(Clearwisdom.net) Since July, 1999, millions of Falun Gong practitioners have become the targets of a massive persecution under the Chinese Communist Party. While the CCP mobilized its entire propaganda machinery to defame Falun Gong, it stops at nothing in torturing Falun Gong practitioners to give up their beliefs. Hundreds of torture methods have been used on Falun Gong practitioners. Among the tens of thousands of torture cases collected from China, one particular group stands out: those taking place in medical facilities, including hospitals and mental institutions, where lives are supposed to be saved, and where the doctors and nurses who are supposed to safeguard lives have become accomplices in the crimes.
Falun Gong Human Rights Working Group has compiled 1089 cases detailing psychiatric tortures and over 200 hospitals that have participated in the medical tortures. These cases are by no means exclusive, but they do showcase the vast and extensive nature of the persecution.
Judicial psychiatry against religious or political dissidents is emphatically prohibited by internationally agreed-upon standards of legal and medical ethics. The exposure of political and abusive psychiatry in the former Soviet Union was once a major human rights concern. It eventually forced the withdrawal of the Soviet All-Union Society of Psychiatrists and Neuropathologists from the World Psychiatric Association.
Since July 1999, however, Falun Gong practitioners have been sending substantial and detailed reports on the incarceration and violent abuse of thousands of peaceful Falun Gong practitioners in psychiatric hospitals by the Chinese government. These reports have exposed the Chinese government's systematic exploitation of psychiatry for despotic repression. The abuse far exceeds in scope and severity even that of the former Soviet Union. After the 11 years of persecution of Falun Gong, this practice of medical torture has been extended to those who the government deems destabilizing factors of the communist party, such as those who appeal their plights to the central government, or human rights defenders.
During the 13th session of the UN Human Rights Council Conference held in Geneva, the United Nations Association of San Diego, together with the Conscience Foundation and Falun Gong Human Rights Working Group submitted the compiled cases to UN Human Rights Council and asked the special rapporteur on torture to pay attention to these grave human rights violations.
Introduction
Before your eyes is a document that no one should have seen, because what it reports are cruelties and sinister events that should never have happened. Unfortunately, they are happening in mainland China on a large scale and on a regular basis.
On July 20, 1999, the Chinese government launched a barbaric persecution against 100 million Falun Gong practitioners, and announced that "No measures are too excessive against Falun Gong,"
The torture methods used are only limited by their decadent imaginations, and the amount of pain inflicted is limited only by the victims' deaths.
Failing to break the will of Falun Gong practitioners with physical torture, the Chinese authorities have escalated the use of nerve damaging chemicals to directly destroy their capacity to hold thoughts and conscience. This horrifying, mind-destroying psychiatric torture has caused hundreds to become insane. The use of other harmful chemicals have also paralyzed and killed many Falun Gong practitioners. Due to the Chinese government's blockade of information, the atrocities are feared to be even more extensive.
The report has also cited over two hundred hospitals that have taken part in the administration of harmful chemicals. In addition, medical professionals also advise and assist medical torture in detention centers and labor camps. In his report of his visit to China, Prof. Nowak noted that 8% of alleged torture in China has happened in psychiatric hospitals. All this highlights the widespread use of psychiatric torture in China. Moreover, Special Rapporteurs Jahangir and Nowak have also repeatedly requested China to explain the allegation of organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners. All this raises a serious question of the role of medical professionals in human rights violations.
We ask the world to first of all ban these doctors who have participated in such crimes. Second in our report, we have listed over 200 hospitals that have participated in such mind-destroying practices. This information is only a fraction of what we have now, but it is enough to show how widespread psychiatric torture is in China. We will ask that reputable journals not allow publications from these hospitals. We must hold these individuals, including the doctors participating in such tortures and the presidents of the hospitals, personally accountable for what they have done.