Must European Businessmen give up their Beliefs in order to do Business in China?

Alfredo Fava Minor is the chief executive of a textile company in Shanghai. He travels between Rome and Shanghai very regularly. However, when he returned to China on 8th October, he was refused entry in less than an hour and a half after he landed. The reason given by the Chinese customs is that Mr Fava Minor attended a gathering to support the Falun Gong practitioners in Rome two weeks ago, and therefore his name is on the black list.

Mr Fava Minor has been very successful with his company in China. Six years ago he set up a master plan under his own initiative. He is also very keen on Chinese culture. He married a Chinese woman and employed 35 Chinese staff in his company. The local government once presented him the “Model for foreign entrepreneurs” prize. Mr Fava Minor is also a Falun Gong practitioner. Falun Gong is a meditation practice. The practitioners have no political agenda, but focus on the principle of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forebearance. However, such a peaceful practice, which helps to revitalise people’s moral values, is banned and now persecuted in China. The persecution resulted in misfortunes for thousands of families, and has been the greatest tragedy in human history.

In the past two years, the reported death cases have increased to 302. Over 500 were sentenced to prison service for more than 18 years. Over 1,000 were sent to mental hospitals and subject to psychiatric tortures. Over 100,000 were illegally arrested and detained. Last year, a 28 year old mother and her 8 month old son were tortured to death. Pregnant practitioners were forced to undergo abortion by the police, in order to keep them in prison. The bloody persecution by the Jiang Zemin regime has been as evil as the state terrorism.

In order to support the Falun Gong practitioners’ basic human rights, Mr Minor attended the larger rallies in Rome. Among those present were also Italian MPs, MEPs and NGO members. The Italian Parliamentary Vice- Chair gave an opening speech in person. What we do not understand is that what Mr Minor did was perfectly legal in his own country, regarding the freedom of belief and speech. Simply because of this, his rights to continue his business in China were taken away by the Chinese government. Must foreigners give up their beliefs in order to do business in China?

Mr Minor’s case clearly shows that the Chinese government’s terrorism has spread to Europe. What the Chinese government did to Mr Minor states that any European citizen could lose his business in China because of his own belief, hence the Europeans must give up their beliefs in order to do business in China.

We urge all European governments, organizations and citizens, to pay close attention to the increasing persecution of the Falun Gong practitioners by the Chinese government. We urge the Europeans to recognize the nature of the Chinese foreign delegation to use business and political lies to control Europe. We urge that we should respect the basic human rights of the Chinese citizens and the Europeans.

2001-10-24

Translated from http://yuanmingeurope.net/articles/2296.html