Reference Material: The CCP's "Show of Sympathy"

(Note: The reference materials reprinted from other sources were written by people who are not Falun Gong practitioners, and their views do not necessarily reflect those of Falun Gong practitioners)

The spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, Kong Quan, talked recently about the Canadian and U.S. Power outages. Speaking for the Chinese Government, he expressed his concern and sympathy for the suffering the American and Canadian people had to endure. This action seems to indicate that China is connecting with the international community, becoming a sympathetic country with morality.

I do not know if the American and Canadian people will actually hear his message or how they will respond. However, as a Chinese citizen still living a life in China without freedom or respect, I feel Kong Quan's expression is a little fake. Our Party and government should be concerned about their own citizens' basic human rights and freedoms, including the right to live, because the American and Canadian people have their own governments to naturally take care of their problems.

Tragically, not too long ago, a little 3 year-old girl named Li Siyi died of starvation in her home in Chengdu City, Sichuan Province. Residents reported to police that a peculiar odor was coming from their neighbor's home. When police broke down the door, they found the decomposing body of the 3-year-old girl crumpled on the floor. There were scratch marks from her fingers on the door. A government official said she died of thirst or starvation.

The next day, the Chengdu Business Times ran a story on Li Siyi's death and asked for information about the girl's missing mother. A reporter at the paper soon found the answer. Siyi's 39-year-old mother, Li Guifang, had been in police custody since June 4th, and police had coldly refused her pleas to find care for her daughter, which inevitably led to this tragedy.

The local police station happens to be across the street from the home of Li Guifang's second older sister's, only about 100 meters away. Despite her begging on hands and knees, no one from the police station ever notified her sister until 17 days later when the child's body was found. Currently Li Guifang is still detained. These are the names she remembers of those she pleaded with for help, directly or indirectly: police on duty at the Chengjiao Substation, Jintang Station, Huang Xiaobing and Wang Hualin; Criminal Control Team Leader and vice director of Chengjiao Substation Wang Xin; Another Vice Director of Chengjiao Substation Lu Xiaohui; Police in Training at Mu Yu of the Tuanjiecun Substation, Qingbaijiang District Station. Every single evil deed will not be forgotten. Evil is not something abstract; evil is done by people.

Li Guifang worked at a local steel mill, but was laid off without any welfare pay. Three years ago, Li got pregnant. Her two sisters and brother tried to persuade her to have an abortion, but she wanted the child. Relatives and friends said it was unclear who the father was. Li lived off what she could gain as a shoplifter and on handouts from her older sister, Li Defang, and her 92-year-old father. When he died last year, Li's situation worsened. Li Guifang took to stealing milk, rice and noodles from supermarkets, eating her fill, and selling what was left on the street at half-price. To escape from the everyday misery of her urban existence, her relatives said that she began using heroin. Li had clashes with the law on several occasions, family members say. She was detained for shoplifting, and two years ago she was arrested in connection with heroin trafficking. She was sentenced to two years in jail but was freed because no one was willing to take responsibility for her daughter. This time, however, this inhumane tragedy occurred.

But when a reporter attempted to write the story, the city government banned the newspaper from publishing it. Police told the paper that the reporter was fabricating the details, and she was warned that if her story appeared in any other newspaper, she would be fired. The reporter had no choice but to post her article on the Internet. Journalists from several publications descended on Chengdu, and Li Siyi's story is now known throughout the country.

A Washington Post article said, "The death of Li Siyi is the latest in a series of incidents that highlight flaws in China's justice system." Another scholar on the web condemned with anger, "the whole story shows the coldhearted nature of our system. What kind of country is this? What kind of society?"

In my opinion, Kong Quan should not mention the power outage in Canada and the US, but should focus on incidents like Li Siyi that are happening in China right now. The death of Li Siyi was not an accidental death, but it was accidentally exposed. Similar incidents happen in China every day--incidents like Sun Zhigang, a college student detained and beaten to death a few months ago, which is also not an accidental thing. What we have seen is only is the tip of the iceberg, or a drop of blood in the bucket...

If an official does not sympathize with his own fellow countrymen, or a dead child, he is in no position to sympathize with a little inconvenience across the ocean! As the spokesperson of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, Kong Quan should express regret and sorrow for Li Siyi in the name of the Party and the government.

Faced with national shame for the Li Siyi incident, Kong Quan either outright denies, or pretends not to hear or show the least amount of sympathy. If one has no shame, how can one have sympathy? I want to further ask Mr. Kong Quan, why not sympathize with those who lost family members during the Tiananmen Massacre over ten years ago? Fourteen years have passed since that June 4th incident. Those who died have found no rest; their family members do not even have the right to openly speak about or mourn their lost loved ones. Police are still harassing the Tiananmen Mothers, represented by Ms. Ting Zilin, every day with threats, harassment, and prison terms. You killed their children, but do not allow them even to cry. How sympathetic this Party and government is! I would still like to ask, why Mr. Kong does not show sympathy towards the persecuted Christians and Falun Gong practitioners? Many of them never did anything to violate the law--all they did was to hold on to their pure faith, but they are tortured to death and their families are torn apart. What kind of unsympathetic Party and government not only tries to control people's bodies, but also control their minds?

The bottom line is that Kong Quan's sympathy is only a "show of sympathy." In fact, we do not blame him, because what kind of official can hold on to his dignity and basic kindness under such a dictatorship?