[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 9 (Wednesday, January 24, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H804-H805]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
HOLOCAUST: THE CHINA PARALLEL
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the
gentleman from Virginia [Mr. Wolf] is recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. WOLF. Mr. Speaker, I spoke earlier, and I just want to take a
little time after the 1-minute to really urge Members to get a copy of
the Washington Post piece by Walter Reich called, ``Holocaust: The
China Parallel.''
The writer is a physician, the director of the U.S. Holocaust
Memorial Museum. He points out that what is taking place in China is
parallel to the Holocaust that took place in some respects in Nazi
Germany. Now, this Congress last year was going to do something with
regard to China. It passed a bill with regard to putting some
restrictions on China and dealing with Radio Free China. Frankly,
nothing has happened to it. This year the Congress I think is obligated
on both sides of the aisle to do something to deal with the issues of
religious persecution and what is taking place in China.
As a couple of examples, and I will submit them for the Record,
Freedom House has documented 200 Christian Leaders in prison since
April 1, 1995. A Christian ministry in the United States had delegates
recently to visit a house church during a recent visit to China. The
leaders in these churches have to be itinerant in their own country.
They cannot meet with their own families. They have no permanent home.
Many leaders have been jailed, beaten, fined, tortured, or sent to
labor or reeducation camps for their religious beliefs.
Quite frankly, I wish that Ronald Reagan were back in the White House
whereby we could have somebody who could come out and stand up and
raise these issues. Frankly, since the Berlin Wall has fallen and since
Ronald Reagan has left the White House, neither the administration, the
Bush administration, nor the Clinton administration, nor Republican
Congresses or Democratic Congresses, have done anything with regard to
human rights in China and many of the other countries.
Quite frankly, the business of the Clinton administration is
business. It is not human rights. They do not care if Catholic priests
are being persecuted and bishops are going to jail. They don't care if
evangelical ministers are being put in prison. They don't care if
Buddhists are being put in prison.
Mr. Speaker, does the Congress care? We know that Clinton does not
care. We know that Secretary Christopher does not care, because we have
seen no action out of the State Department. In fact, Mr. Speaker, the
sound of silence that has come from the Clinton administration on
religious persecution is deafening. Mr. Speaker, to be fair, the sound
of silence coming from the Republican Congress on this issue is
deafening.
Now, all one had to do was watch ``60 Minutes'' Sunday night where
they showed Chinese children tied to beds, mainly female children, and
they starved them to death, similar to what the Nazis did before World
War II. Had that happened in the 1980's, had Ronald Reagan been able to
see that, had Senator Jackson of Jackson-Vanick been able to see it,
leaders who have fought on both sides of the aisle for human rights,
this Congress would have passed a resolution on it. This Congress would
have debated this issue. But frankly, Mr. Speaker, this Congress, along
with the Clinton administration, has done absolutely nothing.
It would be my hope and prayer that both parties would have a plank
in their platform this year for religious freedom from dissidents
around the world, for persecution of all religious beliefs, whether
they be Buddhist or Christian or Jews. This issue should be on the
forefront of the burner of both political parties.
As I again urge my colleagues after they read the article in today's
Washington Post, I will close with what the author said. He said, ``If
the Human Rights Watch report can be verified by international
inspections, the parallels between the Chinese orphanages and the Nazi
programs that killed disabled children are alarming. These parallels
remind us that human beings, including physicians and other caregivers,
are extraordinarily vulnerable to inhuman acts and extraordinarily
capable for justifying their behavior on what they see as rational
grounds. And they remind us that countries in which democratic
institutions are forcibly forbidden and human rights systematically
quashed are ones in which human life becomes, quite simply,
expendable.''
[[Page H805]]
This issue is not going to go away. If the Clinton administration
does not deal with it, I hope and pray that at least this Republican
Congress will deal with it.
China Steps Up Religious Repression
December 22, 1995.--The Chinese government is subjecting
unauthorized Catholic and Protestant groups to intensifying
harassment and persecution as social tensions in the country
increase, says Human Rights Watch/Asia in ``China: Religious
Persecution Persists,'' released today.
``During the last two years, the Chinese government
broadened its drive to crush all forms of dissent. In
addition to targeting prominent dissidents such as Wei
Jingsheng, who last week was sentenced to fourteen years in
prison, all religious believers, and especially Christians,
are seen as potential security risks,'' said Mickey Spiegel,
research consultant for Human Rights Watch/Asia.
Chinese authorities have issued new directives requiring
all congregations to register with religious authorities,
stepped up pressure on evangelists, and tightened controls on
contact with foreigners and on distribution of religious
materials. Individuals suspected of linking religion to
political activity have received the harshest treatment. The
extensive crackdown on Protestants and Catholics violates
both the Chinese constitution and freedom of religion as
guaranteed by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
As Communist ideology has lost public support, interest in
religion, particularly evangelical Protestantism, has spread
rapidly in China. But since the early 1990s, a new
development has emerged which the country's leaders consider
even more ``subversive'': a growing alliance between
underground Christian churches and pro-democracy activists,
many of whom have converted to Christianity in recent years.
Dissident groups such as the League for the Protection of the
Rights of Working People (LPRWP), some of whose members are
Protestants, have been particularly targeted for official
repression, with President Jiang Zemin describing the LPRWP
as ``the most counterrevolutionary organization in China
since 1949.'' After witnessing the role of the Catholic
Church in undermining Communist power in Eastern Europe, the
authorities have renewed their determination to eradicate all
autonomous religious activity in China.
For example, Xiao Biguang, a thirty-three-year-old former
professor of literature at Beijing University, was one of the
main drafters of the charter for the LPRWP. He was arrested
on April 12, 1994, and put on trial this past April 1995 on
criminal charges including ``swindling'' and creating a
``negative atmosphere'' among his students at a theological
seminary. As of mid-December 1995, he had not been sentenced
and was still being held in a Ministry of State Security
lockup in Beijing. Meanwhile, Xiao's wife, Gou Qinghui, has
been continually harassed, subjected to periodic
surveillance, and forbidden to continue seminary teaching or
to meet with co-religionists at home. She has been detained
at least four times in May 1994 and May 1995.
The most recent crackdown began in January 1994, when
Premier Li Peng signed new regulations tightening the
existing requirement that all church groups in China register
with the state-controlled Religious Affairs Bureau. This
policy, which violates international standards on freedom of
expression and association, has forced Christians and other
religious believers to choose between registering their
congregations lawfully, which often exposes their services to
intrusive surveillance and official control, or continuing to
operate underground, thereby risking fines, arrests, and even
prison terms. The January 1994 regulations also reiterate
China's ban on proselytizing and other public religious
activities by foreigners, depriving Chinese believers of
their right to associate with their co-religionists from
overseas.
Local authorities seeking to suppress unauthorized church
groups have often violated China's own laws and regulations,
acting even more brutally than the national religious policy
allows. Christians in many rural areas are routinely and
often repeatedly harassed through arbitrary detentions,
beatings, and confiscations of property. Those considered
``ringleaders,'' especially Protestant preachers with a large
popular following, are at risk of arrest and imprisonment.
In one case, Huang Fangxin, a twenty-nine-year old
seminarian from Yongkang County, Zhejiang Province, was
sentenced without trial to three years of ``re-education
through labor'' in April 1994, after organizing a group of
young people from the country into a ``gospel team'' to
recruit new members to the local church. Several of his
followers have since faced further harassment, including
mandatory ``study classes'' at which they are lectured,
fined, and sometimes physically abused.
Similar abuses against underground Protestant groups,
including raids on churches and mass arrests, have been
reported throughout China, particularly in Henan and Anhui
provinces where the evangelical movement is especially
strong. Roman Catholic bishops who maintain ties to the
Vatican have also faced harassment and arbitrary detention.
Foreigners suspected of promoting Christianity among
Chinese citizens have become a major target of the new
crackdown, especially those caught bringing Bibles and other
religious literature into the country illegally. During the
Fourth World Conference on Women, held in Beijing in
September 1995, foreign participants were warned to bring in
no religious materials other than those for personal use.
Leaders of Protestant ``house churches'' in Beijing were
warned to avoid contact with conference delegates arriving
from overseas, and one Catholic leader. Bishop Jia Zhiguo,
was removed from his home and detained until the day after
the conference ended.
The presence of foreigners was in part responsible for a
mass arrest in Hubei Province on April 18, 1995, in which
security officials, armed with electric batons, broke up a
theological training class for new pastors and arrested at
least sixty-seven Chinese and three overseas Protestants. The
detainees were interrogated, some of them were badly beaten,
and some of the men had their heads shaved.
Human Rights Watch calls on the Chinese authorities to lift
all official controls on religious activities, including the
compulsory registration of church groups, and to thoroughly
investigate all reports of illegal mistreatment of religious
believers, including beatings, ill-treatment, and torture.
All those held for participating in religious activities
outside the official churches should be unconditionally
released, including those convicted of violating state
security laws or the laws on counterrevolution.
Human Rights Watch also urges the international community
to exert pressure on the Chinese government to allow greater
religious freedom. The U.S., European Union, Japan, and other
governments should sponsor and vigorously promote a
resolution censuring China at the United Nations Human Rights
Commission in Geneva next March. Among other abuses, the
measure should specifically call for an end to religious
repression. In addition, the United Nations Special
Rapporteur on Religious Intolerance should be invited to make
a second visit to China early in 1996, following his previous
visit to Beijing and Tibet in November 1994; he should seek
to visit those Chinese provinces where the persecution of
Christians is most severe. Human Rights Watch/Asia urges
delegations of parliamentarians and trade delegations to
China to make specific inquiries about cases of religious
activists still in custody and those detained, ill-treated
then released. They should call for the immediate repeal of
all official restrictions on free expression of religious
belief and practice.
Copies of the report are available from the Publications
Department, Human Rights Watch, 485 Fifth Avenue, New York,
NY 10017 for $6.00 (domestic) and $7.50 (international).
human rights watch/asia
Human Rights Watch is a nongovernmental organization
established in 1978 to monitor and promote the observance of
internationally recognized human rights in Africa, the
Americas, Asia, the Middle East and among the signatories of
the Helsinki accords. It is supported by contributions from
private individuals and foundations worldwide. It accepts no
government funds, directly or indirectly. The staff includes
Kenneth Roth, executive director; Cynthia Brown, program
director; Holly J. Burkhalter, advocacy director; Robert
Kimzey, publications director; Jeri Laber, special advisor;
Gara LaMarche, associate director; Lotte Leicht, Brussels
office director; Juan Mendez, general counsel; Susan Osnos,
communications director; Jerera Rone, counsel; Joanna
Weschler, United Nations representative; and Derrick Wong,
finance and administration director. Robert L. Bernstein is
the chair of the board and Adrian W. DeWind is vice chair.
Its Asia division was established in 1985 to monitor and
promote the observance of internationally recognized human
rights in Asia. Sidney Jones is the executive director; Mike
Jendrzejczyk is the Washington director; Robert Munro is the
Hong Kong director; Jeannine Guthrie is NGO Liaison; Dinah
PoKempner is Counsel; Patricia Gossman and Zunetta Liddell
are research associates; Joyce Wan and Shu-Ju Ada Cheng are
Henry R. Luce Fellows; Diana Tai-Feng Cheng and Paul Lall are
associates; Mickey Spiegel is a research consultant. Andrew
J. Nathan is chair of the advisory committee and Orville
Schell is vice chair.
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