Brussels (EFGIC) On the occasion of the ASEM 8 meeting (4/5 Oct) and EU-China summit (6 Oct) in Brussels, the European Falun Dafa Association calls on participating heads of state and the EU to take this opportunity to ask the Chinese authorities: Free all Falun Gong prisoners of conscience, and end the systematic campaign of vilification, arbitrary detention and torture against them by the Chinese communist regime.
The Amnesty International 2010 Annual Report states, "the campaign against Falun Gong intensified, with sweeping detentions...enforced disappearances and deaths in detention following torture... Former [labour camp] prisoners reported that Falun Gong constituted one of the largest groups of prisoners."
To date, there are 3406 confirmed Falun Gong deaths due to torture - unnamed “death sentences” without any legal procedure. According to an independent investigation report by David Kilgour and David Matas, there is sufficient evidence to conclude many Falun Gong practitioners were killed systematically by the Chinese regime for their organs, which are being sold for high profit on the transplant market.
According to Mannfred Nowak, UN special rapporteur on torture, among the several millions of prisoners in Chinese labour camps, about 2/3 are Falun Gong practitioners. They are forced to make products exported to the rest of the world (Laogai-goods).
Human right lawyers who defend Falun Gong cases in China are systematically being harassed and have their license being revoked by the Chinese authorities.
As the EU has put human rights on the agenda for the EU-China summit, the European Falun Dafa Association urges the EU to raise the issue of the most large-scale and systematic human right violation in China and the world today – the persecution of Falun Gong.
Kleine Wetstraat/Petite Rue de la Loi, adjacent to Schuman Square
Press point will be at 2h30pm, with witness of torture and supporters (NGOs, politicians).
Background:
Falun Gong is a traditional-style Buddhist “qigong” practice, with roots in the Chinese heritage of cultivating the mind/body for health and spiritual growth. By the Chinese government's own estimates, there were 70-100 million people in China practising Falun Gong by 1999 -- more than the entire population of France. In July of 1999 China’s autocratic Communist Party launched an unlawful campaign of arrests, violence, and propaganda with the intent of “eradicating” the apolitical practice. For the past decade, the Chinese Communist Party has sent millions to detention centres, forced labour camps and prisons. The use of torture to 'transform' Falun Gong practitioners is wide-spread in these facilities.
FOR MORE DETAILS, PLEASE CONTACT THE EUROPEAN FALUN GONG INFORMATION CENTRE - Nicolas Schols + 32 (0) 479 875 734
* * *
You are welcome to print and circulate all articles published on Clearharmony and their content, but please quote the source.
more ...