, have generally received less concentration than they deserve. Each seriously affects the health and freedom of millions throughout the country. Both are staple issues in the search for human rights and democracy. Furthermore, food scarcity and militarization pervade at the local, regional and national levels, powerfully influencing politics, economy and culture.
Food is the most basic economic right.
Food is universal, transcending class, race and creed. Similarly, freedom from hunger is a universal wish native to human experience. By choosing to investigate the right to food, the Tribunal affirms this universality. Emphasizing food also clarifies the difference between campaigning for human rights and campaigning for political change, two related but separate agenda. One easily loses this distinction because Burma's odious government seems to embody everything a state should not be at the close of the twentieth century.