Germany: People Sign the Petition to Support the Human Rights Torch Relay during the Wagner Opera Festival

The 5th of August was the third day of the second round of the seven operatic repertoires in Germany's Wagner Opera Festival. Some volunteers held an event close to the theatre to let people know about the Chinese Communist Party's atrocities of harvesting and selling organs from living Falun Gong practitioners. They also collected petition signatures in support of the Global Human Rights Torch relay initiated by the Coalition for the Investigation into the Persecution of Falun Gong (CIPFG).

Most of the people at the festival who signed the petition had travelled in China before. Some of them had a long conversation with volunteers and said the five thousand years of Chinese culture is very good but the human rights situation in China is not good.

Several people asked the same question: “Don’t you think that holding the Olympics could change the human rights situation in China?” But as soon as they heard that the organ harvesting on living Falun Gong practitioners is still happening, although it was revealed one year ago, people changed their minds and signed the petition immediately.

Many people signed to support the human rights torch

Some people knew the nature of the Chinese Communist Party very clearly but they said it would not make any difference to sign the petition, because the CCP would turn a deaf ear. They also pointed out that governments and businessmen all over the world turn a blind eye to China's grave human rights situation for their own interests. A person who had been banished to Siberia by the Communist Party in East Germany for sixteen years said, “What is the use of signing the petition to boycott the Olympics? My whole life was ruined by the Communist Party; All I did was say one sentence they did not like. I wish you good luck, but the nature of the Communist Party will not change because of my signature on your petition.”

The volunteers asked them: “The Communist Party’s crimes have deteriorated to such a degree today - isn’t it caused in some way by our silence? Did we provide it some ground for it to become so rampant? Those who do not sign the petition can tell their friends and relatives, or write to the president of the International Olympic Committee. Everyone can express their opinion in their own way, every voice is counted and every voice has power behind it. What the evil party likes most is people’s despair and their wait and see attitude.” After the volunteers’ explanation, the people who had doubts signed the petition to boycott the bloody Olympics.