The "610 office" was set up on June 10, 1999 before the formal persecution started, hence it's name. It is the executive office of the "Dealing with the Falun Gong Issue Central Leading Group" and a standing office of the "Political and Judiciary Committee of the Central Communist Party Committee." It's function is to "direct and coordinate the Public Security Bureau, the Procurator, legislators, courts, Security Departments to detect, arrest, prosecute, and investigate all activities concerning Falun Gong."
When the persecution started, the " 610 office" became a ministry-level organisation, and thousands of subordinate "610 offices" in the provincial, city, and other levels of government were set up with a million employees and a very large budget.
The various levels of the "610 offices" form an independent but integrated system that has authority over the Chinese Communist Party, every level of government, and the judicial system. Each level is responsible only to its upper level "610 office." You will never find any legal basis for the foundation of the "610 office" no matter how you search through all the Chinese laws. The 610 Office can only be compared to the notorious Gestapo of Nazi Germany, the ruthless KGB of the former Soviet Union, and the "Cultural Revolution Central Leading Group," a much feared branch of the Chinese government that existed in the time of Mao's bloody Great Cultural Revolution.
The "610 office" exists only to carry out the persecution, Jiang's failed political campaign to exterminate Falun Gong. It tramples citizens' rights and makes a laughing stock of China's judicial system. It's a slap on the face to all in the legal profession and those who think that China is operating by the rule of law. It reminds us that law is only a convenient term for decorative purposes. Law is too complicated with too many procedures and technical details. An "office" is much easier to manipulate than any law, and can be used to benefit the dictator.
5. Forced Labour Camps: the advantage of a "war of quick decision"- an illegal solution posed as a "legal" one
After the "610 office" was set up, one of its major functions was assigning the sentencing of Falun Gong practitioners to forced labor camps. Although the National Congress passed a law, it is far from adequate as a persecution tool. A law involves too many parties, and it even allows defense for the accused. That procedure was too "cumbersome" and "slow", as it didn't fit the dictator's intention of quickly eradicating Falun Gong.
Thus, forced labour became the "highest administrative punishment" in China, and became one of the major tools used to persecute Falun Gong practitioners.
The Chinese forced labour system started in the 1950s, shortly after the Communist Party had come to power. It aimed to reform those who were "idlers" and those who belonged to the former "exploiting class" to do physical labour, and so turn them into "new socialist people". Later it evolved into an "administrative measure to forcibly reform the people who are educated through hard labour" and "a method to deal with the internal conflicts between people."
On January 21, 1982, the Chinese State Council issued "Proposed Regulations of Forced Labor." Article 10 of the regulation defined who could be sent to a forced labour camp as follows:
"1. Anti-revolutionary, anti-communist party, anti-socialist members whose crimes are not cause for criminal prosecution;
2. Those involved in murdering, robbing, raping, or committing arson in groups, but whose crimes are not cause for criminal prosecution.
3. Those who have committed crimes of immoral behaviour, prostitution, stealing, or fraud that are not severe enough for criminal prosecution, and did not correct themselves even after being persuaded many times;
4. Those involved in group fighting, instigating violence, making trouble that disturbs the stability of society, but are not enough for criminal prosecution.
5. Those who are employed but refuse to work for a long time, or damage the work rules and thus disturb production, work, education or scientific research, and do not listen to the persuasion or could not be stopped;
6. Those who instigate others to break laws or commit crimes, but whose crimes are not serious enough for criminal prosecution.
The dictator tried very hard to seek legal justification for the persecution, but the actual persecution process relied on the outdated "Proposed Regulations of Forced Labour," which is not a law and in which "anti-revolutionary, anti-communist party, anti-socialist" people are considered to be criminals. Since forced labour is an administrative measure, it does not need legal procedures. It can be carried out with a "forced labour ticket" from the "Forced Labor Management Committee" controlled by the Chinese Communist Party Secretary. So, prosecutors, formal charges, lawyers, evidence, trials, judges, appeals, etc, are not necessary. See how fast, easy, and effective it is?
As to which of the preceding six articles Falun Gong practitioners have violated, no proof is needed. As the author knows, in the early days of the persecution, many detention centres and forced labour camps simply filled in the "crime" column with "Falun Gong", which is later changed to "disturbing the social security."
In a period when "president Jiang Zemin" was also the military head and the Communist Party head, he dictated to the whole country. Everyone simply had to follow his orders, or else. How could you expect the "law enforcement officers" to follow the law?
6. Brainwashing "Classes" and Kangaroo Courts Funded by Public Money
Since the second year of the persecution, Falun Gong practitioners have accounted for fifty to ninety-five percent of the people detained at the various labour camps in the country. To date, more than one hundred thousand practitioners have been sentenced to labour camps. However, this number is still far smaller than the total number of Falun Gong practitioners. Even though the authorities have utilised all the jails, labour camps, detention centres, psychiatric hospitals, and drug rehabilitation centres to detain and persecute practitioners, they still cannot achieve their purpose of forcing all the practitioners to give up their belief in Falun Dafa. Therefore, brainwashing centres are set up nationwide to help realise their goal.
Of course, the government does not call such facilities brainwashing centres, but refers to them as "learning classes," "transforming classes" or "legal system education classes," etc. Brainwashing centers are located within schools, government compounds, hotels or reception locations; sometimes they are constructed from scratch. The abducted practitioners are taken to the above-mentioned locations to participate in the so-called "education." The so-called "education" period can be likened to a jail-stay, as practitioners lose all their freedom and basic human rights. The truth is, practitioners receive the same brutal treatment in brainwashing centres as they do in jails and labour camps.
The reason I use the word "abducted" is because the behaviour of forcibly removing and detaining citizens without any legal procedures, restraining their human rights and even torturing them, is no different from the behaviour of kidnappers.
People in the brainwashing centres not only lose their physical freedom but also have money extorted from them or their families. All the detainees have to pay so-called "tuition fees," "living expenses," etc. There are so many detained practitioners that there are not enough police or government officers to handle all of them. The detainees need to be accompanied by relatives, co-workers, or leaders from the work unit. The responsibility of these monitors is to watch the practitioner and they have to pay living expenses to the brainwashing centre as well. Hence everyday people are dragged into the persecution of Falun Gong.
Assuming all kinds of names, the brainwashing centres are in fact kangaroo courts set up for the purpose of annihilating Falun Gong. They follows no laws and trample the laws of the country.
Operating expenses of these kangaroo courts established by the "610 Office" are borne by the government, and are ultimately paid for by hard earned money from the taxpayers. According to some overseas media, in December 2001, 4.2 billion Yuan was used to establish brainwashing centres around the country. Internal documents of the Beijing Financial Bureau indicated that, in the first ten months of 2001, 32 million Yuan [1 Yuan is approximately $0.12] was used to deal with Falun Gong issue; in June 2001, the Haidian District of Beijing spent 3.6 million Yuan to form brainwashing classes. Similarly in 2001, the Shapingba District of Chongqing City spent 2.02 million Yuan on Falun Gong issues. All of the information above is very hard to obtain but it represents only a tiny portion of the total expense. If we include all the expenses in persecuting Falun Gong for the last four years, and add up the money spent in persuading members of the United Nations Human Rights Commission to keep silent on the persecution, the cost of undertaking and maintaining this persecution becomes even more of an astronomical figure.
The responsible parties' behaviour during this persecution has violated the following articles in the Chinese Constitution:
Article 37 [Personal Freedom]
(1) The personal freedom of citizens of the People's Republic of China is inviolable.
(2) No citizen may be arrested except with the approval or by decision of a people's procuratorate or by decision of a people's court, and arrests must be made by a public
security organ.
(3) Unlawful deprivation or restriction of citizens' personal freedom by detention or other means is prohibited; and unlawful search of the person of citizens is prohibited.
Article 38 [Personal Dignity]
The personal dignity of citizens of the People's Republic of China is inviolable. Insult, libel, false charge, or frame-up directed against citizens by any means is prohibited.
Article 39 [Home]
The home of citizens of the People's Republic of China is inviolable. Unlawful search of, or intrusion into, a citizen's home is prohibited.
In order to justify their persecution of Falun Gong in front of the world, Jiang's regime had to make an effort to come up with a "reason" based on some "law." However, when it comes to executing persecution orders, Jiang's regime uses all means possible to annihilate Falun Gong. Everything in people's lives and work, from government officers' promotion, hiring or laying-off, granting bonuses, positions of leaders; from enrollment and test scores of students, the hiring of police officers to the sentencing of criminals--it is all directly connected to the results of persecuting practitioners. The intention of Jiang is very obvious, which is to get rid of Falun Gong. Secret orders such as "defame Falun Gong, physically destroy them and financially bankrupt them," and "torture deaths of practitioners are counted as suicide and police can directly cremate them without investigating" have been passed down from the top. On the one hand, Jiang's regime promises to reward people who persecute Falun Gong; on the other hand, Jiang's regime threatens to subject whoever does not follow orders to severe consequences. This is why so many people were dragged into this persecution.
Let's use the labour camp as an example. The "quota" to transform practitioners is a fixed number that must be achieved regardless what methods are used; otherwise the police will lose their jobs or their bonuses from the work unit. Whoever does well in transforming practitioners is rewarded both financially and with promotions. "Transformation" means that the practitioner must defame his belief and also help police to transform other practitioners.
Police can easily get criminals involved in the persecution. In Chinese jails and labour camps, there is a sentence reduction system in place. In some cases, a long jail term can be reduced by thirty percent or more. For example, by law, up to thirty percent of the labour camp detainees may have their sentences reduced. Every six months, the police evaluate detainees and determine who may be granted sentence reductions.
The best reward for a criminal is to leave the labour camp as soon as possible. Therefore the criminals at detention centres, jails, and labour camps are induced to work together with police to set up kangaroo courts to satisfy their personal interests. The easiest way to have their sentence reduced, is to assist the guards in "transforming" Falun Gong practitioners. The tortures used are indescribably cruel and inhumane, with the ultimate goal of eliminating Falun Gong and its practitioners.
With more and more so-called "horror stories" cooked up and aired on national TV to slander and frame Falun Gong, Falun Gong practitioners have been treated as inferior people in society. If a practitioner and his family members were killed because of his belief in Falun Gong, then their distant relatives may not even dare to take a look at their corpse or inquire about the cause of their deaths. In some cases, even the leaders of street offices have the authority to determine the life or death of practitioners, totally disregarding the basic human rights bestowed to citizens by the Chinese Constitution.
The defaming and slandering propaganda of Falun Gong and the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners has employed all means possible, including illegal arrests, detention, interrogation, removal from government occupations, dismissal of students from school, public humiliation of practitioners, deprivation of human rights, restriction of the freedom, forced brainwashing, salary/pension deduction or suspension, confiscation of private property, physical torture, and the coercion of practitioners to sign "confessions" and to renounce and defame Falun Gong.
The above behaviours violate the following Chinese laws:
- Constitution
- Criminal Law
- Administration Penalty Law
- Administration Appeal Law
- Minors Protection Law
- Women Protection Law
- Education Law
- Civil Law
- Labour Law
- Nationality Law
- Copyright Law
- Judges' Law
- Prosecutors' Law
- People's Police Law
- Jail Law
- Demonstration and Parade Law
- Labour Education Law
- Appeal Rule
- Guidelines for the Use of Weapons by Chinese Police
- Publishing Guideline
- TV Broadcasting Guideline
At the same time, they also violate the following conventions that China has signed:
- Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide
- International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
- Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment
- International Covenant on Economic Social and Cultural Rights
- Convention on the Rights of the Child
It may seem strange that there are violations of the Minors Protection Law and Convention on the Rights of the Child. There are instances where practitioners' children were refused entrance to school, or arrested with their parents. In some cases the infants and mothers were tortured to death together. The crimes committed in this persecution are just too many to list.
To summarise, every aspect of this persecution, from the underlying reasons for it to the implementation of the persecution orders, is completely against Chinese law. The persecution of Falun Gong has violated countless laws and the damage caused by the persecution cannot be measured.
We need to bring the main person responsible, Jiang Zemin, to justice.
REFERENCE:
http://www.oefre.unibe.ch/law/icl/ch00000.html
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