Undercover investigators disclosed today that, in response to public exposure,
officials in China have now begun a massive, deadly campaign to destroy evidence
of concentration camps holding practitioners of Falun Gong; at the camps, the
Falun Gong are killed after having their organs extracted for sale. The situation
has now escalated to an even more alarming level.
The investigators said
today that hospitals in at least eight Chinese provinces are working overtime
to perform a flurry of surgeries, excising detainees’ organs, so as to “cash
in” on the bodies of the currently-held Falun Gong prisoners of conscience.
Post operation, victims are to be killed and bodies cremated, or moved to other,
hidden locations.
The organ “harvesting” spree appears directly
connected to recent legislation in China, titled “Interim Regulation for
Human Organ Transplant Practice,” announced March 28, by China’s Ministry
of Health, that would in theory outlaw forced organ removal. The legislation will
not go into effect until July 1—giving profit-bent officials a three-month
window for wanton seizure of organs. The new legislation, the Center notes, closely
followed disclosures of one such concentration camp for Falun Gong, in the Sujiatun
district of Shenyang City, on March 6 (news). In the past China took no such measures,
even after testimonial before the United States Congress detailing China’s
secret organ trade.
The overall trajectory is clear: the camps are exposed;
Chinese Communist officials panic, discuss what to do (for three weeks); a massive
cover-up effort is launched, including blanket denials and cosmetic legislation;
before the legislation takes effect a frenzy to turn bodies into profit begins.
“What
we’re seeing in China is a systematic cover-up, one in which Falun Gong practitioners—tens
of thousands it appears—are either being killed at an accelerated rate for
their organs or shipped to other camps and facilities to eliminate evidence,”
says Center spokesperson Mr. Erping Zhang. “We are deeply, terribly concerned
by reports of killing in mass numbers, and unfortunately, have every grounds to
believe the statements being made.”
“Regrettably, it appears
China’s regime is acting much more quickly on this matter than the Western
press, governments, and investigative organizations. SARS showed us to what lengths
China’s rulers will go to cover up and save face, and in this case the stakes
for them are infinitely higher,” Zhang said.
According to investigators,
hospitals and transplant centers in Heilongjiang, Hunan, Shanghai, Zhejiang, Yunnan,
Anhui, Shan’xi, and Xinjiang are working overtime to perform forced transplant
operations. Hospital staff members told undercover investigators that prospective
patients should “come in quickly” if they want transplants. Staff added
that they can find matching organs in as little as one or two days; under normal
circumstances, such as in the U.S., such procedures typically take two years.
One hospital staff member remarked that it would be difficult to so quickly arrange
a transplant “after this batch of organs is used up.”
Corroborating
this picture are the remarks of a doctor in Shandong province, telephoned by undercover
investigators working for the World Organization to Investigate the Persecution
of Falun Gong, disclosed last week. The investigator said, “I want a kidney
from those who practice Falun Gong, one that’s totally healthy,” to
which the doctor replied, “We will definitely have a lot of suppliers like
that in April.” When asked why, he replied that, “I can’t tell
you that because it involves… Anyway, there is no need to go into that. I cannot
go into that with you.”
“Let’s be clear on what’s
happening here,” Zhang said today. “Falun Gong practitioners are being
carved up and killed to provide a supply of lucrative organs. The international
community must act, and it must act now. If we have learned anything from the
genocides of the 20th century, it is that for horrific tragedy to take place,
all it takes is silence and delay by those who look on.”
A wealth
of information surrounding the camps in China has emerged over the past month,
with three sources from China testifying in grisly detail. Informants thus far
include a journalist from China; a hospital staff member from Sujiatun, whose
husband performed the surgeries described above, on live prisoners; and a military
doctor from the Shenyang military zone. The latter said that Sujiatun is just
one of 36 such facilities throughout China, and said the number of Sujiatun detainees—Falun
Gong adherents—reached a peak of 10,000 in early 2005.
Of the camps
throughout China, the largest camp, codenamed “672-S,” is said to hold
over 120,000 people, among whom are Falun Gong and other prisoners of conscience.
“Falun Gong practitioners… are no longer regarded as human beings, but
as raw materials for commercial products,” the military doctor told The Epoch
Times newspaper, adding that, “The Chinese Communist Party’s Central
Committee decided to treat Falun Gong practitioners as ‘class enemies’
and handle them in any manner that is economically profitable.”
The
current round of investigations into the camps is being led by the Integrated
Committee to Investigate the Secret Sujiatun Concentration Camp and the Facts
of the Persecution of Falun Gong in China, a civil group started by the Falun
Dafa Association and Minghui website after the Sujiatun camp came to light.
Posting
date: 10/April/2006
Original article date: 7/April/2006
Category: Media
Release
