Dear Ladies and Gentlemen in the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives:
Most respectful greetings from Gao Zhisheng! Allow me to express my sincere gratitude for your kind consideration and support in the past year to me and to the values I am pursuing.
In the past two months, I have twice read the Debates in the Federal Convention of 1787 by James Madison. Freedom, democracy, and rule by law and constitution are the values China has longed for but has not been able to enjoy.
There is a saying in China, “A bite when hungry is better appreciated than a feast when full.” Likewise, your persistence is especially precious given the almost total silence, or even subservience, of the mainstream international world in the past few years in the face of the tyranny of the Chinese communist regime, a parvenu government that stops at no evil.
Your persistence is a symbol that tells the world that the shining side of humanity continues to exist. The persistence you and many others demonstrate in refusing to collaborate with this fascist government is a strong wall that the overbearing communist regime can not surmount. This persistence is a buoy that keeps the oppressed from being completely drowned by darkness, and it is the source of strength for the downtrodden Chinese people who are struggling to resist the atrocities and defend human rights. It is the manna that gives us hope to persevere in our peaceful protest.
You and other people of conscience are an important force that makes it possible for the Chinese people to peacefully abandon the tyranny and to establish a free, democratic, and civilized new China.
I am not a politician. I promise that you won’t see any rhetoric, distortion, or pretence in this letter. Experience teaches us that though the world can be very critical, people often favor counterfeit virtues. This rule is brought to extremes in my country by those who vilify the good and glorify evil. In the past two years, the Chinese communist regime has demonstrated every vile act one can and cannot imagine during its efforts to silence me.
As if to prove its determination to destroy human feelings and conscience at all cost, the regime ordered at least four secret police to maintain continuous intimate man-to-man surveillance on my less-than-3-year-old son. My 12-year-old daughter was “privileged” to an even higher level of treatment with six to ten male and female secret police at her heels day and night, month after month, even when she was in the classroom. All my family members have been followed around by secret police and have been illegally detained at will many times.
During this period, my wife and children suffered repeated brutal assaults. The regime is determined to stop at nothing to persecute me, and made special efforts to reveal its true color of “what’s there to be afraid of, being already so notorious,” only because I stick to my conscience and responsibility as a human being. Behavior that is commonly considered to be too degrading for human beings is enforced in my country as [mere] political tasks.
Today, as we approach the Beijing Olympic Games, I ask you to pay attention to the ongoing human rights disaster in China, and wish you to forward my appeal to the whole world. I ask you to seriously consider the outlook of morality, justice, and humanity for today’s mankind, as well as to what extent such values are undermined in China.
More and more Chinese people are speaking out against the coming Olympic Games in China, which they often refer to as “the bloody Olympics” and “the handcuff Olympics.” They raised the protest, “We want human rights, not the Olympics.” Recently Mr. Jacques Rogge, president of the Olympic Committee, expressed to the Chinese media his determination not to be moved by these “desperate and indignant” voices. Meanwhile, Mr. Rogge asked people not to politicize the Olympic Games.
Though I have very positive feelings about the spirit embodied in the Olympic Games, I am not willing to rebuke Mr. Rogge for his dereliction of duty to defend the ethical values of the Olympics. But it is necessary to remind Mr. Rogge that the Chinese communist regime treated the application and hosting of the Olympic Games exactly as an important political task. Everything related to the Olympics is regarded as a political issue.
Liu Qi, China’s key person in charge of these Olympics, claimed that it is an “overriding political task” to ensure that every need of the Olympic Games is met. This is a simple and commonly recognized fact in China.
What the Chinese authorities failed to predict is how wildly the corrupt officials are taking advantage of this “overriding political task.” Under the name of securing the success of the Olympic Games, all kinds of evils have been committed in broad daylight without any obstruction, including forced eviction, illegal arrests and persecution of people who petition to the authorities, and suppression of religious people.
It is plain as day to all Chinese people that, with successes in hosting the Olympic Games, the communist regime is trying to achieve two goals. First, it tries to prove to the Chinese people that the world is still acknowledging the Party as a legal government despite all the suppressive and bloody tyranny and all the horrible crimes against humanity the Party has committed during the past decades at the cost of at least 80 million Chinese lives. Second, it wants to prove to the world that the Party is still fully competent in reigning over China and still enjoys the people’s full support.
As more Chinese people are waking up and rising up to demand the end of tyranny, the call for human rights is becoming louder and louder. Under such circumstances, the Chinese communist regime has developed a twisted but fragile mentality and a freakish obsession for maintaining stability and ensuring the Olympic Games at all costs.
A recent incident in Beijing fully reflects the regime’s fear of the people. An old man persevered, until his last breath, in petitioning against the forced eviction that robbed him of his home, and died for this cause. At his funeral, Beijing police sent hundreds of policemen and unidentified personnel in 59 police vehicles (mostly vans) to surround the old man’s residence to prevent people from attending the unyielding old man’s funeral (that was being held there).
Such shameful crimes against people of conscience have been going on for decades. A Heilongjiang farmer, Yang Chunlin, was robbed of his land. He was arrested for “instigating others to overthrow the state government” after he cried out, “We want human rights, not the Olympic Games.” In recent years, the illegal arrests of innocent people have gone beyond all limits.
Dear friends, as a Chinese person, I have a profound love for my homeland and our kind-natured and beleaguered people. I also long to see the day when the Olympic Games are held in China. But when I look at the social environment of China, and how the Olympic Games will be exploited here, my conscience and sense of justice make my heart ache. As you know, today in China those who link the Olympics with human rights are immediately hunted down by the communist regime and its gang as “the enemies of the state,” “the sinners of the people,” and “the destroyers of social harmony.”
We don’t support, nor pretend to support Olympic Games that are used as a political tool. Nor can we support or pretend to support Olympic Games that have no consideration for human conscience, justice, or morality. In a world where the mainstream political forces value profit above everything else, where morality is sneered at, we tried in vain to urge the Olympic Games [the International Olympic Committee] to perform its duties.
But still, I choose to express myself in a way that has almost led to the annihilation of my whole family. I choose to present to the international community what’s happening in China, the vivid scenes going in parallel with the preparation for the Olympic Games that are totally against the Olympic spirit, though at this moment people are busy congratulating themselves on what they have gained in the coming Olympic Games. I choose to do so despite the danger I may bring to myself because I consider it my obligation as a human being and as a Chinese person.
The Chinese Communist Party is a criminal group that operates under the protection of state powers. It is essential to realize its criminal nature so that we can come to the objective conclusions and in turn make the right decisions. I know clearly that due to their greed for profit, not many people would publicly acknowledge this observation, while too many people will just pretend they don’t believe it.
I. The Ongoing Bloody Religious Persecution
The virtues taught by true beliefs, when manifested in society, mean only disaster to the evil. Though the freedom of belief is dictated by China’s constitutional law, the communist regime has never stopped fighting people’s right to choose their own beliefs, a right that is justified by human nature. On the other hand, without a court that can enforce the constitutional law, the law has no effective bonds. Even so, the communist regime takes great pains to make sure the constitutional law is completely suffocated with numerous orders and regulations (for example, the Annual Regulation on Religious Affairs issued by the State Council of China).The bloody persecution of Falun Gong, starting in 1999, has surpassed all evils ever known to mankind. In the past eight years, over 3,000 Falun Gong practitioners have been confirmed killed, and countless others injured. Hundreds of thousands of practitioners have been sent to labor camps. Millions were illegally detained in the countless brainwashing camps established in every corner in China by the notorious 610 Office, an agency founded to lead the persecution of Falun Gong. Such brainwashing camps require even simpler procedures for admittance than the labor camp system, while the methods used to “educate” the practitioners are shockingly cruel.
Tens of millions have been persecuted in various ways. A large number of children have been expelled from school only because their parents practice Falun Gong. Some of the children were left unattended or even homeless after their parents were arrested. (Since last August my daughter met many such children who lingered at the gate of her school. The children, though homeless, risked their lives to come up to my daughter to express their condolence and support. When my daughter came back to relay the message, we were stabbed to the heart.)
The eight-year-long suppression of Falun Gong is so far the most long-lasting and the most serious human-rights disaster in China and in the world. This is why I am emphasizing it early in this letter. As a proof of this persecution, I'd like to recommend the investigative report I composed after doing an investigation myself. The report records the legally acceptable evidence that I collected as an attorney.
One of the cases in the report involves 28-year-old Liu Boyang, who held a bachelor’s degree in medicine, and his mother, who were both Falun Gong practitioners. The mother and son were tortured to death in the same building, within less than 10 days of their arrest. The last several nights before their deaths, the two could hear each other’s tragic cries during the torture. The Chinese police serving the communist regime committed horrible crimes to the mother and son, setting a record of shame that blemishes human dignity in history. By the time I was writing my third open letter to the Chinese leaders, the corpses of the mother and son were still held by the 610 Office that had killed them. Some other victims are still alive to testify about the persecution.
So today, I would take the liberty to ask you, and to ask all of mankind, the following questions:
1. Are the eight-year-long persecution of Falun Gong and the crimes against humanity committed by the Chinese Communist Party only a problem for the victims? Or are they problems for all of mankind?
2. Are the CCP’s genocide and their crimes against humanity a threat only to the victims, or are they a threat to the moral values of all of human society?
3. Is mankind capable of dealing with such genocide and crimes against humanity committed under the protection of state power? Here three sub-questions may be asked:
A. Does today’s society have the courage and conscience to stand up against the long-standing and openly committed genocide?
B. If yes, do we have the capability to stop it?
C. Judging by the definition of crimes against humanity and genocide stipulated in international laws, a large number of CCP officials’ conduct meets all the criteria for both crimes, including Jiang Zemin, Luo Gan, Zhou Yongkang and Liu Jing. As for evidence, it is nothing but ample. So after all, it’s a question of whether mainstream international society has the sense of responsibility and courage to honestly face this evidence. The evidence includes:
a. For each of the over 3,000 confirmed cases of Falun Gong practitioners who were persecuted to death (the number is still growing thanks to our indifference), we have:a. their full name, date of birth, ID, and addresses b. detailed accounts of how they were tortured to death c. documents to prove their deaths d. their corpses, ashes, and tombs as material evidence e. testimony from their living families or friends f. evidence for their arrests in most cases g. for those whose organs were removed, the stitching on the bodies and the telephone conversation record with involved hospitals, and evidence provided by the transplant doctors involvedh. a large number of photos of the dead bodies i. The people responsible for the killing are still alive and can be summoned and investigated by a special tribunal.
4. The issue all of us have to face is whether to pursue punishment [of the criminals]. Is China an exception when it comes to Public International Law for its crimes against humanity and genocide? We should not ignore difficulties to start this process due to the fact that the CCP has seized state power to give shelter to the criminals. However, it is feasible, possible, and necessary from the perspective of International Law to launch criminal procedures, including issuing arrest warrants, to bring the criminals to justice.
A significant part of this letter will be dedicated to the Falun Gong issue, as the persecution of Falun Gong is the worst disaster to humanity in this era. It does not mean, however, that the rights of other religious groups in China are not violated. The CCP’s continuous suppression of Christian family churches is comparable to the shocking persecution of Falun Gong. Except for large cities such as Beijing and Shanghai, where people strongly oppose the persecution and force the dictators to become somewhat restrained, the persecution in townships and villages toward family church members is no different from the disaster suffered by Falun Gong practitioners.
In my hometown, a small county, the number of arrested, detained, and robbed family church members each year is far beyond those persecuted Falun Gong practitioners [in the county], and this illegal persecution has been going on for a long time. Based on my investigation on the persecution toward family church members in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, the CCP has trained a dedicated group of police to focus on harassing, persecuting, and suppressing family church members, year-in and year-out. Just recently Mr. Zhou Tong and others in Xinjiang were illegally detained. The CCP’s persecution of Christians is an open secret.
II. The Brutal Suppression of People’s Freedom and Rights
Freedom is one of the most important spiritual factors of a human being. In addition to physical needs, man is the only creature on this earth to also have his equally important spiritual needs. It is a clear manifestation as to how blessed human beings are in the eyes of God. However, the Chinese people are ruthlessly deprived of this blessing by those in power. In China, freedom is not only a luxury item, but it also is regarded as a dangerous item by several generations of dictators. The suppression of people’s longing for freedom is against human nature and against heavenly principles.Freedom of speech and freedom of the press are basic indicators of a civilized society, and they are also the basic building blocks of freedom, especially social freedom in today’s world. For a country without rule by law, freedom of speech and freedom of the press are the only ways to ensure people’s rights and safety. Without this freedom, one can imagine how unabashed the dictators are and how helpless the suppressed groups are.
The CCP has always considered the control of media as a key political task. When implementing this task, the plagues for the CCP have never been any conscientious regret, but only problems arising from technological challenges. Recently, especially in the past three or four years, along with people waking up to pursue their rights and freedom, the CCP has become paranoid and has tried to use every method to control the media. It has created shocking incidents suppressing people who practice their rights of freedom on the basis of law.
In the past two years, Mr. Zheng Yichun, Mr. Yang Tianshui, Mr. Guo Qizhen, Mr. Guo Feixiong, Mr. Yang Zhengxue, Mr. (Wang) Lihong and a large number of other renowned Internet writers were illegally detained, and more recently, the CCP illegally arrested Mr. Lu Gengsong and harassed his family, turning a deaf ear to all appeals from home and abroad.
Recently, the CCP’s Ministry of Public Security issued an urgent notice to order Internet Data Center (IDC) providers to shut down all forums, blogs, and other online information exchange platforms before the 17th National Congress. If one center is found to have more than seven sites of online platforms, it will be shut down and heavily fined. This is another evil campaign in the CCP’s atrocious history to illegally suppress the media.
Freedom of association is regarded as a threat by dictators. In a country without freedom of association, people have no way to create a strong union to defend themselves from the brutal dictatorship. How can a group of people without any connection, as a result of lack of freedom of association, challenge a regime fortified with weapons as its state machinery? The feeling of fragility and frustration of the Chinese people is beyond imagination for those in a democratic country. In China, the whole nation is subdued by a small group of hooligans who segregate and persecute people, one group after another. Even the thought and speech about establishing another political party is regarded as a first-level terrorist event and is illegally suppressed.
III. Furious Suppression of the Rights Defense Movement
In recent years, the CCP has furiously suppressed the Chinese peoples’ rights defense movement to the edge of lunacy. A typical example is the case of Chen Guangcheng. When Chen Guangcheng, a blind man and a human rights defender, learned of family planning abuses in Linyi City, Shandong Province, through his own investigation, he made public the CCP’s practice of forced abortions and sterilizations. Chen said that a human being should be allowed to travel freely to the country and the world. However, his single voice caused the whole Chinese communist regime to panic. Their reaction was not to stop the continuation of these crimes committed throughout the entire country, but to exert brutal persecution against the upright and brave hero Chen Guangcheng, along with his innocent wife, young son, and elderly mother in her seventies.The CCP’s birth control policy is the largest genocide in the history of mankind. Millions of unborn each year have lost their lives simply because a few dictators made such a policy. (The Chinese regime officially released figures that the birth control policy has helped prevent 400 million births in the last 20 years). Common people who have not obeyed the policy have received extremely harsh punishment. The startling evidence of these excessive crimes by the CCP that blind Chen Guangcheng happened to “witness” and exposed to the public–these are just a small fraction of the long list of the CCP’s countless crimes.
In such cruel and inhuman ways, the CCP suppresses and persecutes the populace. Since Chen helped local villagers in their attempt to sue the local authorities in Linyi City for carrying out an illegal policy of forced abortions and sterilizations that reportedly affected thousands of local women, Chen has suffered severe beatings, illegal detentions, false accusations, and his family has also encountered endless harassment and persecution.
The CCP has been criticized as being completely insane and inhumane, which is very true. The CCP has no regard for consequences and commits crimes at all costs. The CCP knows clearly to what an excessive and heinous extent it has committed crimes against humanity, the people, and the country, and that the atrocities are startling. On one hand, they continue to deceive people and commit crimes. On the other hand, the CCP covers its lies and crimes at any cost. The whole Party focuses its effort on covering up its lies and crimes, which is labeled as “political awareness” among all levels of government organizations and CCP committees.
Here I want to remind the ladies and gentlemen of the open letter to Hu Jintao, written by the prominent human rights defender Guo Feixiong’s wife, which contains a detailed account of Guo’s horrifying experience during a year in prison. Guo is a human rights defender of complete integrity in both personality and conduct. His firm determination and persistence in his human rights work threw the communist regime into panic. In two years, Guo was detained three times, during which he had his first hunger strike for 40 days and second for 59 days. The letter revealed how the communist dictatorial system had blatantly tortured Guo against humanity and civilization:
“According to Guo’s attorney, Mo Shaoping, during a prison visit on Sept. 29, 2006, Guo told Mo that he was subjected to around-the-clock interrogation for 13 days. Guo had gone on a hunger strike for 15 days in protest against the torture he had received since his detainment on Sept. 14, on suspicion of ‘illegal business activity.’
“During his detention, he was subjected to physical abuse and was handcuffed and shackled to his bed for 42 days. Guo experienced the worst treatment after being transferred to a detention center in Shenyang City, Liaoning Province. There interrogators heavily beat him, shackled his hands behind his back, and sat him on a tiger bench. As a result, overpressure from the torture damaged his shoulder joints. Even more brutally, the police, headed by Tao Zhongge and Yang Naixin, applied a high-voltage electric baton to his genitals. On August 7, 2007, Guo told his attorney that this brutality of viciously and continuously striking his genitalia damaged his health and lead to incurable injury to his body.
“All of these to us are just like nightmares that we cannot get away from. In the past two or three years, the precipitous, cruel reality around us has become the main theme of our lives. How can the world become so absurd, and what on earth will it drive people to? If we hadn’t personally experienced the suffering and pain, we could not believe such incomprehensible things happening around us.
“President Hu Jintao, what I have seen is this: Your face looks calm and smiling, shown along the headlines of major newspapers; your manner of statesmanship plays well in domestic and international news; moreover, you are often found to be associated with bright events and warm scenes. But here, at this moment, I have to tell you a story that one cannot bear to listen to, as if it had happened on some other world.
“What is actually going on? Why have all of these things happened? Does the harmonious society that people dream about and long for truly exist? How far is this ideal from my own life? How far away are we from having true human rights? To the disgrace and indignity of all humanity, on Feb. 12, 2007, police forced a confession from Guo after using electric batons to shock his genitals, but they were not quite satisfied. On the night of March 19, officers dragged him to a secret location for his final interrogation and reportedly beat him. They tortured him the same way they would treat a death-row prisoner–with his face covered and hands tied. They beat him fiercely and concluded their abuse by shoving an electric baton into his pants and striking his genitals continuously for about five to six minutes.”
I am not able to see your facial expressions as you read these stories that tell how Hu’s regime treats people of conscience. Few people in China would be surprised about hearing such things. Unfortunately, this is because our government has subjected too many to this savage behavior for too long. Among both male and female Falun Gong practitioners that I have been in contact with, the majority of them were tortured and humiliated through the assaulting or shocking of their genitals with electric batons.
Since the beginning of this year, there have been large-scale forced abductions of appellants in Beijing, Shanghai, and other cities. The bloody violence occurring in broad daylight is shocking.
IV. Evil Conduct of Stealing Private Property
The Constitution of the Chinese Communist regime also regards the protection of private property as a constitutional principle. However, for over half a century, the regime has conducted enormous and indescribable crimes against property owners. As stated by Jean-Jacques Rousseau, when people feel the need to unite themselves into civil societies, “you will find no other motive than that of assuring the property, life, and liberty of each member by the protection of all.”The United States is fortunate in that legislators came into being after the War of Independence. The disaster of China’s situation stems from a militant and imperious regime that emerged during our civil war. This ruling force, whose evil deeds have become almost second nature, has continued to use its power to steal people’s property.
Let’s look at some examples of how the Chinese government has continued to abuse people’s rights through confiscating their property. On Jan. 18, 1956, the Secretary of the CCP Central Committee stipulated a policy known as “Management and Leasing of Properties” which demanded that private property owners turn over their land rights to the government. The government would then take control over the leasing and management of these properties, giving the former owner a symbolic rent fee at a shockingly low rate. This campaign affected 700,000 households, with the government taking over approximately 130 million square meters (80,800 sq miles) of private property.
In Beijing alone, six thousand households were ordered to turn in their property, which amounted to 199,147 ½ homes. It was later revealed that this particular plunder was yet another massive theft of private property after the government’s Land Reform and Socialist Reform programs. However, this round of theft was different from the two before in two aspects. First, the constitution was already in place at that time. Second, the government had issued a property ownership certificate for all these properties before the confiscation. Therefore, this very government revealed another side of itself–that of a crooked and scoundrel regime. To this day, the government still occupies these stolen properties and refuses to return them to their rightful owners. Most of these property owners have suffered tremendously under the government’s “Management and Leasing of Properties” policy.
Ning Jinglun’s family once owned 18 ½ houses in Beijing, which were turned over to the government in 1958. When an official made a mistake calculating the rent, Jinglun, who was 17 at the time, voiced his opinion, and was branded for having “political problems.” Jinglun was sentenced to four years and four months of forced labor for his comment, and his mother was held in a detention center for five days. During the Cultural Revolution, his father and elder brother were beaten to death, due to issues arising from the government’s “leasing and managing” their confiscated property. Jinglun was later labeled a counter-revolutionary and was driven out of Beijing along with his mother. The property has never been returned to the family.
Ma Lianfu and his sister were also residents of Beijing. Their parents passed away when they were still young. They depended on the rental income from their 16 ½ inherited houses to make a living. After the “Management and Leasing by Government” campaign in 1958, the government only gave them 15.61 yuan (about US$2) per year in rent. At that rate, the brother and sister soon became homeless. Staff from Tiantanghe Farm forcibly took the Ma’s into their labor camp. It was not until 1992 that they returned to Beijing, jobless and homeless. These two elderly people have suffered many heartbreaking ordeals. Even today, the government periodically puts the Ma’s under house arrest during major festivals and CCP celebration events.
Year after year, hundreds of thousands of victims of the “Management and Leasing of Properties” policy and their heirs continue to struggle with appeals for their unjust situation. On Dec. 15, 2006, the CCP’s Construction Administration Department issued a No. [2006]208 document regarding housing, emphasizing that “properties confiscated under the ‘Management and Leasing of Properties’ policy are explicitly owned by the state. Ownership status must not be changed.” The document also instructed local authorities to pay attention to these properties as they are “political” issues and “sensitive” in nature. It reads: “For issues related to these properties, no one is allowed to conduct interviews or report these issues without approval from the Construction Administration Department.” Millions of individual’s property ownership rights were thus denied by part of an unconstitutional document.
In today’s China, those who are in power are indeed worthless in terms of virtue and conscience. Even worse than their suffering a deficiency of such attributes, these individuals gained power precisely because of their lack of virtue and conscience. The rich do not even spare a tiny portion of their wealth to benefit the society. They are infinitely more concerned with maintaining the status quo than in changing it. They’ve colluded into a political clique despised by all and respected by none. With the excuse that their parent’s generation had made indescribable accomplishments to justify today’s dictatorship, they grasp and protect their privilege at all costs.
The barrels of guns, police, and prisons are all that account for their “spiritual” wealth. Without virtue or conscience, they stop at no evil; they seem to have no limit when it comes to committing evil. They never concern themselves with how much they’re hated or the negative image they project because they can resort to the above-mentioned “spiritual” wealth to further their pursuits. The massive shared hatred against this political clique constitutes yet another “possession” in their life, on top of all their existing evilness.
Over the last 15 years, this political clique has forcibly torn down civilians’ private homes to a completely irrational extent. They have forcibly torn down countless homes of the poor–an act no different than stripping the clothes off a person suffering poverty in the cold of winter. Their crimes do not just stop here. For a long time, through terror and duress they have relentlessly fought the appeal and accusation that would otherwise arise from their victims.
Take Shanghai as an example. For over a decade, courageous local citizens went to Beijing, one group after another, to expose the crimes of [various Communist Party officials] Huang Ju, Chen Liangyu, Han Zheng, Liu Yungeng, Wu Zhiming, and others. Several lost their lives in doing so; while many others endured illegal surveillance, home-ransacking, detention, forced-labor, imprisonment, forced submission into mental hospitals, harassment, having their phones tapped, and all kinds of suppression. Recently, 215 courageous Shanghai citizens, including the renowned human rights lawyer Zheng Enchong, wrote an open letter to the CCP’s chairman Hu Jintao, enumerating the crimes committed by the political clique in Shanghai that had harmed people’s personal rights and property rights to the extreme. In an open letter they wrote: “By any means necessary, they drove 2.8 million Shanghai citizens from the center of the city to the suburbs, and forcibly confiscated farm land and tore down residences originally belonging to one million farmers in the outlying suburbs.”
For more than a decade, Shanghai has been the origin and center of forceful land appropriation and coercive residence tear-downs to force people to move. In the past two years alone, the Shanghai city government organized 4,000 cadres from the appeals office to serve as a large-scale force to prevent victims from appealing. The government also organized a gang of ruffians to beat up civilians in order to implement the city’s plan to appropriate land. Civilians’ bodies were brutalized; sometimes their lives were taken away. All channels to appeal were completely blocked.
V. The Environmental Disaster Will Ruin the Future of One Quarter of the World’s Population
We do not deny some of the economic success the Chinese Communist Party has “accomplished” in certain forms, but these “accomplishments” are at the cost of destroying human justice, morals, and conscience, as well as the environment. In 2005, the Environmental Bureau Director said, “If our environmental protection measures could not closely follow economic developments, our economic miracle would end.”VI. The Problems Farmers Are Facing
The economic development does not benefit the people. Most rural areas are still poor, so poor that they are beyond the imagination of the outside world. Even though there is no more agriculture tax, this tax was merely one of the many reasons for the poverty. Its cancellation did not help reduce the degree of poverty.The current constitution states that all farm lands belong to the state or the commune, while the commune ownership is totally controlled by the state. Thus the logic is: “The state owns the land, the CCP rules the state, and the CCP is run by the bureaucrats.” Therefore, the CCP bureaucrats are the biggest landlords because they own all the land in China. Billions of farmers in China labor all of their lives on these farm fields, but do not own any of it. This is extremely unfair.
Currently in China, there are 120 million city laborers who are rural residents. They are the biggest slave group in human history. They are not treated with dignity. They have to do hard labor in very severe conditions and are paid $1.50 or less per day. Even with such low salaries, payment is often delayed by employers. Although there are more than 100 million farmers laboring in the cities, they are deprived of the right to form unions. Obviously, as individuals they are extremely weak before the authorities, which is the fundamental reason why they are taken advantage of.
After the June 4th Tianamen massacre in 1989, corruption accelerated. The economic reform, lead by corrupt officials, is in every aspect characterized by ignoring the interests of the people. Farmers, city laborers composed of farmers, involuntary early retired workers, and other weak groups constitute the majority, that is, 70 percent of the Chinese population. During the “Medicare Reform,” it was precisely these 70 percent of Chinese who were excluded from the system. Expensive medical costs deprived them of the possibility of seeking medical treatment. Hence, tragedies happened in quite a lot of the countryside. Elderly people would commit suicide to put an end to their illnesses.
At the same time, in order to pay children’s tuition, the lower class families are squeezed out of every last penny and down to their last drop of energy. Many parents committed suicide as soon as their children were admitted into a college. The government statistics showed that the bureaucrat group used 400 billion yuan of state funds each year on banquets, another 400 billion yuan on touring, and another 400 billion yuan on vehicles that are allegedly public owned, but only the officials have the privilege to use them.
VII. Extremely Unjust Legal System
Today, the corrupt judiciary agencies have gone all out in their anti-justice, anti- rule of law conduct. The Supreme Court, which is by no means a legislative entity, continuously issues judicial documents to disallow citizens the right to safeguard their rights, and to serve the needs of the authorities to plunder the Chinese people.These documents stipulate that attorneys and judges are not allowed to accept cases regarding the forceful destruction of personal housing, not allowed to accept cases of farmers losing their fields, not allowed to accept cases related to the “Management and Leasing of Properties” policy, not allowed to accept cases for retired military personnel, not allowed to handle early retirees’ argument cases, not allowed to process Falun Gong cases.
VIII. Disasters Have Become a Common Practice, a Part of Daily Life
People suffer disasters on a daily basis. For instance, as reported on Aug. 30, 2007, in Nanfang Zhoumo(Southern Weekends): On July 29, flooding in the Sanmenxia Coal mine in Henan Province trapped 69 miners underground. On Aug. 14, 2007, the Fenghunag Bridge in Hunan Province, which was still under construction, collapsed and killed 64. On Aug. 17, flooding in the Huayuan Coal mine in Xintai City, Shandong Province, trapped 172 miners underground, and more than 30 days later, they still were not rescued. Their chances of survival are very little. On Aug. 19, 2007, Zouping County Aluminum Factory had an explosion where 16 workers died. On Aug. 30, 2007, a small coalmine in Fangshan District, Beijing City, collapsed, and the local government decided to stop all rescue efforts in less than 48 hours.Shockingly, the local government officials even ordered the victims’ coworkers to stop their self-initiated rescue efforts. Mr. Liu Guojun and others were locked up, to prevent them from continuing the rescue, until the two trapped workers miraculously walked out alive after 132 hours. These two survived by struggling with indomitable courage and drinking each other’s urine during the entire self-rescue. Many people made sarcastic comments about the inhumane order issued by the local government: “It was a good thing that these two workers did not know the government’s ’scientific decision‘ to disallow anyone to rescue them; otherwise, their escape would be illegal, as judged by the ’scientific decision’ of the government.”
Dear Ladies and Gentlemen, the CCP regime has deprived me of my rights of freedom of speech and press for more than one year by means of the most primitive methods. As soon as I started to write this, my heart was filled with an upsurge of emotions. I am writing to you based on my firm belief, which is to say: I know that the above crimes truly exist, and have offended the sense of justice and freedom of the whole human race, including yours.
I truly believe that you all share those beliefs, and know that whoever does nothing in front of such truth, has given up human sensibility and responsibility. I truly believe that you all know, as we do, that western governments are sacrificing ethics and values in exchange for political and economic benefits that are right in front of their eyes.
I truly believe that you are all, as I am, longing to work to lift up human principles, change the tyranny, stop the evil, and end the common embarrassment facing the entire human race. I truly believe that you all, as I do, recognize that dictatorship and the inheritance of the dictatorial system generation after generation, is equal to treating all Chinese people as privately owned livestock as well as “inheriting” people as livestock when the leadership changes hands. The reason the dictatorship receives such inheritance is not due to their ability or virtue, but their lack of virtue. If this reality does not change quickly, human rationality will continue to be blemished and offended.
You all must believe, as I do, that to satisfy the evil totalitarian regime’s request to host the Olympic Games, is a dark chapter in the history of the Olympics, and puts shame on the whole human race.
My dear ladies and gentlemen, writing this letter is a heavy thing. If these crimes only happened once or several times, I believe each one of you would be as indignant as I am. Yet, in today’s China, these inhuman tragedies have become a common situation that is happening all over the country. Many people have become used to it, and they are indifferent.
The reason the CCP can sustain its power, is that by purposely attacking our conscience with violence, and numbing our conscience with lies, it is eroding our virtue on a daily basis, until out of their helpless state, some people start to rely upon the CCP, which in turn evolves into passive support.
Furthermore, it has degenerated a great number of people’s basic moral standards, to the extent that this group of people even defends and justifies CCP atrocities. Thus, the regime feels temporarily relieved because its power is apparently secure. Today, the CCP is expanding its strategy of moral corruption to the whole world. If the CCP succeeds in hosting the Olympics, it is equal to the success of its global moral corruption.
My dear ladies and gentlemen, a society has its “immune” mechanisms to avoid huge sins through morals, laws, public opinion, checks and balances, supervision, and the like, because everyone wishes to live in peace, and not in terror. When we witness those crimes against humanity happening all over the country, and those evil deeds challenging people’s basic senses happening in the legal system, media, and the environment, we have no choice but to admit to ourselves that our social “immune” mechanism is completely destroyed.
The force destroying the mechanism and keeping it from rebuilding is the Chinese Communist Party. If you are concerned about me, as a lawyer, from the standpoint of the legal system, I must remind you directly that no one more eagerly longs for the justice of the legal system than I myself as a victim, but every day the CCP exists is a day we cannot realize judiciary justice.
Dear ladies and gentlemen, Dr. Martin Luther King said,
The CCP’s logic on this subject is backwards. For them, “Justice anywhere is a threat to injustice everywhere.” Even if justice does not want to combat the evil as an enemy, the evil will attack justice as its enemy because the existence of justice itself blocks the path of evildoers.
Dear ladies and gentlemen, there is both sadness and hope existing in China now. It is sad that officials at different levels have reached a certain harmony in robbing common people’s properties; bribery is transmitted from bottom to top; and the higher levels are protecting the lower level’s crimes. Chinese society is in a twisted balance, like an ecological system, tolerating mistakes, self adjusting, self accommodating, and self assembling.
This twisted ecological “balance” is the fundamental support for the CCP regime, which explains why a regime that has committed all kinds of evils has not been overthrown yet. No matter what beautiful wishes Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao may have, they are completely incapable of changing this state as individuals.
The hope lies in the religious groups, be it Falun Gong or Christians, that are rebuilding morals by pursuing their faith. They are changing the destiny of China through their peaceful protest of the CCP’s tyranny, and by pursing their faith, they are becoming the foundation of China’s development and stabilization in the future. Any politician wishing to have interaction with China must not ignore this force.
Making changes in China seems so difficult because the CCP owes an unbearable debt–it has killed 80 million Chinese citizens, and is thus less forgivable than even the Nazis. In turn, precisely because the CCP is fully aware of this un-repayable debt, it killed those students who requested democracy on June 4, 1989. On the other hand, changing China is so easy, that is, it can be done through a moral awakening in every person. A lot can be done in this regard.
If you can use your actions, not just words, to support those free media outlets which expose the CCP’s crimes, support the efforts to break the CCP’s Internet blockade and send the truth to mainland China, and support the organizations who peacefully renounced the CCP to regain self conscience, China will change very soon.
My dear ladies and gentlemen, you fully have the ability to take action now to stop all of the CCP’s crimes against humanity. Just as President Reagan said, “If not us, who? And if not now, when? ”
Finally, I'd like to quote the words of the 32nd president of the United States, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, in his State of the Union Address in 1941 as the ending of my letter,
“In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms. The first is freedom of speech and expression–everywhere in the world. The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way–everywhere in the world. The third is freedom from want–which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants–everywhere in the world. The fourth is freedom from fear.”
Upon finishing this letter, I heard that President Bush had decided to join the Olympics next year. Pardon my manners here, but I'd like to shout out, “Mr. President, What are you doing? Have you looked at how President Reagan handled the 1988 Seoul Olympics?” I want to remind my friends here as well, I hope my friends in the Congress, both the Senate and the House, can establish merit for human civilization, as was done during the 1988 Seoul Olympics.
Jesus said, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you!” Those struggling in the CCP prisons, those crying under the CCP’s tortures, those roaming around to avoid mistreatment, all of these people need your help. When the CCP welcomes you with salutes, red carpets and champagne, when the skyscrapers and splendid neon lights dazzle your eyes, I hope you will think of those suffering people. May God bless America. May God give each person a sense of justice, responsibility, and firm determination. May the light of freedom shine upon China proper, allowing evil no place to hide, and may the mistreated no longer be in pain.
Respectfully, Wishing peace and health to all!
Gao Zhisheng Sept. 12, 2007
