MPs Shocked as Practitioners Expose Details of the Persecution in China to the Canadian Parliament (Photos)
By Ying Xin
(Clearwisdom.net) On May 27, 2009, MPs Scott Reid and Irwin Cotler and
other MPs from four major parties hosted a China Human Rights Forum in the
Canadian Parliament. More than ten MPs and senators, dozens of reporters, and
non-government organization representatives attended the forum. Six experts and
witnesses talked about human rights violations in China from different angles. The witnesses and experts gave speeches on how Chinese prison products affect
the Canadian people, the effect of China's large-scale human rights violations
on Canadian families, the CCP's harvesting of organs from living Falun Gong
practitioners, and China's Internet censorship. Senators Consiglio Di Nino (first from left),
Peter Kent (second from left), Keith Martin (second from right), and Devinder
Shory (first from right) in the forum. Mr. Shiyu Zhou, the Deputy Director of the Global Internet
Freedom Consortium, pointed out, "The Chinese authorities started Internet
censorship as soon as the Internet became popular. The battle over the Internet
has intensified since 1999 after the suppression of Falun Gong started." Mr. David Kilgour said, "In China, only Falun Gong
inmates in the camps are used as a live organ bank to be pillaged for sales to
foreigners." MPs Rob Anders (left) and Larry Bagnell (middle) Falun Gong practitioner Yufei Song describes her suffering in
a forced labor camp Forced labor Mr. Kilgour, a former MP and Secretary of State for Asia Pacific, said in his
speech, "As we approach the 20th anniversary of the Tiananmen Massacre and
10 full years since the merciless persecution of Falun Gong began, I feel
compelled to use my limited time today on these issues, despite those who say
any criticism of China's party-state should be muted during the present world
economic crisis." After reviewing the CCP's Tiananmen Massacre twenty years ago, Mr. Kilgour
said, "To divert the ensuing international outcry and re-assert its claim
to legitimacy, which was effectively nullified worldwide by the massacre, the
Party turned its attention towards economic growth. In short order, China was
refashioned into the world's factory, churning out low-cost, often unsafe,
consumer items made by women and men enjoying minimal work safety and virtually
no social programs, pensions or environmental standards. This included prisoners
of conscience who toil without any pay in forced labor camps." He continued, "Forced labor as a consequence of human trafficking is all
too common in many parts of the world today, but only the party-state of China
uses it to punish and suppress Chinese citizens for political dissent or
religious beliefs. Any Chinese national can be sent to a camp without any form
of trial for up to four years upon committal by a simple police signature. "Since the 1950s, a vast network of labor camps has existed. In the
estimated 340 camps across China as of 2005, up to 300,000 'workers' toil in
inhuman conditions for up to sixteen hours daily without pay, producing a wide
range of consumer products, mostly for export in violation of World Trade
Organization rules." Practitioner Yufei Song told about her suffering in a forced labor camp:
"I was forced to do hard labor, including packaging disposable chopsticks,
making Motorola V70 mobile phone promotion brochures, and making candles for
export to Germany. I was forced to get up at 6 a.m. and work until 10 p.m. All
those under 55 years old were forced to wrap over 7000 pairs of chopsticks and
those over 55 were forced to wrap over 5000 pairs of chopsticks each day. Some
old ladies working slowly would be forced to continue till midnight or 1:00 a.m.
till it was done. "Fifty days later I was taken to the Beijing Women's Forced Labor Camp.
About seven hundred Falun Gong practitioners were being held there--they took
about 80 percent of the total detainees there." Harvesting of organs from living Falun Gong practitioners Mr. Kilgour said, "In China, only Falun Gong inmates in the camps are
used as a live organ bank to be pillaged for sales to foreigners. Medical
testing is required before organs can be matched with recipients, but only Falun
Gong prisoners in the camp populations are tested medically on a regular
basis." Mr. Matas, the other author of the investigation report on the CCP's live
organ harvesting, said at the forum, "Once the practice
of Falun Gong was banned in 1999, hundreds of thousands of Falun Gong
practitioners travelled to Beijing to protest or to unfurl banners calling for
the group's legalization. People came almost daily. By the end of April 2001
there had been approximately 830,000 arrests in Beijing of Falun Gong adherents
who had been identified. The extremely large group of people subject to the
exercise of the whims and power of the state, without recourse to any form of
protection of their rights, provides a potential source for organ harvesting of
the unwilling." Michelle Zhang spoke at the forum by telling how her family in China, almost
all of whom practiced Falun Gong, endured ongoing persecution. "I never
imagined that I would lose three of my most beloved family members within a few
years," she said. Shortly after Falun Gong was banned in China in 1999, Ms.
Zhang's brother-in-law, Songtao Zou, was detained for appealing to the Beijing
Central Petition Office for his constitutional right to practice the spiritual
discipline. His daughter was born while he was imprisoned. Though eventually
released, he was detained twice more and died in prison in November 2000.
Without asking the family's permission, prison authorities cremated Songtao's
body. According to the Falun Dafa Information Center, more than 87,000 cases of
torture have been collected and more than 200,000 practitioners have been sent
to prison or labor camps and over a million for different length of time in
various detentions. More than 3,200 practitioners have been tortured to death,
including 104 last year, before the Olympics. Mr. Wenyu Liu, a PhD student at the University of Calgary, graduated from
Tsinghua University in Beijing. He said, "It is painful to recall the
persecution I suffered in China. For the three years that I was jailed, the
police repeatedly beat me, shocked me with electric batons, and threatened to
kill me. When being shocked, my heart froze and the smell of burning flesh
filled the room. The feeling was something I never want to recall. They also
deprived me of sleep for many nights in order to break my will." Mr. Liu's wife, Yao Yue, a practitioner from Tsinghua, was sentenced to
twelve years. Mr. Liu said, "Today, my wife is suffering continuous abuse,
brainwashing, and heavy labor in Beijing Women's Prison. She requested
communication with me, but was not allowed. Her parents told me her health is in
poor. From the age of 28 to 36 she has served almost nine years in jail. She has
had the best years of her life stolen from her by this evil regime. I miss her
very, very much. My schoolmate Yu Ping, a former PhD student, was sent to a
labor camp in April, 2008. My friend Zheng Xujun also a former PhD student, was
sent to a labor camp in February 2008. These cases took place right before the
Beijing Olympic Games." Internet censorship Mr. Shiyu Zhou, the Deputy Director of Global Internet Freedom Consortium,
pointed out, "The Chinese authorities started Internet censorship as soon
as the Internet became popular. The battle over the Internet has intensified
since 1999 after the suppression of Falun Gong started." "The CCP
regime co-opted North American companies such as Cisco and Nortel to create an
Internet that is fully censored and monitored." Ms. Song said, "In December 2001 I posted on the Beijing University
Internet Bulletin Board System an article revealing that the self-immolation
incident was a set up by the government to frame Falun Gong. Since China's
Bulletin Board Systems were under the control of the regime, Chinese police
found out my IP address with the Internet surveillance system and arrested me on
the morning of December 25, 2001." Mr. Liu stated, "After almost one year of abuse and detention, the
Beijing Intermediate Court subjected six Falun Gong practitioners, including my
wife and me, to a show trial. We were accused of downloading information about
Falun Gong from the Internet and spreading it and hanging up Falun Gong banners.
At the end of the show trial, my wife was sentenced to twelve years in prison,
and I was sentenced to three years. Other fellow practitioners were sentenced to
11, 10, 9 and 5 years. Amnesty International reported on this case in
2002." Commerce at the cost of human rights is inappropriate MP Scott Reid, the host of the event, said the fact that China's communist
regime was making money from persecuting Falun Gong practitioners was especially
disturbing, "The worst forms of human rights abuses are those which are
economically sustainable. Abusing human rights on a mass scale is an immense
proposition. It requires a lot of money and vast resources and therefore it can
only be perpetuated in the long term when it becomes self-financing. That was
certainly the key of the SS system that was used to exploit and profitably
destroy the Jewish population." Mr. Kilgour said in his conclusion, "As the world experiences the
economic crisis and seeks China's cooperation in dealing with its challenges, it
is tempting to overlook Beijing's human rights record. We must remind our
leaders that to equivocate on China's record here is a departure from Canada's
own values of human dignity and rule of law. We must caution them that trade
with China at any price is costly both for the people of China and the people of
the world. We must remember the sacrifices of victims of the massacre and other
abuses. We must demand that, instead of mocking the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights, China should honor its provisions."
Ms. Zhang's mother died as a result of torture, while her sister disappeared
after being arrested. Police denied detaining Ms. Zhang's sister and Ms. Zhang
is now almost certain her sister is one of the 46,000 Falun Gong practitioners
believed to have been killed for their organs.
A challenge to human morality
Chinese version available at
http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2009/5/28/201798.html
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