Australia Urged to Amend Migration Law, Combat CCP’s Forced Organ Harvesting

He told me, 'Your eyes are good': Chinese refugee tells first-hand experience

Falun Gong practitioners in Vienna, Austria, stage a demonstration of organ harvesting of imprisoned practitioners in China during a protest against the importing of human organs from China to Austria, on Oct. 1, 2018. Joe Klamar/AFP via Getty Images

Australian lawmakers are being urged to pass legislation to help stop Beijing’s heinous crime of forced organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience.

On June 22, Migration Amendment (Overseas Organ Transplants Disclosure and Other Measures) Bill 2023, proposed by Senator Dean Smith, was introduced and went through second reading in Parliament.

The proposed bill, in an effort to amend the Migration Act 1958, would add a requirement to Australia’s immigration framework that persons entering the country must disclose if they have received an organ transplant outside Australia within the last five years.

Recipients will be required to disclose the name of the medical facility where the transplant was performed, as well as the town and/or city and country of the facility.

“This information is to be disclosed by persons entering Australia via the incoming passenger card,” Mr. Smith told the Senate. “The resulting data will then be made available to the responsible Minister, who will be required to table an annual report in the Parliament detailing.”

Senator Smith said the amendments would advance Australia’s mission to uphold and strengthen human rights.

“When organs are provided to recipients through illicit means of coercion or compulsion, the result is a tragedy in which one human life is prized more than another,” he said.

Senator Dean Smith speaks to the media during a press conference at the Foodbank Western Australia in Perth, Monday, June 26, 2023. Aaron Bunch/AAP Image

“This represents an egregious attack on the foundations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the commitment contained within it that ‘all human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.’

“Every time a person is pressured to sell an organ to another, or when a prisoner of conscience is executed and their organs harvested, this principle of universal human equality and dignity is transgressed.”

In its final judgment dated June 2019, the China Tribunal chaired by prominent human rights lawyer Sir Geoffrey Nice KC, who served as lead prosecutor in the war crimes trial of Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milošević, concluded that “forced organ harvesting has been committed for years throughout China on a significant scale and that Falun Gong practitioners have been one—and probably the main—source of organ supply.”

Organ Harvesting During COVID-19 Continued

The motion comes after the International Organization for the Persecution of Falun Gong (WOIPFG) released a survey report in April stating that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)’s crime of live organ harvesting did not abate during the pandemic.

“According to surveys conducted before the lockdown was lifted, China’s organ transplant industry was not seriously affected by the ‘Zero-COVID’ policy during the three-year pandemic,” reads the Chinese version of the report.

“Transplant clinics around the country opened as usual to receive patients; many hospitals said they had plenty of organs. Many people died because they did not have food or medical help, but the supply of organs was unaffected by the strict lockdown of cities and roads.”

The report’s information comes from ongoing tracking telephone investigations of dozens of transplantation expert professors, directors, and chief surgeons after the lockdown policy was lifted this year. The investigations involved 32 hospitals in 23 provinces, municipalities, and autonomous regions.

Fled China, Speaks Out

Wei Jun, a Chinese Falun Gong practitioner who recently fled to Sydney, confirmed allegations of the horrible crime with her personal experience.

Ms. Wei, who is in her 50s, recounted that when she first arrived at Mishan Brainwashing Centre, its head, Li Lijun, sat in a dimly lit corner after dinner and told her to “contribute yourself to the nation,” meaning donate her organs.

Wei Jun (L), who recently fled from Heilongjiang Province in China, spoke at a rally to mark the 24th anniversary of the CCP’s persecution of Falun Gong in Martin Place, Sydney, on July 14, 2023. Ling Xiao/New Tang Dynasty

“Later he said to me: ‘There are doctors in hospital cooperating with us, in the name of medical checks for your body, to see if your physical indicators meet the standards for live organ harvesting,’” she said at a rally to mark the 24th anniversary of the CCP’s persecution of the Falun Gong faith group on July 14.

“On another night, a man who looked like a butcher—it turned out to be Mishan 610 Director Yu Xiaofeng—stood in front of me, stared at me, and said, ‘Your eyes are good [for being harvested].’”

Australia Urged to Join International Efforts

If passed, the legislation will be Australia’s latest move to join international efforts to stop the heinous crime.

On March 27, the U.S. House overwhelmingly passed the Stop Forced Organ Harvesting Act of 2023, the country’s first bill to punish Beijing’s forced organ harvesting.

On Dec. 15, 2022, Canada’s Bill S-223—“An Act to amend the Criminal Code and the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act” received Royal Assent into law. The legislation prohibits the entry of permanent residents or foreign nationals into Canada if the Minister is satisfied that they are involved in activities related to the trafficking of human organs.

“The world is getting clearer and clearer about the CCP’s anti-humanity crime of live organ harvesting. In addition to the moral condemnation, many countries have begun to promote legislation,” Dr. Wang Zhiyuan, president and spokesperson of WOIPFG told The Epoch Times.

“I believe that big actions will soon be taken on this matter. The day of full reckoning for the CCP’s live organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners will soon arrive.”

Dr. Wang Zhiyuan, president of WOIPFG, speaking in Berlin on Oct. 28, 2016. Jason Wang/Epoch Times

Lucy Zhao, president of the Falun Dafa Association of Australia, called the Australian government to join its allies on this matter.

“The United Kingdom, United States, and Canada—Australia’s partners in the Five Eyes intelligence alliance—have all enacted or are progressing legislation to combat forced organ harvesting and organ trafficking in China,” Ms. Zhao wrote in a recent letter to members of Parliament.

“In addition, the European Union and several countries have also enacted or proposed legislation to address this in on to address this international issue.”

Senator Smith closed the motion for the second reading by urging that “it is not enough to be a signatory to international conventions such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, or the Genocide Convention, without doing what we can to ensure the tenets of these conventions are upheld globally.”

“This amendment is a step forward toward that eternal and noble goal,” he said.