Archive for the ‘Laogai News’ Category
LRF Italia Releases New Book on Persecution of Catholics in China
Posted: June 21, 2012 in Laogai NewsThe Laogai Research Foundation’s Italian branch has published a new book on the persecution of Chinese Catholics.
Below is a translation of LRF Italia’s press release:
The Plight of Catholics in China: Arrests, Violence and Abuse of Clergy and Laity of the Catholic Church
The Oppression of Catholics in China Since 1949
Chinese Communism, atheist, materialist, and totalitarian by nature, values the State above all else, designing everything in order to support the absolute power of the Communist Party (CCP), which subsists solely in the State apparatus. Whoever refuses to place the State before all else is considered a potential danger to the regime, something worse than the common criminal. The pretense of Communist ideology is to play the role of a true religion, so much that the Party cannot tolerate any other object of veneration besides itself, the only and true god in China: the State and the Party that represents it. The persecution of Catholics in China began in 1949 and continues today.
The 2008 Olympic Games up to the present
The Olympics in August 2008 served primarily to let the PRC’s leaders show the world a new China in totally contrast to the past, an ultra-modern China on a par with every other country. For this reason the regime ensured that no discord of any kind occurred during that period, including anything related to religious freedom. However, “petitioners” continued to be arrested and forcibly interned in psychiatric hospitals, as they brought cases of abuse to Beijing, according to the ancient custom of the Chinese emperors. During the Olympics the government kept several bishops and priests of the underground Church under house arrest. Public security police coerced other priests into forced “vacations”, while warning the faithful of the underground Church not to meet during the period of the Games, for “security reasons”. The authorities also banned Christians from carrying more than one Bible at any time, because of the ban on disseminating religious “propaganda,” considered dangerous and listed beside the item “explosive weapons.”
On the solemnity of the Assumption on August 15th, one of the most beloved holidays in the Chinese Church, in the middle of the Olympic Games, at least 1000 underground Catholics defied the police ban and “invaded” the Church of Wuqiu to celebrate Mass, alongside the house where their bishop, Monsignor Jia, had been under house arrest. The authorities had to put on a good face, letting them celebrate the Mass.
Very different was Beijing’s attitude during the Games in the Olympic village that reserved for foreigners. An entire area was devoted to spirituality and prayer, with different halls for Catholics, Buddhists, Muslims, Jews, and Hindus. Great attention was also paid to the quality of food offered according to different religious faiths: vegetarian, halal, kosher. All this was done only in the well-guarded Olympic village, which only registered or accompanied persons could enter. This liberality is stopped just after the Olympics. In rare meetings with foreign priests, “security concerns” seemed to be high on the government’s list of priorities, even though no Christian had ever been charged with violence against the nation. Priests may celebrate religious services in foreign embassies, but at their entrances the police still register and monitor the passports of all the faithful.
Since the Olympics nothing has changed in China, and the persecution of Catholics continues. In March 2009, two thugs with knives attacked a priest who had been called by his mayor to discuss land expropriated from the Church. The beating took place right in the office of the municipal authority. Father Francis Gao Jinli, 39, a priest of the Diocese of Fengxiang (Shaanxi), was admitted to the hospital in Baoji for the beating he received, and in still under the control of the police who continue to interrogate him. Especially in Hebei, the province near Beijing with the greatest concentration of Catholics, underground communities are under continuous pressure and are forbidden to meet for Mass. A priest in Donglu, Father Paul Ma, 55, was recently arrested from recently celebrating the Eucharist with a few underground faithful. The Christian community fears that his heart problems will remained untreated in prison.
At the end of March of the same year, coinciding with the plenary meeting of the Vatican Commission on the Church in China, Bishop Jia Zhiguo, 74, was again arrested. Five policemen and two cars arrived at the bishop’s house and took him to an undisclosed location. Bishop Jia suffers from various ailments due to past imprisonments and to his age; the faithful of the diocese are concerned that this new sequestration may endanger his life. This latest arrest strikes at the heart of efforts by the Vatican to reconcile the Patriotic and underground Churches, as long as the desire persists for union between the bishops of both. Months ago Bishop Zhang Taoran of Shijiazhuang (Hebei), a diocese of the Patriotic Church, reconciled with the Holy See, and on the recommendation of the Vatican agreed to collaborate with Bishop Jia Zhiguo, becoming his auxiliary bishop.
During the “Dialogue on Human Rights in China” between China and the United Nations in Geneva in February this year, several countries have asked China to permit religious freedom, including Australia, Canada, Switzerland, Germany and Italy. However, despite international pressure and the goodwill of the Holy See, the persecution of Catholics in China continues.
The Laogai Research Foundation Italy Fund has published a book on the persecution of Catholics in China as a tribute to the Catholic Church in China. After a brief overview of Chinese history before and after Mao Zedong, the book focuses on today’s complex reality, in light of recent papal teaching on the issue. On the one hand shows the maternal care and concern of Holy See for its Chinese children, but on the other pays tribute to innumerable “souls of those who were slain for the word of God and the witness they have made” (Revelations 6:9). In particular, it is a tribute to the Christian martyrs in China today, where fundamental human rights are denied, where Catholics and others who displease the regime disappear into the Laogai for years without due process. Bishops, priests and lay people are still persecuted, imprisoned and oppressed, while the West unwittingly or connivingly continues to do trade with the Chinese dragon, caring only for maximum profit.
On June 25th, at 7:00 pm, the book “La persecuzione dei cattolici in Cina” will be presented at L’Universale, Libreria Galleria delle Arti, via F. Caracciolo 12 Roma, with the speakers Francesca Romana Poleggi, professor and curator of the volume; Gianluigi Indri, journalist for GiornaleRadio; and Pier Paolo Saleri of the Movimento Cristiano dei Lavoratori. Click here to purchase!
For more information in Italian on religious persecution in China, click the links at the bottom of Laogai Italia’s press release.
Brief History of the Persecution of Catholics by the People’s Republic of China
After the CCP founded the PRC in 1949, foreign missionaries were expelled from mainland China one after another. In May of 1950, Wu Yaozong, a representative of the Christian faith, met three times with Zhou Enlai. With one sentence, Wu set the tone for Christianity in Communist China – linking missionaries with imperialist aggression. He put forth three suggestions: first, a patriotic anti-Western imperialist movement should be fostered within the church; second, in new China, Christianity should be restrained and should not be preached openly on the street; third, churches should be independent and autonomous, cutting off any ties with Western imperialist nations, thus establishing China’s “self-governing, self-supporting, self-propagating” church. Wu Yaozong and other Christian leaders subsequently published the “Three-Self Declaration”, which proclaimed that “Chinese Christian churches and organizations completely support and uphold the new China,” and that they would, “under the leadership of the Communist Party, oppose Western imperialism, feudalism, and bureaucratic capitalism.” In 1951, the Three-Self Innovation Preparatory Committee was established and in 1954, the “Three-Self” patriotic movement began. Since then, all believers must register with one of the “patriotic associations” that supervise the five religions recognized by the state - Daoism, Buddhism, Islam, Catholicism, and Protestantism. Each associations limits its religion’s number of converts and properties, forbids contact with foreign groups, trains and censors clergy, and injects statist propaganda into its scripture and preaching.
Chinese Catholics were required to establish their own “Three-Self” Patriotic Church and to join the movement. Several Catholic leaders urged their followers to remain faithful to Roman Catholicism. This included Kung Pin-mei (龔品梅), who had just been installed as the first ethnically Chinese bishop of the Diocese of Shanghai, as well as a number of Shanghai priests. They did not permit believers to participate in Communist political campaigns, the atheist ideology of which was contrary to Catholic doctrine. In particular, they resisted the new Chinese government’s movement to “reform” the Catholic Church, refusing to engage the Church in the “anti-Western imperialist movement” and did not participate in the “Chinese Catholic Patriotic Church” or any related organizations. All of them were later arrested and sentenced, some of whom died in prison.
Current State of Religious Freedom in the PRC
During the Cultural Revolution, the Three-Self Patriotic Church ceased all activities, but resumed again after Mao’s death. Even with the reopening of churches and temples in 1980, and the ensuing proliferation of religious activity in China, it is still illegal to be Roman Catholic in China. Only Catholicism under the watchful eye of the Catholic Patriotic Association is legal. These “patriotic” Catholics are permitted to pray for the Pope and to enact most directives that Rome issues, but are forbidden contact with the Vatican and the worldwide communion of bishops and faithful. The “Three-self” Patriotic Church is subject to direct supervision by the National Bureau of Religious Affairs. These so-called churches are the only ones recognized by the CCP and the PRC.
The officially atheist Chinese Communist Party forbids its members from holding religion. For the rest of the population, the constitution protects only what it calls “normal religious activity,” that is, within government-sanctioned places of worship. Such state interference has prompted the rapid grouth of underground communities, including Protestant house churches, Roman Catholics faithful to the Pope, and Falun Gong practitioners. Scores of independent Catholic churches that do not belong to the Three-Self Church exist illegaly inside China. These churches are known collectively as “house churches” or “underground churches” and have far more followers than the Three-Self Church, yet they have long been monitored by the government and even destroyed. Police harassment, imprisonment, torture, and forced conversion await such unregistered groups that grow too strong or vocal, on the charge of “illegal religious activities” or “disrupting social stability.” Uyghur Muslims and Tibetan Buddhists faithful to the Dalai Lama particularly face repression, as the Chinese government equates their religions with ethnic independence movements and terrorism.
The CCP fears any voice in China with organization, moral authority, and appeal that rivals its own, particularly one linked with foreign countries. Fear that its Catholic citizens may follow their clergy or the Pope instead of the State on issues of conscience is the only reason that the State has restricted the official Roman Catholic Church’s activity within its territory. The Chinese Patriotic Church has been defanged so it can never challenge the state’s capital punishment (the highest in the world), forced abortion and sterilization (a necessity of its one-child policy), lack of freedom of information, of political freedom and of democracy. China’s 3-5 million judicially-sentenced prisoners are funneled through a thousand forced-labor prison camps (called the Laogai), where backbreaking work and nonstop study of Communism brainwash them out of religions including Catholicism. China’s Catholic opposition leaders have all entered this vast and brutal prison system, and many have been tortured there until death for refusing to renounce their faith. It is safe to say that the People’s Republic of China, the world’s toy factory, has also produced generations of Catholic martyrs.
LRF presents flowers at the Victims of Communism Memorial to recall past and present victims of PRC
Posted: June 14, 2012 in Events, Laogai NewsLRF director Harry Wu and staff attended the ceremony marking the fifth anniversary of the Victims of Communism Memorial in Washington, DC. Harry was accompanied by the eight Tibetan former political prisoners who had flown in from India and New York to speak at this week’s LRF conference on Tibet. In honor of China’s Laogai prisoners and the Communist Party’s victims throughout its brief but bloody history, Harry and the Tibetans laid flowers at the foot of the memorial statue, a bronze replica of the Goddess of Democracy erected by the soon-to-be-massacred student protestors in Tiananmen Square in 1989.
Following a moment of silence, VOC Memorial Foundation Chairman Lee Edwards opened the ceremony with a speech noting the importance of education and perseverance against the persistence of the few remaining Communist regimes. He also emphasized the foundation’s bipartisanship.
Ambassadors from of the former Communist countries of Albania, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Poland, Romania, and Ukraine laid wreaths of flowers in the colors of their flags, in addition to representatives from the Republic of China (Taiwan), Tibetans from ICT, and exiles from the still-Communist countries of North Korea, Vietnam, and Belarus.
Among the speakers was Annette Lantos (pictured above), chair of the Lantos Foundation and wife of the late Hungarian-American congressman, Holocaust survivor, and human rights champion, Tom Lantos (D-CA-12). She spoke about her husband’s legacy and the hardship her family endured in Communist Hungary. She stressed the fact that everyone has a right to freedom and a duty to protect the freedom of others.
Tibetan Laogai survivor Ghang Lhamo (pictured above) made the following speech:
Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, on behalf of those standing here with me, I thank you for hosting this important event. We gather here to remember Communism’s countless victims; however, we must not forget about those who have yet to know freedom.
We, like Mr. Harry Wu, know firsthand the horrors of Communism. At the hands of our supposed liberators, we have each suffered and endured torture in China’s Laogai. What were our crimes? We voiced our support for His Holiness the Dalai Lama; we protested for his return to Tibet; we asked for freedom. Yet our peaceful protests were met with swift and violent crackdowns now only seen in countries ruled by despots.
Today, we humbly ask the world to stop turning a blind eye to the plight of people suffering under communism. This problem may seem daunting; however, we believe that if all countries that stand for freedom and human rights banded together, achieving true freedom would only be a matter of time. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said it best: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” The situation in Tibet is no different. Thank you.
Other speakers included former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Vietnamese Boat People refugee Anhthu Lu, and Women’s Rights Without Frontiers president Reggie Littlejohn (pictured below).
Instrumental in making known to the world the recent plight of blind Chinese lawyer Chen Guangcheng, who defended victims of China’s One Child Policy (OCP). Littlejohn spoke about human rights abuse in China (transcript here). She pointed out that 500 women kill themselves a day in China, which is the only country where the suicide rate is higher for women than for men. She identified the reason as the OCP, whereby paid informants identify pregnant women to be captured by police for full-term forced abortions and sterilizations, and charged for the operation.
Almost all Chinese women of childbearing age must monitor their personal lives to make sure they do not conceive a second child, for fear that they will be identified and have to undergo a forced abortion - some operations so botched that they result in infections and injuries. It is true that the OCP has made women as only children receive educations, career opportunities and inheritances that they would not receive if they had brothers. However, a preference for boys and the ineffectiveness of a law banning sex-identifying ultrasounds has resulted in an estimated 50 million “missing girls”. The current male-to-female ratio in China is 120:100, producing 30 million more men of marriageable age than women by 2020, leading to an increase in sex trafficking and rape of women, as well as lack of families, depression, and gang activity for men. The benefits to women listed above do not outweigh their need as infants to survive sex-selective abortion and infanticide, and as adults to survive an increase in rape, sex trafficking and infections, injuries, and suicides from forced abortions. For those Chinese daughters who survive sex-selective abortion, life may better in terms of education, career and inheritance, except for the day that they discover they’re pregnant and actually desire a new addition to their family as women in the rest of the world so often do. It is fitting that this monument is of the female Goddess of Democracy, as the women of China are today’s most numerous victims of Communism.
In honor of the Chinese people, LRF congratulates the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation on the fifth anniversary of its memorial in DC. We hope that the flowers laid and the speeches made there this week will educate the US and the world about the cruelty of Communist China, and that China’s suffering population will take hope from this show of support from the United States capital.
See the Victims of Communism report on the ceremony here.
Tibetan Former Political Prisoners Recall Horrors of the Laogai at LRF Conference
Posted: June 14, 2012 in Events, Laogai NewsOn June 8th, 2012, the Laogai Research Foundation hosted the first day of its “Laogai in Tibet” Conference in the Rayburn House Office Building on Capitol Hill. Eight Tibetan exiles (some pictured with Harry Wu below) shared their moving testimonies, which detailed their experiences in the Laogai after protesting, their courage in facing religious and cultural oppression from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), as well as their long, arduous treks over the Himalayas into India after being exiled from their homeland.
The conference was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to hear the stories of survivors, as it was extremely difficult for six of the eight to obtain U.S. visas (Ngawang Sangdrol and Tubten Khetsun live in the United States). Among the speakers were LRF Director Harry Wu, Congressman Frank Wolf (VA-10), Congressman Chris Smith (NJ-4), His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s Representative Lobsang Nyandak, International Campaign for Tibet (ICT) President Mary Beth Markey, and ICT Vice President for Special Programs Bhuchung Tsering. The Tibetan Laogai survivors who spoke were Tsewang Dhondup, Tubten Khetsun, Dolkar Kyap, Ghang Lhamo, Jampel Monlam, Ngawang Sangdrol, and Lukar Sham. In addition to the Members of Congress, several congressional staff were in attendance.
The conference commenced with a video of the Director of the Lhasa Police Bureau and 180 police officers surrounding Drepung Monastery, in order to find “terrorists” amongst the monks and nuns and detain them. This film is evidence that in the Tibetan “Autonomous” Region, the peaceful demands of the Tibetan people are met with violence, and the monks and nuns who spend their days studying the pacifist Buddhist religion are met with oppression.
Congressman Frank Wolf (pictured above) recounted his visit to Lhasa’s monasteries, where monks and nuns led him to secret rooms to tell him of their lack of rights and the miserable conditions caused by the CCP. He also upheld that, contrary to China’s claim, Tibet is not a part of China. He urged that rather than simply criticizing or trying to contain the CCP, we should be questioning its entire legitimacy, because “China is running against the global tide of democracy.”
Lobsang Nyandak (pictured above), Representative of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, stated that the purpose of the conference was to show that Tibetans are not pleased with the policies of the CCP, which encroach upon their basic human rights. The CCP is trying to indoctrinate its anti-religious, anti-Tibetan, and pro-Beijing beliefs in Tibet’s schools, cities, and monasteries through coercion and intimidation.
Mary Beth Markey (pictured above), president of the International Campaign for Tibet (ICT), said that the noted absence of State Department officials at the conference was indicative of the U.S. government’s approach to Tibet. She emphasized that their participation is crucial in securing the release of any political prisoner, including Tibetans. Markey also recounted that in a recent meeting to discuss human rights, representatives of a global power gave the Chinese a list twelve political prisoners, including some Tibetans, seeking their release, but China’s only response was that the list was too long. She pointed to this incident as evidence that world powers need to do more to stand up to Chinese leaders both in public and in private.
Congressman Chris Smith (pictured above) has been a champion of international human rights issues for 32 years. He said that the severity of the Laogai can be compared to Nazi concentration camps. He proclaimed that the CCP’s violent destruction of Tibet was cause enough for sanctions under the International Religious Freedom Act, but that the U.S. lost any moral leverage over China when President Clinton delinked human rights and trade policy in 1994, by removed human rights improvements as a condition for renewing China’s Most Favored Nation trade status. Both Congressmen Wolf and Smith visited Beijing Prison 1, one of thousands of the vast Laogai system. They took a pair of jelly shoes from the prison and found an identical pair in a store when they returned to the U.S.
Nearly all of the Tibetan exiles in attendance had been unjustly detained and arrested for peaceful protest, and suffered physical torture and mental abuse while serving their sentence in the Laogai.
Tsewang Dhondup (pictured above) can no longer use his left arm after being shot by Chinese police while trying to help an injured Buddhist lama amid the March 2008 unrest. He also has scars from bullet wounds on his stomach, side, and back. Although initially he was not able to seek medical attention while in the Laogai, he still refuses to do so, as he believes that his arm and scars are a testimony and evidence of China’s oppressive policies and the injustices of a corrupt government.
Tubten Khetsun (pictured above), the eldest of the panel, was arrested during the 1959 Tibetan uprising against China, a protest to protect the Dalai Lama and to prevent China from invading Tibet.
Dolkar Kyap (pictured above, with translator at his left) was arrested in 1996 for passing out CDs of the Dalai Lama speaking and for putting up Tibetan independence posters while attending Northwest University for Nationalities in China. He recorded his experiences during his three years in the Laogai by writing secretly on cigarette cartons, which he later used to publish his book Prison Records. A replica of the cartons is exhibited in the Laogai Museum.
Ghang Lhamo (pictured above) was arrested in 1990 on suspicion of being a “counterrevolutionary” and for “spreading false information”; she spent three years in Laogai. She is currently the general secretary of the Tibetan Gu-Chu-Sum Movement in Dharmsala.
Jampel Monlam (pictured above) was a member of the Drepung Monastery and was also arrested for participating in a “counterrevolutionary” protest calling for Tibetan independence in 1989. He served five years in prison, and was expelled him from his monastery after his release. He is now the vice president of the Tibetan Center for Human Rights and Democracy.
Ngawang Sangdrol (pictured above) was sentenced to prison when she was only fifteen years old, and was subjected to various methods of torture at the hands of prison officials. While imprisoned, she composed songs and various other works relating to Tibetan independence, which you can hear in the Laogai Museum. Her sentence was extended as a result, and she ended up serving 11 years.
Lukar Sham (pictured above) was originally sentenced to seventeen years in prison for peacefully protesting in 1992, but only served four years as a result of his poor health. He was released for medical treatment because he weighed a mere 81 pounds. Sham is currently vice chairman of the Tibetan Gu-Chu-Sum Movement in Dharmsala.
On Monday, June 11th, the Tibetan survivors shared their same stories in a round-table discussion at the Laogai Museum. The intimate setting allowed attendees to ask the survivors questions during their testimony and during the group lunch. ICT Vice President for Special Programming has written an article about his experience on this second day.
The Laogai Research Foundation would like to thank the International Campaign for Tibet, the Lantos Foundation for Human Rights and Justice, and the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation for making this conference possible. We would also like to thank those who attended for supporting the fight for Tibetan human rights, as well as for those who are still suffering in the Laogai in Tibet and all of China.To read the statements of the Tibetan survivors and the sponsors’ Joint Declaration on the Current Situation in Tibet, please see the event page on our foundation website.
Desperation in Tibet: Laogai Research Foundation Invites Tibetan Exiles to Share their Perspective
Posted: June 7, 2012 in Events, Laogai News
Since March 2011, at least 38 Tibetans have resorted to self-immolation, setting themselves on fire in order to protest against the religious and cultural oppression they experience from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Twenty-nine have died as a result. Peaceful protests have been met with extreme violence from Chinese military forces. Most of the self-immolators have been young monks and nuns, and most of the protests have taken place outside of Tibet. On May 30, 2012, the first self-immolations in Tibet’s capital, Lhasa, took place. An estimated 600 protestors were placed in detention centers, while protestors from outside of the Tibet Autonomous Region were expelled to their native locations. Government officials say that Tibetans already “enjoy religious freedom” and have “benefited from improved living standards brought on by China’s economic expansion”. However, it remains clear that the Tibetan people lack basic freedoms such as speech, religion, and assembly.
History of Chinese Repression in Tibet
In 1951, China coerced Tibet to sign the Seventeen-Point Agreement, which reaffirmed China’s sovereignty over Tibet, but also ensured that Chinese authorities would not tamper with the current social system or the political powers of the Dalai Lama. After the takeover, China says that Tibet enjoyed democratic reform, as well as social and economic progression. However, in 1959 the Tibetan uprising occurred as a result of China not honoring the Seventeen-Point Agreement. Tibetans were afraid that Chinese forces intended to kidnap the Dalai Lama and take him to Beijing. As a result, 300,000 Tibetans surrounded the Norbulingka Palace in Lhasa. Around 30,000 to 50,000 Chinese troops surrounded the palace and fired at the crowds, with an estimated 430,000 Tibetans being killed as a result. After the uprising, the Dalai Lama was exiled and fled to India, where he was later granted asylum by the Indian government. The Dalai Lama has since renounced his political leadership, but still continues to be the one and only true spiritual leader for five million Tibetans.
Since 1949, over 6,000 Tibetan Buddhist monasteries and shrines have been destroyed. Tibetans also suffer from political oppression and heavy military presence, particularly near monasteries: an estimated 300,000 Chinese soldiers are posted in Tibet. Tibet’s rural nomadic lifestyle is also being threatened, as the CCP has encouraged Han Chinese to seek work in Tibet, which is destroying Tibet’s agricultural economy as well as making Tibetans a minority in their native homeland. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei has accused the Dalai Lama of instigating the protests and self-immolations, and for encouraging ‘splittism’- the pursuit of Tibetan independence from the P.R.C. Lei also says that these acts of self-immolation will not attain “Tibetan independence and separatism”. (2) The Dalai Lama has repeatedly said that he seeks autonomy for Tibet, not independence. It seems, however, that in recent years under increasingly brutal oppression, more and more Tibetans are rejecting the Dalai Lama’s peaceful, nonviolent, “middle way”. Those who resort to self-immolation do so because they feel that it is the only way to express their beliefs and to gain freedom from their oppressive government.
Making Voices Heard
Please join the Laogai Research Foundation as we host our “Laogai in Tibet” Conference on June 8th, 11th, and 12th, 2012. Thanks to the generous support and collaboration of the International Campaign for Tibet, the Lantos Foundation, and the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, several Tibetan exile Laogai survivors will come to Washington, DC to share their testimonies. The speakers, including several of whom have traveled from Dharmsala, India, were imprisoned by the Chinese government for protesting against the injustices of the CCP policy in Tibet. It is important for the world to know that Tibetans do not live free lives, but are constantly facing religious and cultural oppression by the CCP. While Tibetans are peacefully protesting and sacrificing their own lives, Chinese military forces continually resort to violence in order to suppress these protests. The world must let the Chinese know that this is unacceptable. It is important for Tibetans to gain the basic human rights they so desperately deserve.
In the words of the late Jamphel Yeshi, a man who immolated himself in order to gain freedom from the oppressive Chinese government: “Freedom is the basis of happiness for all living beings. Without freedom, six million Tibetans are like candlelight in the wind, without direction.”
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
Harry Wu Discusses Laogai on Italian TV Program, “Quello che (non) ho”
Posted: May 18, 2012 in Laogai News
TAP America, the Made In the USA Foundation and the American Job Alliance today announced the ‘Buy American Coalition’ to stimulate the U.S. economy, protect the American values of tolerance and patriotism, and weaken authoritarian regimes that violate human rights, like the People’s Republic of China.
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
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In Attempt to Cover Up Laogai Camps, China Expels Al-Jazeera Reporter
Posted: May 8, 2012 in Laogai NewsClick 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 21st 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
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Global Online Freedom Act passes House subcommittee, endorsed by LRF
Posted: March 30, 2012 in Laogai NewsTags: bill, censorship, china, chris smith, freedom, house, internet, legislation, online
H.R. 3605, called the Global Online Freedom Act, was approved by voice vote in the Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, and Human Rights, chaired by Congressman Chris Smith (NJ-4), and is now pending decision in the House Foreign Affairs Committee.
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.
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