Blogs | The International Coalition to End Transplant Abuse in China

Disclosure in China of the killing of Falun Gong for their organs

by David Matas

UK Parliament briefing session 25 November, 2014 / Welsh National Assembly briefing November 26, 2014 / Photo by Roger Luo

I have been asked to address new developments on the killing of Falun Gong for their organs. As time goes by and organ transplant abuse in China continues, the pace of new developments accelerates. Given the time I have, I will mention only one new development, the officially sanctioned disclosure in China, two weeks ago, of evidence of organ transplant abuse.

Official access in China to evidence of Chinese organ transplant abuse happened once before, at the time of the power struggle between the then Chongqing mayor Bo Xilai and then Premier Wen Jiabao factions within the Communist Party. The attempted defection of Bo Xilai henchman Wang Lijun in February 2012 to the American consulate in Chengdu and the scramble between Bo Xilai and President Hu Jintao to get Wang Lijun back led to a temporary lifting, in March 2012, of the Chinese internet blockage of work that David Kilgour and I had done showing that Falun Gong were being killed for their organs.

‘Bodies’ of the Persecuted

By Sam Rosenthal / Photo Wikimedia Commons

Extensive evidence suggests that both of the popular “Bodies: The Exhibition” and “Body Worlds” exhibits, which tour major cities across the world, have displayed and may continue to display the plastinated remains of Chinese practitioners of the Falun Gong, a spiritual belief rooted in Buddhism. In 1999, the Chinese government arrested and imprisoned Falun Gong believers by the thousands.

Masha Savitz’s debut documentary, “Red Reign,” chronicles the efforts of David Matas, a Jewish-Canadian human rights lawyer who has fought to expose the Chinese government’s systematic imprisonment, slaughter and for-profit organ harvesting of these prisoners. In 2010 Matas was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize for his investigation of the Falun Gong imprisonment.

With a rabbi for a father and an artist for a mother, Savitz spent her formative years in Parsippany, New Jersey. A Boston University graduate, she taught at religious schools to earn a living before attaining a Masters in Rabbinic Studies from American Jewish University. With her background in journalism as a writer for The Epoch Times, Savitz grew interested in filmmaking, and became an important advocate for the community of spiritual practitioners who have suffered human rights abuses of the worst kind.

A Bipartisan, Human Rights Issue that Congress Needs to Address

By Ming Chen, MD

When this month’s elections gave the Republican Party control of Congress, both President Obama and incoming congressional leaders pledged themselves to try and find ways to work together despite their political differences. But an opportunity to demonstrate that kind of leadership doesn’t need to wait until the next Congress is sworn in; in fact, that will be too late.

House Resolution 281 condemns a little-known but brutal practice in the People’s Republic of China known as “forced organ harvesting”: transplant organs are taken, without consent, from inmates in Chinese prisons, typically from people imprisoned for their political or religious beliefs.

This practice, which began 30 years ago and has continued despite dissembling and evasions from Chinese officials, has been extensively documented by journalists and human rights advocates. Among other things, this gruesome practice is a cash cow for China’s state-run hospitals: Chinese patients and wealthy “medical tourists” from abroad will pay between $60,000 and $100,000 for more common transplants, while organs like hearts and livers fetch prices as high as $350,000.

The Protocol on Trafficking in Persons and Transplant Tourism

by David Matas
Prepared for a side event to the Conference of States Parties, Vienna, Austria.
Does the Protocol on Trafficking in Persons of the Convention on Transnational Organized Crime encompass transplant tourism? That is a question I want to address. My answer to that question is yes. Getting to that answer though takes some explaining.
I should state up front that, though this question is general, I approach it from quite a particular perspective. I wrote a report with David Kilgour in June 2006 which concluded that prisoners of conscience in China, practitioners of the spiritually based set of exercises Falun Gong, were being killed for their organs which were being sold at high prices to transplant patients, mostly transplant tourists. We produced a second version in of our report in January 2007 and a third version in book form under the title Bloody Harvest in November 2009. Our report prompted the founding of a non-governmental organization Doctors against Forced Organ Harvesting or DAFOH. I and Dr. Torsten Trey, the founder of DAFOH, co-edited a book of essays on organ transplant abuse in China published in August 2012 under the name State Organs. Ethan Gutmann, in research with Jaya Gibson, announced in June 2010, and, in a book titled The Slaughter published in August 2014, wrote that the killing of innocents for their organs had spread from Falun Gong to Tibetans, Eastern Lightning house Christians and Uighurs.

Medical Professionals Support Banning Organ Piliaging in China

By Minghui.org

“We are aware of the state-sanctioned organ harvesting in China,” an immunologist told Falun Gong practitioners at their petition campaign in Hannover, Germany on October 18, 2014.

Falun Gong practitioners collected signatures on the petition drafted by “Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting” (DAFOH), and received support from local medical professionals in Hannover, the home of Medizinische Hochschule Hannover, one of the best German medical schools. The school plays a leading role in the field of organ transplantation.

The immunologist said, “I recently went to an organ transplant conference in Mannheim. A medical doctor at the conference, who practices Falun Gong, gave an excellent talk on the issue of organ harvesting in China.

Canadian Remedies for Organ Transplant Abuse in China

by David Matas
Presented to a forum at The National Archives, Ottawa
I want to express my appreciation for the remarks of Ethan Gutmann and Damon Noto. I have been on this file for over eight years now and it is a relief to have colleagues as informed and articulate as Ethan and Damon joining me and David Kilgour in our efforts.
Today I am not going to talk about the evidence. I start with an assumption that you are either convinced by my colleague or at least troubled enough by what they said to want to do something about it. The question I want to address is what that something in Canada might be.

Edmonton Man Wants PM to Ask for Release of Sister on China Trip

By Omid Ghoreishi, Epoch Times

EDMONTON—Robin Li’s sister, Hong Li, was arrested two years ago in China for practicing Falun Gong and was sent to prison.

Now Li, a Chinese-Canadian software engineer living in Edmonton, wants Prime Minister Stephen Harper to ask for the release of Hong Li publicly when he meets with Chinese authorities on his trip to China this week. He also wants Harper to ask for an end to the persecution of Falun Gong and the killing of prisoners of conscience for their organs.

“The thought that my sister may be at risk of being killed for her organs makes me shiver to the bone,” Li said at a rally organized by the Falun Dafa Association of Edmonton at the Alberta Legislature on Nov. 4.

Falun Gong or Falun Dafa, a traditional meditation practice, is severely persecuted by the Chinese Communist Party in China.

Investigations by former Edmonton MP David Kilgour and Winnipeg human rights lawyer David Matas, as well as American journalist and author Ethan Gutmann, show that the Chinese regime uses organs from prisoners of conscience, particularly Falun Gong, to sell for profit. The victims are kept alive only until their organs are sold, dying on the operating table to maximize the viability of their organs.

Dalian Corpse Factory Worker Exposes Inside Information

By NTD Television

Recently, a Chinese Korean Mr. Li gave inside information about the former Dalian corpse plant; which involved former Chongqing Secretary, Bo Xilai and his wife, Gu Kailai. Mr. Li said that he had been working at this factory for one and a half years.
Recently, a Chinese Korean Mr. Li said he personally experienced live organ harvesting and could testify when he saw in Seoul, the Falun Gong banners exposing organ harvesting and selling corpses.

Former corpse factory worker Mr. Li: “I can tell this plant was Bo Xilai wife’s plant. Once Bo was arrested, it was closed. I had been working there one and a half years. Nobody was allowed to enter without the specific card. Those allowed to enter the factory gave up our cell phones. Those who did not get the cards, had to pay up the phone. All were medical school graduates, wages were very high. I was responsible for assembling the livers. I dare to testify on this matter. ”

Mr. Li is currently working in South Korea. He said that normal people could not emotionally bear to be
in this corpse plant.

Mr. Li: “There was a special work shop to handle the dead: including boiling the dead like a bubbling pig in a big pond full of formalin syrup. They put two good specimens into one pool, but worse 4, 5 specimens into one pool. After that, they extracted all water and oil from the dead and injected chemical material. Eventually, it’s not like a human, but a tasteless and colorless plastic…..some are pregnant women, you know?”

Film on Organ Harvesting Wins Best Documentary

By Zhou Hang & Zhang Xiaoqing, Epoch Times

“Davids and Goliath,” a film about organ harvesting from living Falun Gong practitioners in China, won Best Documentary at the 9th Hamilton Film Festival in Hamilton, Canada.

“Davids and Goliath” focuses on the investigation into organ harvesting in China by Canadian human rights lawyer David Matas and former Canadian Secretary of State (Asia-Pacific) David Kilgour. The movie contains interviews with a number of patients who received transplanted organs in China.

“It is a fantastic documentary, really incredibly sad and horrifying. It left a good impression on all of us who watched it. So it was easy to select that one as the best documentary,” the administrative director of the Hamilton Film Festival, Nathan Fleet, said.

In March 2006, two witnesses testified that practitioners of Falun Gong were being detained in Sujiatun, a suburb of Shenyang City, in northeastern China’s Liaoning Province. They said the detained practitioners were being held as a kind of live organ bank and would have their organs harvested when they matched a patient seeking a transplant. More testimonies followed afterward.

The Slaughter: Canadian Book Tour Raises Awareness About China’s Illegal Organ Trade

BY THE EPOCH TIMES U.S. author Ethan Gutmann’s new book, The Slaughter: Mass Killings, Organ Harvesting, and China’s Secret Solution to Its Dissident Problem, is a riveting inside account of China’s booming organ transplant business and gives a glimpse into the Chinese state’s secret program to get rid of arrested dissidents while profiting from the sale…

Canada MPs: Forced Organ Removal in China Beyond Question

BY MATTHEW LITTLE I EPOCH TIMES

OTTAWA, Canada—It’s no longer possible to deny the Chinese regime is killing political prisoners and prisoners of conscience for their organs, said Scott Reid, chair of the Canadian Parliament’s human rights subcommittee.

“Nobody could seriously doubt the nature of the problem, the size of the problem. What we call ‘plausible deniability’ is now gone,” said Reid.

Reid’s comments came after investigative journalist Ethan Gutmann, and medical doctor Damon Noto, a spokesman for Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting, testified before the Canadian Parliament’s human rights subcommittee on Tuesday.

In sometimes gruesome detail, the two men outlined much of the current evidence of forced organ harvesting in China.

Gutmann recently released a book on the topic, “The Slaughter: Mass Killings, Organ Harvesting, and China’s Secret Solution to Its Dissident Problem,” in which he detailed how the practice began in Xinjiang Province where Uyghur Muslim political prisoners were executed and their organs removed.

Q&A: Author & Analyst Ethan Gutmann Discusses China’s Illegal Organ Trade

BY BARBARA TURNBULL
That’s the conclusion of a groundbreaking book on the practice of illegal organ harvesting in China.

The Slaughter: Mass Killings, Organ Harvesting and China’s Secret Solution to Its Dissident Problem, is the latest from Ethan Gutmann, a veteran China analyst based in London, England.

The book investigates China’s secret program to eliminate dissidents — Falun Gong, Tibetans and Uyghurs — while profiting from the sale of their organs. The purchasers are often from Western countries.

The Slaughter provides personal accounts from top-ranking police officials, nurses, doctors who have killed prisoners on the operating table and refugees who came close to being killed.

Gutmann’s writing on China has been widely published. He’s testified before the U.S. Congress, the European Parliament and the United Nations. He’s speaking on panels across Canada on a tour that brings him to Toronto on Thursday.

Ethical Standards and Chinese Organ Transplant Abuse

BY DAVID MATAS

Chamber of Deputies, Rome, Italy

I wrote a report with David Kilgour in June 2006 which concluded that prisoners of conscience in China, practitioners of the spiritually based set of exercises Falun Gong, were being killed for their organs which were being sold at high prices to transplant patients. We produced a second version in of our report in January 2007 and a third version in book form under the title Bloody Harvest in November 2009. Our report prompted the founding of a non-governmental organization Doctors against Forced Organ Harvesting or DAFOH. I and Dr. Torsten Trey, the founder of DAFOH, co-edited a book of essays on organ transplant abuse in China published in August 2012 under the name State Organs.

Going through all relevant evidence to come to an informed conclusion on the killing of Falun Gong for their organs is a time consuming task and it is unrealistic to expect everyone interested in the issue to do that. That does not mean though that those who have neither the time nor inclination to engage in this work should to nothing.

PA House of Representatives Unanimously Passes Resolution Against Forced Organ Harvesting in China

BY FOFG.ORG

At Friends of Falun Gong, we applaud the Pennsylvania House of Representatives’ passage of House Resolution 1052 with a vote of 198 to zero. The short title of the resolution on the PA General Assembly website is: “A Resolution encouraging the medical community of this Commonwealth to help raise awareness of unethical organ transplant practices in China.”

A special thanks to Representative Mathew E. Baker, the primary sponsor of the resolution, and the other representatives who cosponsored HR 1052: Becky Corbin, Ryan P. Aument, Vanessa Lowery Brown, Tim Mahoney, W. Curtis Thomas, David R. Millard, Tina M. Davis, R. Lee James, Tina Pickett, Rob W. Kauffman, Sandra Major, RoseMarie Swanger, Todd Rock, Thaddeus Kirkland, Mark M. Gillen, Thomas P. Murt, and Thomas R. Caltgirone.

Live Forum: China’s Practice of Organ Harvesting & Mass Murder – Guest speakers Ethan Gutmann & David Kilgour

Downtown Central Library, John Dutton Theatre (2nd floor)
616 Macleod Trail SE
Calgary, AB
Canada
Wednesday, 29 October 2014 from 12:00 PM to 1:00 PM (MDT)

MORE INFO

Military Health Minister Says Jiang Zemin Culprit Of Organ Harvesting

BY NTD CHINESE

Former Health Minister of the General Logistics Department of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) personally confirmed that former Chinese President Jiang Zemin ordered live organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners. These organs were used for transplants according to telephone records recently released by World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong (WOIPFG). The telephone record also confirmed that the organ harvesting crimes have been jointly committed by the judicial system, the military, armed police and local medical institutions of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). WOIPFG says the recordings expose only a small part of the findings of the entire investigation process. A more complete series of evidence will be soon submitted to the International Tribunal.

Since 2006 when the CCP was exposed for organ harvesting from live Falun Gong practitioners for the first time, the CCP Authorities have publicly denied the allegations with the excuse of “insufficient evidence.” They turned their backs and attacked innocent Falun Gong, saying the accusations were fabricated rumors. The outside world also did not pay full attention to this event due to the bloodiness and sensitive nature of the subject.

The Hinckley Institute Radio Hour: Organ Harvesting from Chinese Prisoners

The Hinckley Institute Radio Hour (Air date: October 1, 2014) – In recent years investigators have revealed a systemic practice by the Chinese government to use the organs from executed prisoners of conscience for transplantation. Many victims of this practice are members of the persecuted religious group Falun Gong. A week ago, September 19th, 2014,…

Italian Congress Shows the Double Face of Organ Transplantation

BY EPOCH TIMES

ROME—The congress of the Italian Society of Organ Transplantation (SITO) concluded in Siena, Italy, end September. Doctors and professional workers shared with the public the reality of a sensitive issue. From one side, Italy is one of the most advanced medical countries in the world, from another side, there is still poor information about the illegal organs’ market, which flourishes in some regions of the world.

Speakers who took turns on stage showed the same desire: give an organ to about 9,000 patients on the Italian waiting list. “We could do more,” said Professor Franco Citterio, SITO President, during an interview with Epoch Times. “We see that when people are informed, the number of donations increases.”

Professor Citterio recalled the 20th anniversary of Nicholas Green’s death – the 7 year old American boy killed by mistake by the Mafia in southern Italy. His parents’ altruistic decision to donate his organs, saving thus seven people, was widely publicized by media. The donation figures increased dramatically in Italy from that day, which reached 2,841 transplants in 2013.

The First Criminals in Live Organ Harvesting Announced

BY NTDTV

Since organ harvesting from living Falun Gong practitioners was first revealed in 2006, the relevant evidence and information about the CCP’s (Chinese Communist Party) crimes have continued to be exposed. WOIPFG, the World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong, announced the first list of medical staff alleged to have participated in live organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners. They are either the suspects committing genocide and murder or witnesses.

WOIPFG announced on Sept. 27 the first list of alleged organizations and members of 228 hospitals and 1,814 medical staff in China.

WOIPFG stated, whereas the CCP has committed the crimes of genocide and crimes against humanity by its persecution of Falun Gong, live organ harvesting is a serious breach of medical ethics and of any law enacted by mankind. Therefore, any individual participating in organ harvesting from living Falun Gong practitioners or prisoners of conscience must take full responsibility for their actions. These accused doctors, nurses, anesthetists, and etc., prior to providing credible and reliable evidence to prove his or her innocence, should be regarded as suspects committing genocide, murder or witnesses.

Letters: Stop forced organ harvesting in China

Thank you, Tribune, for your work through the years to help us all be more aware of events and concerns in our state, nation and our world.

Thank you to all four Utah congressmen, who were among the first of a total of 215 Representatives who have co-sponsored H. Res. 281 “expressing concern over persistent and credible reports of systematic, state-sanctioned organ harvesting from non-consenting prisoners of conscience in the People’s Republic of China, including from large numbers of Falun Gong practitioners imprisoned for their religious beliefs, and members of other religious and ethnic minority groups.”

Thank you to the U. of U. Hinckley Institute for hosting the forum Sept. 19, “Forced Organ Harvesting in China and its Effect on the U.S.”