Where are China's Human Rights?

In 2000, the United Nations passed a resolution in Geneva: human rights issues are not domestic affairs. However, since then cases of human rights violations are still not uncommon. The International Human Rights Organization has been deluged with tens of thousands of accusations of vast abuses of human rights in China, ranging from individual appeals to group protests. For instance, the recent incident of 36 Western practitioners protesting in Tiananmen Square is one of them.

On one sunny, breezy day in November, among the hustling throng in Tiananmen Square came a Westerner named Peter. Tucking a tourist visa in his pocket and slinging a camera around his neck, this thirty-year-old lad was not in the mood to enjoy the scenery around. He was going to protest against the persecution of Falun Gong by China in this sacred spot. He has been practising Falun Gong for four and a half years, and steadfastly believes in "Truthfulness, Compassion and Forbearance" [the principles of Falun Gong]. While attending a vocational school in Frankfurt, he made his acquaintance with a Falun Gong practitioner from whom he came to know about Falun Gong. Falun Gong has profound tenets behind its five exercises and is much more than a health-improving exercise; there are about two thousand people in Germany who firmly believe in it.

There are more than seventy million Falun Gong practitioners in China. This figure made the Chinese government so uneasy that they enacted a law to persecute Falun Gong on June 11, 2000, aiming to eradicate it. On World Human Rights Day (December 10), the International Human Rights Organization pointed out the current persecution of Chinese Falun Gong practitioners, in an attempt to stop the escalated evil actions of the Chinese government. The speaker of the German Human Rights Organization, Mr. Martin Lessenthin, said that the abuse these people have suffered in China is no less than what Jews suffered in history. In China, hotels are hanging posters reading Falun Gong practitioners are prohibited from staying there. Besides, employees must sign their names to ensure that they will not practise Falun Gong, or they would lose their jobs. Even students are repeatedly imbued with the concept that "Falun Gong is evil." Whoever expresses opposing opinions is subject to home-ransacking, imprisonment, re-education in labour camps or even losing their lives.

Why is the Chinese government so fearful of Falun Gong issues? The answer is rather simple to Peter, a student of the Sinology Department. The increasing number of Falun Gong practitioners and recognition of Falun Gong from the intellectuals in particular, make the Chinese government feel like they are encountering undaunted enemies. Falun Gong practitioners have outnumbered Chinese ruling party members. "Truthfulness, Compassion and Forbearance" are regarded by its practitioners as supreme beliefs. To crack down on Falun Gong, the Chinese government set up the "610" Office to arrest the practitioners by means of deceiving and tracking. In the past two years, more than one hundred thousand people have been imprisoned and re-educated in labour camps.

Peter and other Western practitioners protesting in Tiananmen Square called for the release of all the Falun Gong practitioners and an immediate stop to the slander and denigration by the government. To make an example of Falun Gong practitioners, on January 23, 2001 China initiated the Tiananmen five-person self-immolation incident, and then transferred the guilt to Falun Gong. According to investigation, these five people had nothing to do with Falun Gong. Peter said, "China has for a long time been ignoring human rights, and Falun Gong is the latest victim being persecuted under the observation of international society." Consequently, Peter has been bewildered by China's hosting of the 2008 Olympic Games and by the dialogue between German Chancellor and Chinese President concerning countries ruled by laws. Although the contract of a magnetic levitated-railway system would benefit Germany a lot, persecution of Chinese Falun Gong practitioners should not be ignored.

Translated from http://www.yuanmingeurope.net/articles/3752.html