August 11, 2006 Falun Gong Bulletin

Organ Harvesting Crisis Gaining International Prominence

• SURGEONS ENFORCE GLOBAL ORGAN TRANSPLANT BAN
  
• ETHICIST SAYS MOUNTING EVIDENCE DEMANDS PROFESSIONAL ACTION
  
• CANADIAN FALUN DAFA ASSOCIATION CAUTIONS MEDIA OVER COVERING CCP DENIALS
  
• 5,000 TAIWANESE HUNGER STRIKE TO STOP ORGAN HARVESTING
  
• CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR EDITORIAL: ORGAN HARVESTING AND CHINA’S OPENNESS
  
• CSM PUBLISHES PHONE TRANSCRIPTS FROM KILGOUR-MATAS REPORT

SURGEONS ENFORCE GLOBAL ORGAN TRANSPLANT BAN
The Epoch Times (Aug 8, 2006): “The international body representing transplant specialists, The Transplantation Society (TTS), has agreed for the first time to enforce a policy that none of its members should use their skills to take organs from executed prisoners for transplant.

[…] “Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School and Director of Medical Affairs for TTS, Dr. Francis Delmonico, said reinforcement of the policy was necessary following the release of a report from a former Canadian MP and cabinet Minister David Kilgour and international human rights lawyer, David Matas, which concluded thousands of practitioners of the persecuted Falun Gong meditation practice have been executed for their organs in China.” [read report at: http://investigation.go.saveinter.net/]
Full story: http://www.theepochtimes.com/tools/printer.asp?id=44721

ETHICIST SAYS MOUNTING EVIDENCE DEMANDS PROFESSIONAL ACTION
University of Minnesota ethicist Kirk Allison recently published a statement about the ethical responsibilities professionals outside China face given the “mounting evidence of Falun Gong practitioners [being] used as organ sources in China.”

Dr. Allison, Associate Director of the Program in Human Rights and Medicine at the U of M, says, “The systematic government persecution of nonviolent Falun Gong practitioners in China…has constituted the greatest concentration of human rights violations against a single cultural group in China since the Cultural Revolution.”

“Given a transplantation system relying on executed prisoners generally, and strong evidence of Falun Gong practitioners as sources in particular,” he says, “the following ethical principles and policy implications apply”:

• “Professional associations…should place a moratorium on research support and collaboration with transplantation in China.”
• “Academic journals and educational venues…must reject papers and presentations relying on data derived from practices violating standards…”
• “Academic institutions should review and suspend research collaborations involving transplantation, and transplantation data sourced from the Peoples Republic of China.”

For a full copy of the statement that can be circulated, see: http://www.theepochtimes.com/tools/printer.asp?id=44706

CANADIAN FALUN DAFA ASSOCIATION CAUTIONS MEDIA OVER COVERING CCP DENIALS
TORONTO (the Falun Dafa Information Center): “When the report on organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners in China was published on July 6th (news) by David Kilgour, former Secretary of State (Asia Pacific), and international human rights lawyer, David Matas, we fully expected the Chinese regime to deny the report. A simple Google search with the words: “China Denies,” after all, brings up over 7.7 million entries.

Any other nation faced with allegations of this magnitude involving their own government would, at the very least, state that they would investigate. However, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) continues to deny these claims and the sum-total of its response has been to attack Falun Gong.

The CCP has a 60-year history of suppression and killing through decades of brutal campaigns from the Great Leap Forward, to the Cultural Revolution, to the Tiananmen Square student massacre. It has frequently denied proven atrocities. Yet, why do some Chinese media in Canada continue to carry their denials instead of demanding that they cease these practices?”

For the full statement, including specific questions for the media to consider, see: /displayAnArticle.asp?ID=9450

5,000 TAIWANESE HUNGER STRIKE TO STOP ORGAN HARVESTING
Over 5,000 Taiwanese practitioners of Falun Gong joined a 24-hour hunger strike in the island’s Taizhong City in order to protest the killing of Falun Gong practitioners for their organs in Chinese labor camps.
Full story: http://www.theepochtimes.com/tools/printer.asp?id=44422

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR EDITORIAL: ORGAN HARVESTING AND CHINA’S OPENNESS
(Aug 3, 2006) “China is scurrying to welcome the world when it hosts the 2008 Olympic Games. […] Two paths lie ahead for President Hu Jintao and his unelected regime. One is to accelerate openness and reform and present an admirable track record of improved human rights to the world two years hence. The other is to try to hide huge discontent bubbling near the surface by cracking down on dissidents. The Hu government seems to be committed to the latter. […]

A report from two respected Canadian human rights activists, featured in today’s Monitor and widely elsewhere, charges China with putting to death “a large but unknown number of Falun Gong prisoners of
conscience” since 1999 and selling their organs – hearts, kidneys, livers, corneas – at high prices to foreigners.

[…] To gain the credibility it seeks for 2008, China should provide transparent evidence to prove to the world that such outrageous practices are not being conducted.”
Full CSM editorial: http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0803/p08s02-comv.html

CSM PUBLISHES PHONE TRANSCRIPTS FROM KILGOUR-MATAS REPORT
At the bottom of an August 3 article, the Christian Science Monitor published excerpts from phone transcripts cited in the Kilgour-Matas report as evidence of systematic killing of Falun Gong practitioners for their organs in China. Here is one example:

M: … So how long do I have to wait [for organ transplant surgery]?
Doctor: About a week after you come….
M: Is there the kind of organs that come from Falun Gong? I heard that they are very good.
Doctor: All of ours are those types.

For full article, see: http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0803/p16s01-lire.html

For the Kilgour-Matas report, including the phone transcripts, see: http://investigation.go.saveinter.net/
For more about the organ harvesting story, see: http://www.killed4organs.net/

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