Czech Republic: Chinese Political Prisoner Zhao Ming and Human Rights Defender David Kilgour in Prague

Two significant guests came to the Municipal Library in Prague at the beginning of May. One of the two personally went through the Chinese labour camp system where prisoners of conscience are detained, the second introduced to the Czech people his revised report into allegations of organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners in China.

Zhao Ming, a former student of Trinity College in Ireland, came to Prague to speak about his experiences in a Chinese prison, where he spent twenty two months. In the beginning of 2000 he was kidnapped by the agents of the Chinese Communist Party after he openly defended Falun Gong meditation practice. In his speech in the Municipal Library Zhao Ming described the terrible conditions in which he was forced to live with his fellow prisoners. The techniques of torture contained forced squatting for a long time, sleep deprivation and also shocking with electric batons. Thanks to his University colleagues, the Irish branch of Amnesty International, Irish politicians and their pressure on the Chinese government Zhao Ming was be released and shared his story with people from many countries all over the world.

David Kilgour during his speech related about his own investigation of the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners in China which he lead with his colleague David Matas. Both of the investigators confirmed in their report that the Chinese regime is not ashamed to commit even the worst crimes against humanity, such as organ harvesting from living people, often without any anesthetics. The auditorium was shocked when David Kilgour quoted the telephonic calls with Chinese doctors who directly admitted that they could provide “fresh” kidneys from young and healthy Falun Gong practitioners.

After the speech there was a time for questions and then, visibly touched and moved people from the auditorium returned to their everyday business. That afternoon they received information which they could think about further.