IWP Vice President for Academic Affairs Dr. Charles Roger Smith, Chairman of the Board of Trustees Owen T. Smith, and Founder and President John Lenczowski present Harry Wu with an Honorary Doctorate of Laws. (Photo by Thomas Zeeb)

On Saturday, May 19th, the Institute of World Politics presented Laogai Research Foundation executive director Harry Wu with an Honorary Doctorate of Laws. Mr. Wu also had the honor of delivering the keynote address to the Institute’s 2012 graduating class.

The Institute of World Politics is a graduate school of national security and international affairs located in Washington, DC. Founded in 1990 by Dr. John Lenczowski, the Institute is unique in its emphasis on cultivating civic virtue and strong moral character in tomorrow’s statesmen and strategists. In keeping with this message, The Honorable Faith Ryan Whittlesey, former U.S. Ambassador to Switzerland who was also awarded an Honorary Doctorate of Laws, stressed that America needs to listen more, talk with global leaders, and engage in public diplomacy in order to rebuild goodwill overseas.

Harry Wu with The Honorable Faith Ryan Whittlesey and Mr. Owen T. Smith, Esq.

Harry Wu addresses the graduates.

In his keynote address, Harry Wu congratulated the graduates on all of their remarkable accomplishments, but emphasized that their greatest achievements are still to come. Wu told his own story of imprisonment and persecution in Communist China, but also of his lifelong battle for freedom and justice.

He recounted, “In 1990, the U.S. Congress invited me to testify on Laogai prison system. Senator Jesse Helms asked me, “How many camps are there? How many prisoners?” I myself had been imprisoned in 12 different camps over the course of my 19 years, but I realized I had no way to answer these questions. How many people went through what I went through? How many Chinese are still in the Laogai, while I sit here a free man? Who will speak out for them? That was when I realized my life’s purpose: to expose the Laogai and all the horrible crimes of China’s Communist Party.”

For his crimes of thought and expression, Wu said, “The Communist Party wanted me to spend a total of 34 years of my life as a prison slave! And for what?! I was not a murderer or a thief; all I did was speak my mind and try to learn the truth about human rights abuse in China.”

By telling his story, Mr. Wu hoped to draw attention to the need for future American policymakers and officials to take a stand against oppressive regimes and defend human rights. He told the graduates, “Freedom should not be considered a privilege. It is a right! But that does not mean that you should not appreciate it. When you work in politics or international affairs, of course it is important to recognize that all countries have different cultures and values. But I am sure about one thing. Inside, we are fundamentally the same. We all want and deserve our basic rights as human beings. The United States has worked hard to protect human liberty since before it was founded. When you work to serve your country and your fellow citizens, you are showing that you are thankful for these rights. But you must also exercise these rights; use them to speak up for those who do not yet enjoy basic freedoms, for those who are oppressed.”

To see the  read the full transcript of Harry Wu’s keynote address, click here: Harry Wu Keynote_ IWP Commencement 2012.  The commencement announcement for the Institute of World Politics is here.

IWP’s class of 2012

The formation of the ‘Buy American Coalition’ comes on the heels of the latest troubling news out of China. Korean customs officials have seized thousands of Chinese-made pills made from the flesh of fetuses, the product of forced abortions under the Communist Party’s one-child policy.  This tragedy is an extreme example of the millions of dangerously unhealthy and unethically produced goods that flow out of China into the U.S. and every other country.

TAP America Founder Mark Bloome said, “The ‘Buy American Coalition’ is of great importance to our country now more than ever. We are seeing our jobs being hollowed out in America by unfair competition from China. Working with both the American Jobs Alliance and Made In the USA Foundation, we believe that this issue is large enough to require examination by multiple organizations. We at TAPamerica.org are leading the charge.”

The Buy American Coalition calls on citizens to buy American and boycott China. This grassroots action sends a clear message that Americans believe that their people and nation prosper by adhering to traditional values of liberty and human dignity, not by abandoning them to appease foreign autocracies such as the Chinese Community Party.

China’s authoritarian regime is critically dependent on American cash and investment to fund its machinery of repression. “When consumers buy American-made products they put Americans to work and starve the Chinese Communist Party of resources. This is a double victory — for American workers and American values,” said Greg Autry, Senior Economist with the American Jobs Alliance. “It is not possible or even necessary to completely shun Chinese-made products to have a positive impact. Even the threat of a substantial boycott would change the behavior of corporations that benefit from China’s exploited labor and mercantilist trade behavior,” Autry notes. “A 20% drop in imports from China would easily destabilize Beijing. Buying American will make U.S. firms appreciate that.”

The Laogai Research Foundation fully supports the coalition’s efforts, especially as we invite guests at our Laogai Museum to consider the origins of the products they buy every day.  For a large proportion of products sold in the U.S., buying Made in China means buying Made in Laogai.  Our founder and director Harry Wu commented on the formation of the Buy American Coalition:

“For decades the U.S. government has said that doing business with China would bring democracy and human rights to the Chinese people, but it is now clearer than ever that buying up their cheap prison-made goods has only strengthened the Chinese Communist Party.  This imbalanced relationship is hurting the American people too, as they see their health threatened by unsafe Chinese products, their jobs lost, and their economy undermined. If governments do not insist that the repressive Chinese regime abide by fair trade practices, then it is up to American corporations and consumers to hold China accountable for its prison slave labor, lack of compassion for other workers, and countless human rights violations.”

The ‘Buy American Coalition” is comprised of:

• Mark Bloome, Founder of TAP America
• Richard Tso, Executive Director of TAP America
• Greg Autry, Senior Economist for the American Jobs Alliance
• Curtis Ellis, Communications Director of American Jobs Alliance
• Joel Joseph, Founder of Made In the USA Foundation

Click here to read more!

Click here to watch the “Prison Slaves” exposé!

At the end of 2011, the Chinese government refused to renew the journalist permit of English-language reporter Melissa Chan for Al Jazeera’s Beijing bureau, only allowing her to stay in China on a temporary visa.  It has expired as of today but Beijing still refuses to extend her permit.  Helpless, Ms. Chan was forced to return to the United States and Al-Jazeera had no choice but to close down its Beijing bureau.

According to reports, Beijing was unhappy with Al-Jazeera’s reporting on topics forbidden coverage in China, especially its November 2011 documentary, Slavery, A 21^st Century Evil: Prison Slaves. A large portion of the documentary was filmed inside China, as a detailed exposé of how China’s prisons force their prisoners to perform intense and unhealthy labor while exporting their products to the international market.  Al-Jazeera extensively interviewed Laogai Research Foundation founder and director Harry Wu during production. The film has aroused strong reactions in the international community, once again making the Laogai – the darkest corner of human rights abuse in China – the focus of attention. In its embarrassment, the Chinese Communist government has unfortunately decided to retaliate against Al-Jazeera’s Beijing bureau, although Ms. Chan was not involved in the filming or production of the Prison Slaves documentary.

The Laogai is the Communist Party’s key to maintaining a single-party dictatorship; its suppression of the Chinese people and its greedy exploitation of prisoners combine to create a uniquely utilitarian political tool. The former provides a steady stream of unpaid labor, herded and locked in a thousand camps across the country, while the latter reaps in huge profits for the regime.  Despite the nearly two-decade long ban on export of Laogai products, Chinese prison enterprises of all levels have continued to dump their forced-labor goods into international markets.  The ban has only made them more subtle in their business dealings.

Forced labor is a serious violation of human rights. The Chinese government must stop perpetrating it, by abolishing its over half-century-old policy of “reform through labor”.  The system is no secret within China; every Chinese person is a few degrees removed from a current or former Laogai prisoner.  However, Beijing denies to the world that it sponsors these camps and their illegal business deals, even after being caught red-handed in documentaries such as Al-Jazeera.  Their crimes are compounded by cover-up, leading China farther and farther down the path of human rights abuse in the eyes of the world.

Giving the cold shoulder to and ultimately expelling Al-Jazeera’s Beijing correspondent shows that protecting the global secrecy about the Laogai is still a core interest for the Chinese regime. The Chinese Communist Partyt is not weakening or softening the clamp-down that started in 1989, but rather intensified it in 2008, and redoubled efforts again after the Arab spring in 2011.  The incident also shows that China’s press freedom continues to decline, not only in its control of domestic press, but also in its blatant interference in the mission of the foreign press.

The Laogai Research Foundation remembers the Chinese Communists’ expulsion of foreign journalists in 1998 during the reign of Jiang Zemin and Zhu Rongji.  The Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao regime’s inability to perform anything but old tricks 14 years later, demonstrates the incorrigible anti-human rights nature of the People’s Republic of China.

The Laogai Research Foundation strongly protests the Chinese communist government’s attempts to cover up the evil of the labor camps, and their expulsion of the Al-Jazeera correspondent.  We call upon the relevant agency to immediately grant Melissa Chan a visa extension, allow Al-Jazeera to continue its presence in Beijing, and earnestly respect the international media’s right to investigate and report the truth.

Laogai Research Foundation
May 8, 2012

请点击看本新闻稿的中文版本。

Harry passionately related the injustices that occurred, and still occur, to common Chinese people throughout the history of the People’s Republic.  In addition to explaining his own senseless arrest, 19-year imprisonment, and two episodes of solitary confinement, he told the students about China’s lack of free speech, lack of political representation, lack of religious freedom, its Internet censorship, and forced abortions and sterilizations under the one-child policy.  Harry closed with the inspirational words that these American students are free to choose their own successful careers and establish their own destiny, but that the Chinese Laogai stole his youthful plans, and it is now his destiny, even at an advanced age, to keep the flame of advocacy burning for the 3-5 million current Laogai prisoners who yearn for normal lives.

As the students were studying ancient China and had not yet covered the 20th-century, museum staff opened the tour with an overview of modern Chinese history, including the Hundred Flowers Period, the Great Leap Forward and ensuing Great Famine, the Cultural Revolution, Deng’s Reform and Opening, and the Tiananmen Square Massacre.  Having learned from our detailed exhibits of the “guilty until proven innocent” mentality on which China’s judicial (and especially extra-judicial) system operates, the students were excited to witness a hopefully more just decision tomorrow at the Supreme Court.

To make the Laogai Museum a part of your DC experience, please email laogai@laogai.org or call 202-730-9308 to arrange a group tour and a talk with Harry Wu.  We look forward to hosting you!

Some of the student’s home universities were American, but most were European.  For Washington Semester, they have temporarily moved to DC to “participate in intellectual, real-world discussions with professionals immersed in [their] field of study” – in this case, a seminar on U.S. foreign policy with Professor John Calabrese.  Students also work in an internship and take an optional elective course or “in-depth research project using Washington DC as a laboratory of information and experience.”

Harry Wu was impressed by their questions, as they brought their international expertise and curiosity to the Museum.  Several were incredulous that the U.S. government has turned a blind eye to prison-made imports from China.

As foreign exchange students themselves, they asked if Chinese students studying abroad return to their homeland with a new perspective on freedom and oppression.  A UK Guardian article writes: “The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences revealed 1.06 million Chinese had gone to study overseas since 1978, but only 275,000 had returned” – only three out of ten.  According to the International Herald Tribune, “while they really don’t fit in America, they have also developed habits and ways of thinking that don’t permit them to integrate back into Chinese society easily.’’  These “habits and ways of thinking” include the freedom of information available in almost every nation other than China, as well as the freedom to enjoy the rule of law, to have more than one child, to worship freely, to live in a safe and clean environment, and to use social media like Facebook and Twitter.

The Laogai Museum wishes the Washington Semester students well and hopes they can return to their home countries and universities with a new thirst for justice regarding Chinese human rights abuse and the Laogai system.

To arrange a group tour of the Laogai Museum and a talk with Harry Wu, please email laogai@laogai.org or call 202-730-9308.  We look forward to hosting you!

The high school students were enrolled in an honors seminar entitled “International Human Rights: History, Ideas, and Practices”.  The visit was designed as part of their midterm assignment, prompting the students to ask intelligent questions of Harry and museum guides.

The course, according to its description, “is an in-depth exploration of human rights as a historical process, a normative idea, and a transnational political issue.  The first half of the course will focus on foundational philosophical issues regarding the idea of human rights (e.g. What is humanity?  What are rights?  Are human rights universal?) and explore the evolution of this idea throughout modern history.  The second half of the course will cover human rights as a political phenomenon as it relates to state sovereignty and the international system, through which students will explore the progress and challenges of international human rights issues.”

We applaud Emerson for offering such a course, the students for enthusiastically participating, and the teacher for his expertise.  We hope more and more high schools and universities will design and offer similar courses in their humanities and Chinese studies programs, to further the next generation’s awareness of human rights abuse in China and around the world.

To arrange a group tour of the Laogai Museum and a talk with Harry Wu, please email laogai@laogai.org or call 202-730-9308.  We look forward to hosting you!

Rep. Smith, a champion for human rights in China and a personal friend of Harry Wu, first introduced the bill in 2008.  The Laogai Research Foundation has endorsed the bill with a letter, noting that all of its policies apply to China’s repressive stance on internet censorship.  We hope that GOFA will pass the House of Representatives without obstruction – the freedom of ideas over the Internet is not contested by left or right.

Click here to read more.

On March 19th, Laogai Research Foundation director Harry Wu had the opportunity to speak about human rights in China with students at the University of Pennsylvania. The lecture was part of the semester-long Center for East Asian Studies Colloquium Series, “China and International Human Rights , which is led by the Center’s Director, Professor Jacques deLisle. Dr. deLisle is also the Stephen A. Cozen Professor of Law and a professor of Political Science at University of Pennsylvania. This semester Dr. deLisle is teaching a law course in conjunction with the colloquium on China and International Human Rights. The seminars address Chinese approaches to human rights over the last few decades, bringing in guest speakers from NGOs, government, and academia, encouraging interdisciplinary discussion among students and professionals in the field.

In the afternoon, Harry Wu met with a small group of undergraduate students pursuing degrees in Chinese Studies and International Relations. Harry shared with them the harsh reality of the Laogai forced labor prison system, as well as other abuses committed by the Chinese government including the One Child Policy, crackdown on dissent, religious persecution, and organ harvesting from executed prisoners. The students were curious to know how these issues can be handled within the framework of U.S.-China relations, and were interested in how LRF works to raise awareness of these issues.

Later, during Professor deLisle’s China and International Human Rights the  course, Harry told of his journey – from being locked up and forced to labor in the Laogai for 19 years, to finally becoming a free man in the U.S., to sneaking back into China to investigate the brutal prison system. He showed countless photographs taken from within prison walls, giving students a look at life inside forced labor camps. His lecture was followed by an open question and answer session, where students asked about his views on the current state of human rights in China, prospects for democratization and reform, attitudes within Chinese society, and the shortcomings of current U.S. China policy. For more information about the China and International Human Rights Colloquium, click here.

Organized by Students for a Free Tibet, a coalition of Tibetan, Chinese, Uyghur, Taiwanese and human rights groups held a joint rally in support of freedom and democracy outside the White House, as Xi Jinping and President Obama met inside.  Chinese groups included members of the China Democracy Party, practitioners of Falun Gong, and protesters against the One Child Policy and Chinese government land seizures.  The staff of the Laogai Research Foundation stood alongside them, holding posters of Chinese dissidents currently imprisoned in the Laogai.

To watch Harry’s and Yu Jie’s speeches at the rally, and to read an interview with Yu Jie by Nippon Television, click here.  You can also go directly to our Youtube channel!