Declaration of Independence of the Nations of High Asia, Inner Mongolia, East Turkistan and Tibet
There is a rare and defining moment in human history when a crushing and
seemingly permanent tyranny reveals on the surface of its implacable
structure the first tiny cracks of impending collapse — allowing the first
stirrings of hope among long oppressed peoples and subjugated nations.
Such a transition was heralded in Eastern and Central Europe and parts of
Central Asia by the fall of the Berlin Wall.
For the people of Inner Mongolia, East Turkistan and Tibet such a moment
may be at hand. China’s economic boom has created enormous and
irresolvable problems and conflicts that threaten to tear Chinese society
apart. Endemic official corruption, desperate peasant uprisings,
large-scale labour unrest, harsh religious repression, ever-widening
economic disparity, ecological devastation, absence of legal recourse to
justice and the almost non-existence of civil society, have been the
cause, according to official Chinese reports, of over 45,000
demonstrations and riots, many violent, all over China in the last year.
The Tibetans, the Uyghur people of East Turkistan and Mongols have
traditionally desired only to live in freedom in their own independent
homelands, but this desire has been thwarted and crushed by Communist
China for over fifty years. It is a matter of history that Communist China
invaded Tibet in 1949-50 overpowering and smashing a small Tibetan army
defending its homeland. It is also the case that East Turkistan and Inner
Mongolia were forcibly occupied by Communist troops in 1949. In no case
did Communist China’s rule in these countries come about through the
consent of the people or even through an accident of history.
Since then China has systematically undermined the ancient way of life of
these peoples, first doing away with their legitimate governments, and
then imprisoning, torturing and executing many of their traditional
rulers, chieftains and spiritual leaders. When the people of these nations
refused to accept these injustices and depredations, the Chinese Communist
army and State Security organs crushed all such resistance with
overwhelming violence. Millions of Tibetans, Uyghurs and Mongols were
killed. Millions more were imprisoned or deported to forced labour camps
(laogai). The people in these lands had, in the past, enjoyed a
sufficiency in basic needs, but now the policies of the Communist
government caused widespread crop failure, recurring famines and mass
starvation where millions of people especially women, children and the
elderly perished.
Under the slogan of revolutionary “struggle” (douzheng), the Communist
administration in these regions coerced and forced the people to spy on
and inform on each other, often employing even children to report on their
parents and participate in public denunciations and “struggles”. All
customary, in fact universal, human values of friendship, hospitality,
trust, respect, tolerance, peace and compassion were regarded by the
Communist authorities as “feudal” and “counter-revolutionary”.
During the years of the “Cultural Revolution”, people were compelled to
destroy their own temples, monasteries, and mosques. Nearly all buildings
and monuments of historical, cultural and religious importance in these
countries were demolished and their treasures and art objects looted and
shipped to China for their precious metals or for sale on the Asian art
market. The mineral wealth, forests, water and other natural resources of
these lands have, especially in the last couple of decades, not only been
systematically exploited to benefit China, but have also been
thoughtlessly wasted and the environment devastated because of the extreme
policies of China’s leadership.
Right now China’s population transfer policy has flooded Inner Mongolia,
East Turkistan and Tibet with Chinese migrants, completely marginalizing
the indigenous population and making them a minority in their own
homelands. Native craftsmen, small businessmen, workers and even labourers
have been near completely displaced by Chinese immigrants, causing
tremendous social problems, and psychological distress among the native
population.
All the while, the informers, the various organs of State Security
(gongan), the State Psychiatric Units (ankang) and the “People’s
Liberation Army” are relentlessly going about their task of spreading
terror throughout these lands and forcing the submission of their peoples.
We individuals and our organisations assembled here today are firmly
behind all the Tibetans, Uyghurs and Mongols who in their homelands are
standing up and demanding independence, and we mutually pledge to fully
support those inside who risk everything, including their lives, in the
quest for a free and democratic homeland. We appeal to the global
community of nations as to the rectitude of our intentions and do thus
declare that Tibet, East Turkistan and Inner Mongolia are absolved of all
political connections to the People’s Republic of China, or any future
Chinese state and government, and shall henceforth be free and independent
nations, each irrevocably committed to a democratic system of government,
established by the free will of the people, and based on the rule of law
and the primacy of individual freedom.
In the case of Taiwan we have a travesty of international justice where a
fully independent, prosperous and democratic nation, is not recognized as
such by other nations, primarily out of concern for displeasing Communist
China. Taiwan may have once been a part of China, but most member states
of the United Nations Organization were at one point or another in their
history a part of another nation or empire. Taiwan was only a province of
China briefly for eight years between 1887 and 1895. Taiwan was, by the
treaty of Shimonoseki (1895), ceded, in perpetuity, to Japan. Whatever the
ramifications of its varied history the people of Taiwan have the right,
as do all peoples in the world, to self-determination; and furthermore
through their successful efforts in creating a progressive and prosperous
democratic state have more than earned the right to nationhood. China’s
numerous and increasingly belligerent threats to invade Taiwan must be
condemned by the international community and Taiwan’s right to
independence recognized.
We call upon individual nations of the world and the United Nations
Organization to support the inalienable right of Uyghurs, Mongols,
Tibetans and Taiwanese to independent homelands. We appeal to the United
States of America, the first liberal democratic nation in the world, to
give due recognition to the rightful cause of these peoples and aid them
in their noble quest for independence, freedom and democracy.
19th September 2006, Conference Room HC-9, U.S. Congress, Capitol Hill,
Washington D.C.
September 23rd, 2006 at 7:38 pm
[…] read the whole thing here … […]
October 12th, 2006 at 5:18 pm
another take on china…
“ DEAD …TO GO PLEASE…” —info compilation from 3 w.pages…
…China metes out capital punishment from specially equipped “death vans” that shuttle from town to town…
…Makers of the death vans say the vehicles and injections are a civilized alternative to the firing squad, ending the life of the condemned more quickly, clinically and safely. The switch from gunshots to injections is a sign that China “promotes human rights now,” says Kang Zhongwen…”I’m most proud of the bed. It’s very humane, like an ambulance,” Kang says. He points to the power-driven metal stretcher that glides out at an incline. “It’s too brutal to haul a person aboard,” he says. “This makes it convenient for the criminal and the guards.” …
…The mobile death fleet is being touted by Chinese legal officials as the latest advance in China’s judicial system as Beijing tries to revamp its international image ahead of playing host to the 2008 Summer Olympic Games…
…The vans are now in vogue because they allow for death sentences to be carried out without the usual trip to the execution grounds and they are cheaper - each execution van is priced at about 500,000 yuan (US$60,000) and, of course, can be reused. Lethal injections require only four people to assist in the execution, while the practice of death by firing squad needs numerous guards at the execution site and along the road to the site…
…The lethal cocktail used in the injections is mixed only in Beijing, something that has prompted complaints from local courts. “Some places can’t afford the cost of sending a person to Beijing — perhaps $250 — plus $125 more for the drug,” says Qiu Xingsheng, a former judge working as a lawyer in Chongqing. Death-by-gunshot requires “very little expense,” he says…
…Qiu has attended executions by firing squad where the kneeling prisoner is shot in the back of the head. The guards “ask the prisoner to open his mouth, so the bullet can pass out of the mouth and leave the face intact,” he says…
…The People’s Republic of China continues to regard statistics on the death penalty as a “state secret” despite internationally accepted instruments requiring all countries still using the death penalty to publish statistics on its use…It remains, therefore, impossible to know the number of people executed each year by the Chinese state…
…For years, foreign human rights groups have accused China of arbitrary executions and cruelty in its use of capital punishment … Amnesty International estimates there were at least 1,770 executions in China in 2005 — vs. 60 in the United States, but the group says on its website that the toll could be as high as 8,000 prisoners…
…According to one estimate based upon internal Chinese Communist Party (CCP) documents, 60,000 people were executed in the four years from 1997-2001, an average of 15,000 people per year…
…A partial illustration of the shortfall between the reports and reality is given by the following example: According to Amnesty International’s monitoring, 17 people were executed in Yunnan Province in 2002. However, in March 2003 the official press reported that Yunnan Province had acquired 18 mobile execution chambers - buses bought and converted at a cost of 500,000 Yuan (US$60,000) each in which lethal injections are administered to convicts.(1) It is highly unlikely that 17 executions per year in the province could justify investment in a fleet of 18 such vehicles…
…According to official national statistics, the conviction rate for all crimes for the five years from 1998 to 2002 was 99.1%.(8) An almost ‘perfect’ conviction rate is deeply worrisome in the context of factors…such as increased detentions and arrests, torture to extort confessions, restricted access to legal representation, the absence of a presumption of innocence, extreme pressure on the police, procuratorate and courts to secure convictions during “strike hard”, and courts passing guilty verdicts through a sense of political obligation and a desire to maintain resolve rather than rigor…
…The UN Human Rights Committee has determined that many categories of crime or specific offences do not fall within the “most serious crimes” stipulated in ICCPR Article 6(2). These include, “theft by force” and “crimes that do not result in loss of life”.(18)… Burglary is a capital offence under Article 264 of China’s Criminal Law… one of China’s foremost experts and commentators on the death penalty, Professor Zhao Bingzhi from People’s University in Beijing, states that 69% of capital crimes defined in China’s Criminal Law are non-violent.(19)…
…However…the scope of certain Articles has been expanded by the Supreme People’s Court and the legislature’s interpretations, applying the death penalty to ever broader sets of circumstances, and thereby increasing the number of people potentially liable to execution…
…For example, following amendments to the Criminal Law in December 2001, the death penalty can be applied to vaguely-defined offences of funding or carrying out “terrorist crimes”, and for belonging to a “terrorist organisation”, even if actual membership has involved no other crime.(25)…
…A judicial interpretation issued by the Supreme People’s Court in May 2003 could apply the death sentence to people suffering from SARS and who break quarantine under a public order clause in the Criminal Law to prevent the deliberate spread of “contagious-disease pathogens”.(26)…
…Some crimes under Chinese law, including vaguely worded crimes of “endangering national security”, are also potentially capital offences, including “splitting the state” or “undermining national unity” (Article 103) and “supplying state secrets or intelligence overseas” (Article 111)…
…The UN Human Rights Committee has also specified that “[…] it is contrary to the Covenant to impose the death penalty for crimes which are of an economic nature”.(20) However, it remains potentially a capital offence under China’s Criminal Law for example to commit tax fraud (Article 205, 206); to produce counterfeit currency (Article 170); to embezzle state property (Article 382); to demand or accept a bribe (Article 383); to smuggle contraband across China’s borders (Article 151) as well as to be a pimp (Article 240) and to kill a panda.(21)…
…The use of torture and ill-treatment in China as a means to extort confessions and other incriminating evidence from suspects, defendants and witnesses is widely reported…
…The People’s Republic of China is a state party to the United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (CAT), ratified by China on 4 Oct 1988. However, China has not yet acceded to the Optional Protocol to the Convention, adopted by the UN General Assembly on 18 December 2002, which allows for regular visits of inspection to places of detention by national and international bodies…
…Numerous accounts of torture in China include details of detainees being suspended from a door or ceiling by handcuffs locked behind their back, or otherwise rendered immobile with chains or ropes. While the detainee is in a prone and defenceless position, officials attack the detainee with truncheons, electric shock batons and other weapons.(44)…
…Article 46 of the Criminal Procedure Law regulates that a person cannot be convicted solely on the evidence of their confession… Confessions are central to most prosecutions monitored by Amnesty International. In these circumstances police regularly torture suspects and their co-defendants to extort further information which can be used as corroborating ‘evidence’…
During Chen Guoqing’s first trial in 1996, he and his three fellow defendants bared their scars to the courtroom, saying that the wounds had been inflicted by police officers torturing them to extort their confessions. However, the judge reportedly brushed aside their complaints, saying “[…] that the four defendants confessed is on record. The facts are clear and there is sufficient evidence to convict.”(41) All four were sentenced to death…
…Amnesty International is unable to confirm whether all people facing a possible death penalty are granted legal representation, as required by Article 34 the Criminal Procedure Law. China’s system of legal aid started in 1996, and is known to be severely under-funded. 600,000 people reportedly applied for legal aid in 2002 - decided on a means-tested basis - but only 120,000 people, or 20% of applicants were successful.(51)…
…In practice, lawyers are often obstructed from assisting their clients. Police, procuratorate offices and courts reportedly tend to view a lawyer’s involvement in a case as detrimental to their chances of securing a conviction. Obstructions can take the form of police imposing short time-limits on meetings between a lawyer and suspect - five or ten minutes; limiting the number of meetings to perhaps only one pre-trial meeting; requiring the lawyer to brief police on the questions the lawyer intends to ask their client, with the possibility of police terminating the meeting if the lawyer strays from the approved line of enquiry; severely limiting a lawyer’s access to the prosecution’s documentary and material evidence; or charging exorbitant fees for supplying copies of documents.(55)…
…Defendants in capital cases are therefore likely to stand trial in a court which has already decided a verdict and possibly even a sentence. This is a probable explanation for the very short duration of trials: it is common for people to be sentenced to death following a trial of first instance lasting no more than one hour.(76) (It should also be repeated in this context that between 1998 and 2002, 99.1% of all trials of first instance ended with a guilty verdict.(77)…
…When the Criminal Procedure Law was revised and promulgated in 1996, commentators pointed to various articles and clauses which although did not explicitly state that suspects were to be presumed innocent, at least when viewed in unison, the principle of a presumption of innocence could be inferred…
…Article 35 still places the burden of proof upon the defendant: “The responsibility of a defender is, on the basis of the facts and the law, to present materials and opinions proving that the criminal suspect or defendant is innocent, that the crime is minor, or that the defendant should receive a mitigated punishment or be exempted from criminal responsibility, safeguarding the lawful rights and interests of the defendant.”…
…A stark example of the lack of a presumption of innocence is the case of Wang You’en, who was tried and retried a total of four times on a charge of murder, and sentenced to death each time. At his third trial on 24 February 2000, a judge asked him in court, “What evidence do you have that you didn’t commit the murder?” Wang was finally pronounced not guilty on 8 November 2000 by Heilongjiang High People’s Court on the grounds of lack of evidence, just over six years after his initial detention.(88)…
…Article 211 of the Criminal Procedure Law states: “After receiving an order to execute the death sentence from the Supreme People’s Court, the people’s courts at lower levels shall, within seven days, deliver the criminal for execution of the sentence.” However, as previously noted, in contravention of Article 211, orders from the Supreme People’s Court are not actually needed for the majority of executions in China, which are instead carried out by an intermediate-level court with the approval of the provincial-level court…
…Condemned prisoners are often executed just minutes or hours after their appeal has failed…
…In December 2003, the Supreme People’s Court urged all courts throughout China to purchase mobile
execution chambers “[…] that can put to death convicted criminals immediately after sentencing”.(142)…
…One by-product of the death penalty in China has been the harvesting and marketing of human organs following execution. This practice is contrary to World Health Organization guidelines on human organ procurement and transplantation(152) and the involvement of transplantation surgeons in such procedures breaches ethical guidance of the international Transplantation Society and the World Medical Association.(153) All member countries including China accepted these guidelines when they were adopted by vote in 1991…
…Amnesty International reported the practice of harvesting organs from executed prisoners in 1993, and called at that time for the Chinese government to ban the practice without the free and informed consent of the prisoner.(154) In 1995 the organization reported that “[…] the use of organs from this source continues in China, reportedly on a widespread scale”(155) and cited a paper suggesting that as many as 90% of organs used in transplantations in China came from executed prisoners.(156) A 1994 report on this subject published by Human Rights Watch(157) provided compelling evidence of the practice, including the text of a government decree on the subject.(158)
…Episodic reports of the use of organs from executed prisoners continued over the rest of the decade with articles appearing in medical literature on the practice.(159) In 1999 for example, Cameron and Hoffenberg cited Professor Lei Shili as informing them that 1,600 prisoners had been the source of 3,200 kidneys in 1996.(160)…
…On 27 June 2001 Dr Wang Guoqi testified to the US Congressional Subcommittee on International Relations and Human Rights that during his medical practice in China, he had personally removed organs from over 100 executed prisoners, mainly their skin, kidneys and corneas. Dr Wang also testified that police and medical institutions co-ordinated their activities, timing executions to coincide with a patient’s pre-operative procedures.(163)…
…Methods of execution are reported to vary depending which organs are to be harvested from a prisoner. For example, if a prisoner’s corneas are to be taken, a bullet is fired into the prisoner’s neck or heart to avoid causing damage to the eyes.(165)…
…The Chinese media and the Chinese government generally remain silent on the issue of organ harvesting. There are some signs suggestive of change, however. Legislation adopted on 1 October 2003 in Shenzhen, Guangdong Province, passes the administration and practice of organ transplants exclusively to the Red Cross. Under Shenzhen’s legislation, a patient’s or their family’s consent must be given in writing, or orally to two doctors for their organs to be used after their death.(166) This is the first legislation of this kind to have been passed in China, reportedly aimed at reducing the illegal trade in organs, where people attempt to sell a kidney for example by advertising on the Internet or by placing advertisements in hospitals.(167) However, the Shenzhen regulations do not extend to prisoners awaiting execution…
…Authorities routinely refuse to give relatives access to bodies of executed prisoners, cremating them quickly after the executions, says Robin Munro, a British expert on China’s criminal justice system. “Once the body is cremated, it is impossible to determine whether any organs have been removed,” she said…
…China’s critics contend that the transition from firing squads to injections in death vans facilitates an illegal trade in prisoners’ organs…
…Injections leave the whole body intact and require participation of doctors. Organs can “be extracted in a speedier and more effective way than if the prisoner is shot,” says Mark Allison, East Asia researcher at Amnesty International in Hong Kong. “We have gathered strong evidence suggesting the involvement of (Chinese) police, courts and hospitals in the organ trade.”…
…Chinese hospitals started organ transplants in the 1960s and now perform between 10,000 and 20,000 transplants annually, according to official figures. A kidney transplant in China costs about $7,200, but this official price could swell to $20,000 or even $50,000 if the patient is willing to pay more to obtain an organ sooner. Even those prices, though, amount only to a fraction of the price for an organ transplant in developed countries…
As patients from Malaysia, Japan, Hong Kong and Singapore flock to China for transplants, the business is bringing in thousands of dollars… Suspicions are growing abroad that the use of newly developed execution vans may be linked to this boom…
…China carried out 8,000 kidney transplants last year but only 270, or fewer than 4% of the organs, came from voluntary donations…
…”The use of mobile execution chambers exacerbates existing problems with prison-related issues in China,” Sharon Hom, executive director of Human Rights in China, wrote in an e-mail interview. “It facilitates the black-market trade in organ sales particularly because there is no access for independent monitors, such as the Red Cross, to prisons, detention centers and labor camps.”…
…The number of people executed in the People’s Republic of China recorded by Amnesty International continues to be more than the number recorded for the rest of the world combined…
Full articles :
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/HG21Ad01.html…
China’s mobile death fleet
By Antoaneta Bezlova
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2006-06-14-death-van_x.htm
..China makes ultimate punishment mobile
http://web.amnesty.org/library /index/engasa170032004
People’s Republic of China
Executed “according to law”? - The death penalty in China