by Mat Churchill

The major focus of news services around Australia in the past two weeks has been the tragic Pike River coal mine disaster in New Zealand where 29 men, including two Australians, died after a huge blast trapped the workers.

In Australia there was a massive outpouring of grief and support for our neighbours across the ditch, and rightfully so.

We can only imagine the awful wait the miners' families had to endure, the frustration of a delayed rescue attempt due to safety concerns of those who volunteered to enter the toxic mine, and then the inevitability of the loss after another explosion which many reports said was bigger than the first.

Something occurred to me while watching and reading these reports, and that was how little media attention is given to disasters of this kind, as well as natural disasters, that happen around the world on a seemingly weekly basis.

In China, for example, over 2,600 coal miners were killed just last year due to blasts, floods, and other accidents. Earlier this year an explosion in a coal mine in central China killed 47, 19 more than in New Zealand.

An earthquake in Sumatra five weeks ago created a tsunami that hit the Mentawai Islands, killing at least 435 people, and displacing 20,000 more. Just last week landslides and floods killed 21 people Venezuela.

I didn't even know any of this had happened.

And it's not just acts of nature or horrible accidents that are being overlooked. Governments are responsible for killing innocent people in the ten's of thousands without as much as a headline being dedicated to it.The Iraq war has claimed at least 100,000 civilian lives. Regardless of the reasons for the war, is it acceptable we don't hear more about this?

Back to China who's government is responsible for the deaths of over one million Tibetans over the past 50 or so years, and an ongoing cultural genocide to which the world casts a blind eye. Again, nothing.

But do I seek out more information after seeing a ten second grab on the nightly news of real people struggling for their lives, wedged somewhere between Madonna's new adopted child and American scientists finding a cure for being red heade d? Rarely.

I suppose I'm getting away from my original point; why is it that events closer to home have a bigger influence on what we see, especially when these events are often dwarfed by others occurring around the world?

Perhaps my head is too deeply buried in the Four Mile Beach sand, or my dedication to watching at least one episode of The Simpsons every night for the past 20 years when I should be watching the news means I'm out of touch.

I'd be keen to hear your thoughts.