Monitoring the Falun Gong Human Rights Crisis in China
Center for Investigative Reporting: "Beijing Olympic Chief Linked to Torture"
April 24, 2008 -- "The president of Beijing's Olympic Organizing
Committee was once found liable for torture in a U.S. federal court, a review of
court records by the Center for Investigative Reporting has found."
"...In an extensive legal opinion, the U.S. District Court in San Francisco
determined in 2004 that Liu Qi was responsible for the illegal detention and
torture of two Chinese nationals and a sexual assault against a French woman in
China....The lawsuit alleged that as mayor, Liu directed security forces to
violently crush the Falun Gong. The plaintiffs claimed that Liu's forces
subjected them to severe beatings, sexual abuse and 'electric shocks through
needles placed in [the] body.'"
For more information visit: http://centerforinvestigativereporting.org/node/3625
For a summary of the case and relevant legal documents visit: http://www.cja.org/cases/liuqi.shtml
15-Year-Old Orphaned as Mother Dies in Custody for Practicing Falun Gong
May 8, 2008 -- The Falun Dafa Information Center has learned of
the death of Falun Dafa practitioner Ms. Zhou Huimin (???), based on reports
from her son and corroborated by sources from within China. Ms. Zhou passed away
at Qingyang District People's Hospital in Chengdu city, Sichuan province on
March 15, 2008. She was 44 years old.
"Just a few days ago, I turned 15. [Also] just a few days ago, my kind and
healthy mother was tortured to death," wrote Zhou Hanyang, the son of Zhou
Huimin, in a letter received by the FDIC last month. "During the 198 days since
my mother was arrested, we worried and feared for her day and night. With great
sorrow, I remember the days I spent together with my mother and mourn her."
Full story: http://www.faluninfo.net/displayAnArticle.asp?ID=9521
MSNBC: China's Organ Harvesting Questioned Again by UN Special Rapporteurs
May 8, 2008 -- Two United Nations Special Rapporteurs have
reiterated their previous findings on China's organ harvesting. Once again, they
requested the Chinese government to fully explain the allegation of taking vital
organs from Falun Gong practitioners and the source of organs for the sudden
increase in organ transplants that has been going on in China since the year
2000.
Citing recently published 2008 annual reports of the UN Special Rapporteurs, the
Falun Gong Human Rights Working Group (FalunHR) applauds the joint request that
Ms. Asma Jahangir and Mr. Manfred Nowak, the UN Special Rapporteurs on Freedom
of Religion or Belief and on the Question of Torture, sent to the Chinese
government.
Full story: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24516546/
April 8, 2008 -- Yang Xiaojing, the wife of prisoner of
conscience Cao Dong, published a letter addressed to the international
community. Cao is a Falun Gong practitioner who was sentenced to five years in
prison for meeting with European Parliament Vice-President Edward McMillan Scott
in Beijing to discuss rights abuses.
"...right after his meeting with Edward McMillan-Scott, [Cao] was arrested and
detained in the Beijing Security Bureau Detention Center. He was handcuffed to a
chair for more than a month. The cruel torture caused massive hemorrhaging in
his stomach," writes Yang in the letter.
"...As his wife, I started to look for a defense lawyer for him in August,
2007...I consulted lawyer Li Heping. ...Lawyer Li Heping was beaten up by police
for several hours. All the materials that I gave him were taken away...My home
was ransacked. Although the police didn't find any Falun Gong materials, they
still took me away to a hotel. They interrogated me..."
Complete text of letter: http://www.faluninfo.net/displayAnArticle.asp?ID=9522
Human Rights Watch Report: Lawyers Who Defend Falun Gong Face Harassment
April 29, 2008 -- "Chinese lawyers who take cases seen by the
government as politically sensitive or potentially embarrassing face severe
abuses ranging from harassment to disbarment and physical assaults," Human
Rights Watch said in a new report. Among the cases highlighted in the report
were lawyers such as Gao Zhisheng and Yang Zaixin who had defended Falun Gong
practitioners and subsequently faced threats, disbarment, beatings, and/or
detention.
"...On October 19, 2005, one day after Gao [Zhisheng] published a scathing open
letter to the top state leaders about abuses against religious and Falun Gong
practitioners, he received an anonymous threat by phone: 'We know where you live
and we know where your daughter goes to school.' The next day Gao and his wife
verified that their 12-year-old daughter was indeed followed by plainclothes
police officers..." (pg. 34)
"...An attorney from impoverished Guangxi province, Yang Zaixin, was dismissed
from his law firm in January 2006 after he took a series of sensitive cases,
including those of defendants accused of being members of the banned Falun Gong."
(pg 48)
For more information visit: http://www.hrw.org/english/docs/2008/04/28/china18656.htm
USA Today: "In
China, a battle over web censorship"; Falun Gong adherents among 'hacktivists'
cracking 'Great Firewall'
April 23, 2008 -- "If an Internet user in China searches for the word 'persecution',
he or she is likely to come up with a link to a blank screen that says 'page
cannot be displayed.'"
"...It's a reflection of the stifling, bizarre and sometimes dangerous world of
Internet censorship in China....Fighting the censors every step of the way is an
army of self-described 'hacktivists' such as Bill Xia, a Chinese-born software
engineer who lives in North Carolina...Invoking the hit science-fiction movie
The Matrix, Xia has compared what he does to giving Chinese Web surfers a 'red
pill' that lets them see reality for the first time..."
"...Xia admits he had little interest in politics until the Chinese government
banned the spiritual group Falun Gong in 1999 and started persecuting its
members. Xia is a member of the group."
Full story: http://www.usatoday.com/printedition/news/20080423/1a_cover23.art.htm
FOR MORE INFORMATION, PLEASE CONTACT THE FALUN DAFA
INFORMATION CENTER- Contacts: Gail Rachlin 917-757-9780, Levi Browde
646-415-0998, Erping Zhang 646-533-6147, or Joel Chipkar 416-709-8678. Email: contact@faluninfo.net,
Website: http://www.faluninfo.net/