The Complete Illegality of the Jiang Regime's Persecution of Falun Gong (Part 1 of 3)

Preface: "Wherever the Party points, that's where we fight," and "Shoot the arrow first. Then draw the bull's eye later."

In Mainland China, in the fifties, there was a famous political slogan, "Wherever the Party points, that's where we fight." After the "Cultural Revolution," the entire society lost confidence in the Party. An unknown genius changed this slogan to "Wherever the Party fights, that's where we point."

There's also another story about an archer who, whenever he shot an arrow, was able to hit the bull's eye. A bystander asked him what his secret was. He replied, "Shoot the arrow first. Then draw the bull's eye later."

In Mainland China, ruled by a dictatorship, the multitude of political campaigns of suppression, for example "the great Cultural Revolution," "the suppression of counterrevolutionaries," "the movement against the three evils," "the movement against the five evils," "anti-rightwing," the June 4th 1989 slaughter of hundreds of protesters in Tiananmen Square, and today''s persecution of Falun Gong--none of these movements or campaigns have had any legal foundation. The highest government executive body, the National People's Congress, and all the law enforcement agencies, from top to bottom, are just manifestations of the dictator's personal will, so the Party can shoot the arrow first then draw the bull's eye later. Discussions of whether Falun Gong is "legal" or "illegal" are simply meaningless.

Nevertheless, this time it's different. With the current world situation and political climate in China, in order to embellish China's officially stated "reform and open policy" and the much publicised theme of "managing the country under the rule of law," in order to find excuses and a basis for the suppression of Falun Gong, and to deceive the entire world''s media with the slogan "rule of law," the suppressor has exploited the entire country's propaganda machinery. Instead of using the Red Guards and farmers' barns as were used during the Cultural Revolution, or the police batons used to violently control past riots, the suppressor now uses policemen, prisons, forced labour camps, brainwashing centres, electric-shock batons and cruelty to imprison and torture several hundred thousand Falun Gong practitioners on a long term basis without any legal procedures whatsoever. One thousand plus people have died because of the persecution. Countless people have suffered mental breakdowns due to severe torture. Countless people have been forced to leave their homes and move from place to place in order to escape being captured and tortured. Over one hundred million Falun Gong practitioners and several hundred millions family members of practitioners have been living under pressure and fear for several years. Institutes at different levels in the Party and in the government, the army, schools at different levels, scientific research institutes, news media, business enterprises, public security offices, courts, the Procuratorate [a unique legal system in China dealing with government employees and Party members], prisons, detention centres, forced labour camps, and even prisoners or detainees in detention centres and forced labour camps, have all been forced to take part in the persecution and become accomplices either willingly or unwillingly, committing crimes of all different levels of depravity. One quarter of the nation's resources have been used to keep this massive and lengthy persecution going. This has therefore brought unprecedented catastrophes to the nation and to its people.

In other words, although this persecution is totally and absolutely illegal, the suppressor has been attempting to show a façade of "rule-of-law" and "legality." In addition to constantly coming up with new "legal grounds" and "laws" to justify the persecution, the architect of the persecution has also deceived the entire world about its legality. Therefore, the author has no choice but to patiently explain the total and absolute illegality of this persecution based on the laws that existed in China before the persecution began.

The True Nature of the Persecution and Its Inherent Illegality: Employing Bully Tactics and Manipulating the Judicial System to Outlaw What the Dictator Decides to be Improper Thought

First, I would like to talk about the true purpose of the persecution.

The true purpose of the persecution is to destroy the practise, ideology and belief system of Falun Gong and Falun Gong practitioners.

The ways used to destroy the practise, ideology and belief system have been first, to confiscate and destroy Falun Gong books, and video/audio materials, then to activate all propaganda machinery to bombard the entire country with defamation and slander of Falun Gong and its founder. People not only miss the truth about Falun Gong; they also have become hateful toward Falun Gong due to the media's slander. In order to achieve this goal and in an attempt to completely destroy the reputations of Falun Gong practitioners, the suppressor resorted to staging the "Tiananmen immolation," shaking people up the whole world over, and cooking up a series of tragic cases of "suicide" and "murder" with blame falsely attributed to Falun Gong.

Comparatively speaking, the "mission" to destroy Falun Gong practitioners has been a lot more difficult, for there are only two ways. One is to "transform" practitioners from believing in Falun Gong to agreeing with the suppressor's "labelling" and "banning" of Falun Gong. The second is to physically eliminate practitioners whose ways of thinking could not be transformed. This includes two aspects, "torture deaths count as suicide," and long and unlimited terms of imprisonment.

Thus, the true nature of the persecution is using force and the "laws" as tools to change people's thoughts.

Anyone with a little understanding of the law knows that the law can only deal with people's behaviour and the consequence of people's behaviour. Laws are not meant to control peoples' thoughts. Jiang Zemin has abused the law in his attempts to control peoples' thoughts, attempting to control issues that are not at all within the scope of the law. Jiang's abuse of the legal system shows how the persecution was illegal from the very beginning.

Jiang Expropriated the Power of the Entire Nation to Satisfy his Personal Will To Carry Out The Persecution

An incident widely reported and exaggerated by China's official media as the "siege of Zhongnanhai" took place on April 25, 1999, when ten thousand Falun Gong practitioners quietly appealed to the government. At the time, the then Chinese Communist Party General Secretary, Jiang Zemin, wrote to the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau, and other pertinent government officials, "If the Party cannot defeat Falun Gong, it will be the laughing stock of the whole world." This document was passed around as an internal document, passed down to all levels of government offices. On June 7, 1999, Jiang gave a speech at a Political Bureau's meeting, claiming that the Zhongnanhai appeal on April 25 was the most serious incident since the political turmoil of 1989. On June 13 of 1999, the content of his speech was passed around secretly, and internally to the Chinese Communist Party. On July 19, in a high level meeting, Jiang announced the policy of suppressing and persecuting Falun Gong. The next morning the official campaign of unified action and nationwide arrests of Falun Gong "assistants" and confiscation of their personal property began. The curtain was raised on a bloody persecution targeting the more than one hundred million Falun Gong practitioners.

This persecution, which wastes people's time and money, faces an awkward dilemma that is damaging to the suppressor and others alike. It was not the Party's joint decision, nor was it approved following any normal government procedure. Instead, it was totally Jiang's own personal will, against the advice of all others. Among the then seven members of the Standing Committee of the Politbureau (the locus of power in China's Communist regime), Jiang was the only one favouring the persecution of Falun Gong.

Perhaps it is difficult for Westerners to understand how one person's will could overpower the government and the Party. Consider for a moment China's "reform and open policy" begun some twenty years ago. It gives the illusion of China having made great improvements and gradually trying to be in sync with the international community.

The prosperous surface appearance of the "reform and open policy" can be, for the most part, attributed to the consumer potential of China''s huge population, which has been created by foreign investors' imaginations. However, this is not the topic of this article. What this author wants to address here is that, on the surface, China, after the "reform and open policy," may have opened up its economics and markets to a certain degree, yet the dictatorial nature of the political system has not changed one iota. Judging from the fact that Jiang presided as Communist Party General Secretary, president of the nation, and chairman of the Central Military Commission, the phenomenon of three major positions of power being in the hands of one single person was indeed the first in the history of Chinese Communist Party.

In a country with a several-thousand-year history of feudalism, where a legal system and democracy have never been realised, it is possible for a dictator with political and military power to act above the Party and above the government. Therefore he is capable of employing the resources of the entire nation at will. In the era of feudalism, an emperor still had reverence for "heaven" [God] and still had the moral discipline of passing his throne to his descendants. The result of the autocratic and dictatorial Communists advocating "violent revolution," "winning political power by means of weapons and guns," and "the joy of fighting with heaven is beyond measure; the joy of fighting with earth is beyond measure; the joy of fighting with people is beyond measure," is a complete absence of the restraints of the system and of morality.

Since lower level government officials are eager to enhance their political interests; since government officials and law enforcement fear power in the hands of others and hope to maintain their personal vested interests; and since the public still fears another massacre like the Tiananmen June 4 protest and tacitly accept that power is truth, Jiang Zemin, with political and military power in his hands, has manipulated the entire country's propaganda machine and abused the power in his hands to create this bloody suppression.

A lot of Westerners have been asking, "Why does China persecute Falun Gong?" People in democratic countries can't imagine all that has gone into this persecution of Falun Gong. How could the "anti-right-wing" movement occur? How about the "great leap forward" and the "great cultural revolution?" After these brutal political campaigns came to an end, the Chinese people realised how ridiculous they were. Yet they happened nevertheless. This is the history of the Chinese Communists: A Party leader has the ability to, at any time, without any justification, usurp the entire country's power structure and resources to initiate a political struggle, from top to bottom, against the head of the country, a common civilian, or a group.