The year 2012 marks the 50th anniversary of the end of the Great Chinese Famine, recorded by Beijing as lasting from 1958 to 1961, but actually extending from 1958 to 1962.  The death of at least 40 million Chinese were not caused by bad weather or foreign plots, but by Mao’s unfeasible and reckless agricultural policies during the so-called Great Leap Forward.  As human history’s most fatal famine, its death toll exceeded that of both World Wars combined.

The Chinese government has consistently withheld records of the mass devastation, twisting history to shift the blame off of the Communist Party.  Half a century later, as the voices of the victims of the Great Famine disappear one by one, it is up to us to ensure this tragedy is not forgotten.   For this reason, the Laogai Research Foundation and the Heritage Foundation’s Asian Studies Center are holding a special international conference entitled “The World’s Greatest Famine: Witnessing, Surviving, Remembering“. Remaining survivors of the Great Famine will share their harrowing stories, never before heard outside of China, while Great Famine experts will present their latest research on the tragedy.

Agenda

DAY 1

Heritage Foundation, 15 February, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m

Allison Auditorium, 7th floor, 214 Massachusetts Ave. NE, Washington, DC 20002

INTRODUCTION: Harry Wu, LRF Executive Director

SESSION 1:       Chinese expert (name to be published upon exiting China)

SESSION 2:      Jasper Becker, author of Hungry Ghosts

LIGHT LUNCH

REMARKS:        Lee Edwards, Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation

SESSION 3:      Frank Dikötter, author of Mao’s Great Famine author

SESSION 4:        Panel Discussion of Great Famine survivors & researchers

Please RSVP on Heritage’s event page.

Invite your friends on Facebook!

U.S. FILM PREMIERE of MAO’S GREAT FAMINE 

Laogai Museum, 15 February, 6-7 p.m.

PRODUCED BY:    Arturo Mio

DIRECTED BY:    Patrick Cabouat and Philippe Grangereau

FEATURING:       Frank Dikötter, author of Mao’s Great Famine

Please RSVP by emailing laogai@laogai.org with your full name and affiliation.

DAY 2

Laogai Museum, 16 February, 10 a.m. – 4 p.m.

INTRODUCTION: Harry Wu, LRF Executive Director

SESSION 1:       Chinese experts (names to be published upon exiting China)

SESSION 2:      Alternative views of the Great Famine

LIGHT LUNCH

SESSION 3:      Survivors’ Seminar (in Mandarin Chinese; no translation)

CLOSING REMARKS

Please RSVP by emailing laogai@laogai.org with your full name and affiliation.

Invite your friends on Facebook!

LRF Contact:  Andrew Yang (202) 408-8300

In the opening ceremony on Wednesday morning, President Ma stated proudly that in Taiwan 40-50,000 books had been published in the last year, while 140,000 were published in mainland China in the same time period. Although China published three times as many books, its population is 57 times larger than Taiwan’s, and by comparison, Ma asserted, Taiwan’s publishing industry is much stronger. He urged more cooperation and communication between the publishing industries of Taiwan and China. Harry Wu had the chance to present Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou with a copy of Qincheng Prison, which Ma praised as helping to reveal the dark story of China’s gulag. As President Ma continues to engage in cooperative relations with the PRC, Mr. Wu hopes that Taiwan will not stay silent on these issues due to political pressure.

Check out some photos from the exhibition below:

Laogai Research Foundation’s booth, Hall 1, A806, Taipei World Trade Center

Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou participates in the opening ceremony of the 20th Taipei International Book Exhibition.

Harry introuduces Laogai Research Foundation’s most recent publications, Qincheng Prison and If It Is for Freedom.

The press conference will take place on January 18th at 1:00 pm, in the Bloomberg Room at The National Press Club 14th St. NW, 13th Floor,  Washington, DC 20045.

To find out more, please see our press conference webpage or contact the Laogai Research Foundation at 202.408.8300 x300 or laogai@laogai.org.

After offering a basket of white roses, Harry makes the traditional bows before the portrait of the deceased.

Laogai Research Foundation founder and executive director Harry Wu paid a visit today to the Czech Embassy in Washington, DC, to offer condolences on the death of Vaclav Havel.  The former president of the Czech Republic passed away on Saturday, 17 December 2012.  Harry was saddened to hear of the death of such an advocate for truth, democracy and human rights.  They had met several times and shared a passionate commitment to exposing the crimes of Communist regimes and liberating their populations.

For the full story and photos, please click here to reach the Laogai Research Foundation’s blogpost.

The report trumpets that “in 2011, Cisco was included on Ethisphere’s list of the World’s Most Ethical Companies for the fourth consecutive year,” but the Laogai Research Foundation questions the ethics of its self-enriching deals with the People’s Republic of China.  Several articles from Cisco’s Chinese website clearly indicate the high degree of cooperation between the American tech giant and China’s Ministry of Public Security.

According to Vice-Chairman of China operations Zhang Sihua, Cisco directly cooperated with the Ministry on the construction of the Golden Shield Project, also known as the Great Firewall of China, which strengthened China’s vast censorship apparatus.  Similarly, a 2004 Cisco publication on China’s second-generation ID cards announced that “the backbone of the Public Security system is predominately made up of Cisco networking equipment.”

According to Cisco, its Corporate Social Responsibility Report  “includes an expanded discussion of human rights and the Internet, including specific steps the company has taken to address these concerns. The report reiterates Cisco’s commitment to selling products that are built to global standards and its opposition to government efforts to fragment the Internet or undermine freedom of expression.”  Contrary to these claims, Cisco is actually providing the very means to insulate Chinese Internet users from the benefits of global online freedom.

The report goes on to proclaim the company’s committal “to protecting the health and well-being of its employees and using its collaborative technology to offer people the freedom to chose how, when and where they work.”  This philosophy, guiding the management of Cisco factories and offices in China, is in stark contrast with the philosophy guiding the Laogai system that Cisco technology is aiding to fill up with prisoners.  Thousands of Chinese political dissidents, human rights activists and religious practitioners, including members of Falun Gong, have been silenced, disappeared, jailed, or executed, thanks to Cisco-provided network surveillance equipment.  Chinese Cisco employees enjoy the freedom to “chose how, when and where they work,” while innocent dissidents, the target of China’s implementation of Cisco technology, are imprisoned and relegated to camps alongside common criminals, who may be forced to labor every day.

Not only has Cisco been proven to have contributed to the Great Firewall of China, but also to the Peaceful Chongqing Project (exposed in a July 2011 Wall Street Journal article).  Chongqing, one of China’s most populous cities, will soon be monitored by a citywide network of 500,000 cameras, the world’s most ambitious surveillance system, and Chinese security company Hikvision Digital Technology has commissioned Cisco to provide the technology.  Cisco spokespersons have insisted that the company “hasn’t sold video cameras or video-surveillance solutions in any of our public infrastructure projects in China,” but it has not denied selling networking equipment and servers along with support for some large video-surveillance systems.

It is good that Chongqing police will be able to monitor and detain common criminals more easily, but they will also keeping their eye on citizens who wish to exercise their human rights of freedom of thought, speech and assembly.  Cisco’s Corporate Social Responsibility Report is a front to mask its complicity in this Chinese version of Big Brother.

To curtail companies like Cisco from collaborating with foreign governments who suppress Internet freedom, Rep. Chris Smith of New Jersey has introduced H.R. 1389, the Global Online Freedom Act.  Currently in being debated in the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, and Human Rights, the bill aims to “restore public confidence in the integrity of United States businesses.”  The Laogai Research Foundation applauds the act as a much-needed intervention on the part of the US government.  The leadership of companies like Cisco must be dissuaded from turning a blind eye to the injustices that despotic regimes perpetrate through use of their products.

Cisco CEO John Chambers commented on the release of the report: “At Cisco, we know that an intelligent network is not only a powerful tool for doing business, but also for transforming lives, building communities, and protecting the environment. Through the network and strategic partnerships, we can increase the capacity for all of us to succeed.”  The Laogai Research Foundation, however, has identified that Cisco’s “strategic partnership” with the People’s Republic of China has in fact resulted in an “intelligent network” of secret police to patrol the Web, and “increased the capacity” for the Communist Party to put a choke-hold on the Chinese population.

The issue of social justice is exactly why Oxfam UMBC invited Harry Wu to speak to them, even during their midterm season.  Imprisoned and forced to labor for 19 years for merely voicing his political opinions as a college student, Harry has an acute sense of what is just and what is not.  He focused his talk on several injustices currently perpetrated by the People’s Republic of China, including the one-child policy (the majority of these students are women), internet censorship, lack of religious freedom, arrest and execution of political dissidents, organ harvesting of criminals, and illegal exportation of forced-labor goods.

One student, born in mainland China, asked Harry where she could find a list of imported goods.  He notified her of our Laogai Handbook, last published in 2008, containing the names of many labor prisons and the goods they produce: Christmas lights, car brakes, you name it.  Unfortunately, the origins of most of the Chinese forced-labor products smuggled into the U.S. are unknown, while all forced-labor goods in the U.S. market are sold as legitimate factory products.  Harry advised the attendees to buy products made outside China and to raise awareness of the Laogai system with people they know.  They were amazed that the U.S. government has been relatively lax in exposing and prosecuting American corporations that knowingly sell Laogai products.

The last student to raise her hand asked Harry why he decided to establish the Laogai Research Foundation and Laogai Museum after his escape, instead of returning to a quiet life.  Impassioned, he told the group that he tried to live normally, but at his first hearing on Capitol Hill, a senator asked him, “How many Laogai camps are there?  And how many people are in them?”  Harry could only reply, “I do not know.”  The senator then asked him, “Will you help us find out?”

Harry has spent the last 20 years courageously ”finding out” as much as he can about the Laogai system and China’s other crimes.  He told the students that no matter our social background or age, we are all heading in one direction: the graveyard.  Freed after 19 years of incarceration and abuse, the only way he can use his freedom and leave the world a better place before arriving at the graveyard is to try to end and prevent the incarceration of other free-thinkers and human rights activists in the Laogai.

Harry’s story was an inspiration to the UMBC Oxfam Club in their weekly sacrifice of time and energy in the fight to save lives, help people overcome poverty, and fight for social justice.  You can read a blog post about the event by one of the attendees here!

If you would like Harry Wu to share his incredible story with your student group, non-profit, religious or charitable organization, please contact the Laogai Research Foundation at laogai@laogai.org or 202-408-8300.

The Laogai Museum also continued its film series into the month of October. Every Saturday, films highlighted different issues in Chinese human rights, with topics that included organ harvesting, the effects of the One Child Policy, and unrest in Tibet.

We hope to have more student groups and visitors in the month of November! If you are interested in organizing a guided tour, contact Laogai@laogai.org. Harry Wu is also available to speak at school and other public events.

BBC:  Prisoner Organ Donors

(43 min.)

This BBC investigative report uncovers China’s lucrative scheme of harvesting organs from executed prisoners.  Sue Lloyd-Roberts uncovers the dark secrets of China’s organ transplant business. (Contains disturbing images and footage)

60 Minutes:  Made in China

(15 min.)

Ed Bradley travels to China to expose products made in China’s forced labor prisons.  He and Harry Wu secretly film prisoners and conditions inside prison camps.  Ed and Harry pose as businessmen and meet with prison officials and secretly film trade deals.

60 Minutes: Expelled Last Thursday

(14 min.)

Harry Wu is interviewed after being released from his 66-day imprisonment in China. Harry was stopped at the Chinese border in 1995 and arrested for “stealing state secrets” as he sought to expose the Laogai prison system.

2pm Saturday, 10/15 & 10/29

Frontline:  Red Flag Over Tibet

(56 min.)

In this documentary, Orville Schell travels to Tibet to witness firsthand the effects of China’s takeover of Tibet and its and influence on the Tibetan people.  This documentary touches upon Tibet’s history before and after the Chinese Communist Party takeover.

ABC’s Nightline:  China’s One Child Policy

(21 min.)

Nightline does an investigative report on China’s One Child Policy (OCP).  Gao Xiaoduan – a former OCP enforcement official, who defected to the US in 1998 – testified at a US Congressional Hearing on the coercive tactics of OCP enforcement.  She provided photographs, videos and documents smuggled out of China, detailing the extreme methods that Chinese population control officials would employ to ensure adherence to the one child per couple regulation.

The Laogai Museum will be continuing with its film series in the month of September. We will be showing documentaries that show the human devastation caused by Mao and his communist regime. As always, this is open to the general public and is free of charge.

In Search of Lin Zhao’s Soul

September 10th, 2 pm
117 min. 

Though I Am Gone

September 17th, 2 pm
69 min.

Where: Laogai Museum, 1734 20th Street NW, Washington DC 20009

Contact: laogai@laogai.org, 202.730.9308

Museum Hours: M-F 10-6, Sat. 10-5     |     Free Admission!