On United Nations’ World Day Against Trafficking in Persons, the international community was urged to demand the end of the Chinese Communist Party’s industrial-scale murder of prisoners of conscience for their organs.
Extensive data reveals that China’s ruling communist regime (CCP) has been profiting from the sale of vital organs stolen from living adherents of the spiritual practice Falun Gong—which is heavily persecuted in China for promoting the values of truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance—according to a joint
statement released by the NGOs Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting (DAFOH), Romanian Independent Society of Human Rights, a nonprofit that has special consultative Status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations, and CAP Liberté de Conscience, which has U.N. consultative status advocating for freedom of belief.
The statement cites the
findings of the China Tribunal—an independent expert panel chaired by international lawyer and former prosecutor in the Milosevic trial in The Hague Sir Geoffrey Nice KC—which
concluded in 2019 that the Chinese regime has been committing crimes of forced organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience for years and “on a substantial scale.”
The tribunal’s final judgment (
pdf) stated that it was “certain” the organs are being sourced from imprisoned Falun Gong adherents and that they are the principal source. Uyghurs and other persecuted minorities in northwest China are also at risk, along with Tibetans and House Christians, experts have
said.
DAFOH’s executive director, Dr. Torsten Trey, believes it’s crucial to underscore the CCP’s organ harvesting crimes against prisoners of conscience like Falun Gong practitioners on the U.N.’s World Day Against Trafficking in Persons.
“Regrettably, the international community has largely ignored the plight and the persecution of Falun Gong—a group that the Chinese government has attempted to systematically dehumanize, demonize, and destroy,” he said in a statement.
The statement also mentions that in 2021, a dozen human rights experts affiliated with the U.N.
expressed shock and dismay at what they said were credible allegations of forced organ harvesting at the hands of China’s communist regime, targeting Falun Gong practitioners, Uyghurs, Tibetans, Muslims, and Christians held in detention by the state. The experts include special rapporteurs to the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) and members of a working group on arbitrary detention.
“Falun Gong—a peaceful Buddhist discipline rooted in the universal principles of truth, compassion, and tolerance—deserves the same awareness and protection as that of other human lives that the U.N. seeks to protect,” it goes on.
Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a spiritual discipline involving meditative exercises and moral teachings based on three core principles: truthfulness, compassion, and forbearance. The practice gained popularity in China during the 1990s, with estimates putting the number of adherents at 70 million to 100 million.
Fearing this posed a threat to its totalitarian control, the CCP launched a sweeping campaign aimed at eradicating the practice starting on July 20, 1999—a program that continues today.
Since then, it is estimated that millions have been detained in prisons, labor camps, and other facilities,
according to the Falun Dafa Information Center. Inside these facilities, adherents are tortured and face the fate of being killed for their organs.
Organ harvesting is a lucrative business for the CCP. During a 2021 hearing before the European Parliament’s Subcommittee on Human Rights, Sir Geoffrey Nice
said the Chinese regime could obtain up to half a million dollars from each victim’s body.
The CCP’s systemic campaign of oppression against Falun Gong practitioners has been
labeled a “cold genocide” by experts, due to the regime’s gradual and persistent efforts to annihilate the faith group over the past two decades. This term is used in contradistinction to a “hot genocide,” which aims to eliminate a group in a short period.
The CCP failed in its
initial hopes to eliminate Falun Gong within three months by targeting practitioners’ reputations, seizing their wealth, and attacking them physically.
“China must not be allowed special status to neglect and bypass ethical standards that the United Nations wishes to implement worldwide,” Dr. Trey said.
“If China wishes to remain a member state of the United Nations, it must also conform to zero tolerance against human trafficking,” he added.
World Day Against Trafficking in Persons on July 30 is a U.N. campaign to raise awareness about human trafficking and appeal to states and civil society to strengthen their efforts to prevent and combat such crimes.
“On the International Day Against Trafficking in Persons, it is crucial to address this heinous violation of human rights, ensure global accountability, and protect the rights and dignity of all individuals, including Falun Gong practitioners, who are victims of this abhorrent practice,” Thierry Valle, president of CAP Liberté de Conscience, told The Epoch Times.
Eva Fu contributed to this report.
