Media Reports Bo Xilai in Trouble for His Poor Human Rights Record

(Clearwisdom.net) While Bo Xilai was governor of Liaoning Province, it was one of the worst provinces in persecution of Falun Gong. Until December 1, 2003, deaths of 90 Falun Gong practitioners were documented. Bo Xilai's poor human rights record has brought him many "troubles."

Asia Times reported on May 13, "During Bo Xilai visiting the US along with Chinese trade delegation, he was sued by human rights organizations charging him with directing the persecution against Falun Gong when he was mayor of Dalian City and government of Liaoning Province."

The report stated, "Bo Xilai was transferred from the post of Liaoning governor and took the post of Minister of Chinese Commerce. This time when he followed Chinese vice Premier Wu Yi to visit USA, he ran into trouble. Chinese vice Premier Wu Yi visited the USA as Chairman of the 15^th China-America Trade Association. The delegation arrived at Washington DC on April 20. The entourage included Bo Xilai and the director of the Bank of China. The trip was the first time Bo Xilai visited overseas as minister of Commerce. He was served with lawsuit papers on April 22 while entering a hotel to attend a dinner hosted by Wu Yi. He was charged with conducting the persecution against Falun Gong when he was mayor of Dalian City and governor of Liaoning Province."

The report also stated, "As early as March 9 and 10, two non-government organizations in the USA filed a detailed document and a list of 102 people with the US State Department and Department of Homeland Security which requested the US government to take action and prohibit those Chinese officials, listed for their direct participation in the persecution of Falun Gong, their spouses and children from entering the US. The new minister of Chinese Commerce Bo Xilai was on the list."

Actually, looking closer at Bo Xilai, one can easily find that the new minister has been in trouble in recent years. The report stated, "Reporter Jiang Weiping who reported on Bo Xilai's corruption case was sentenced to jail under government charges of 'illegally providing state secrets abroad', 'subverting state power' and 'illegally obtaining state secrets'. Thus, Bo was condemned by international human right organizations."

It was reported that before visiting the US, Bo Xilai planned to visit Germany. But German human rights organizations protested his visit and requested German government to refuse his entry. His visit was postponed as a result.

Falun Gong practitioners' protest only targets those persecutors. The report stated, "It is worth noting that in the affair, Falun Gong practitioners did not target other officials in the Chinese delegation. Only Bo Xilai in the delegation was sued in a US court. A similar situation did not occur during an overseas visit by Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao. During last December, Wen Jiabao visited USA, Falun Gong publicly stated that they would not protest Wen Jiabao."

Currently, the outside view is, "Bo Xilai is just appointed as Minister of Commerce and will have more chances to visit other countries. If he meets similar situations during each visit, it would not be good for him to continue to carry out his duty or for China's image." It is not known if the incident will affect his political career. But some one predicted that Bo Xilai would follow the trail of former Speaker of Chinese People's Congress, Li Peng, and his foreign affair activities would be affected by foreign non-government organizations to some extent.
Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2004/5/14/74637.html

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