[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 23 (Wednesday, March 6, 2002)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E286-E288]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




   NEWLY RELEASED DOCUMENTS SHOW PERSECUTION OF BELIEVERS BY CHINESE 
                               GOVERNMENT

                                 ______
                                 

                           HON. FRANK R. WOLF

                              of virginia

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, March 6, 2002

  Mr. WOLF. Mr. Speaker, an organization called the Committee for 
Investigation on Persecution in China has compiled an unparalleled 
trove of documents concerning religious persecution by authorities of 
the People's Republic of China (PRC). The organization's

[[Page E287]]

president, Li Shixiong, has compiled an extensive archive that 
documents some 22,000 testimonies about persecution of Christians in 
China. This archive also contains court transcripts, internal PRC 
government documents and photographs.
  The work of the Committee for Investigation on Persecution in China 
provides a unique insight into how the PRC persecutes and imprisons 
people of faith, and restricts religious freedom throughout the 
country.
  Attached for our colleagues is a copy of an article about the work of 
the Committee for Investigation on Persecution in China that appeared 
in the March 11, 2002, issue of the magazine Christianity Today.

                [From Christianity Today, Mar. 11, 2002]

                     ``New'' China: Same Old Tricks


 Top communists, despite their denials, endorse arrest and torture of 
                  Chinese Christians by the thousands

                            (By Tony Carnes)

       A Chinese Christian refugee in New York, working with 
     Christians in China, has compiled an extensive new archive 
     documenting brutal religious persecution that has caused more 
     than 100 deaths and thousands of injuries.
       Activist Li Shi-xiong, head of the New York City-based 
     Committee for Investigation on Persecution of Religion in 
     China, believes these documents establish that communist 
     rulers at the highest levels take an active role in 
     persecuting house-church Christians. In the past, top leaders 
     in China have blamed repression on overzealous local 
     officials.
       The New York committee timed its unveiling of the archive 
     to influence President Bush during his February trip to 
     China.
       The archive is a 10-foot-high stack of 22,000 testimonies 
     about persecution of Chinese Christians. It includes court 
     transcripts, internal government documents, and photographs. 
     Experts call it the largest collection ever assembled on the 
     persecuted church in China.
       ``The secret documents alone are extremely rare and 
     incredibly important,'' says Carol Hamrin, a star China 
     analyst who recently retired from the State Department. The 
     mammoth collection, which Li calls a ``truth bomb,'' includes 
     5,000 detailed testimonies of Chinese Christians describing 
     their arrests, interrogations, and jailings. Many account 
     include photographs of the persecuted believers, including 
     injuries they suffered while in custody. Some case files 
     include official arrest and court records. The largest number 
     of testimonies comes from central Henan Province, where 
     persecution has dramatically escalated since 1999. Li's group 
     has also collected partial reports on 17,000 others, mostly 
     Christians, persecuted for their religious beliefs.
       Li is also documenting the cases of 117 religious people 
     who have died while in official custody, 700 who have been 
     put in labor camps, and 550 who are wanted by the police but 
     are in hiding. He is also investigating 300 police officers 
     accused of being especially abusive.
       Freedom House's Nina Shea has written that Li's archive is 
     a ``tremendous work.'' Shea, a member of the U.S. Commission 
     on International Religious Freedom, marvels at Li's 
     ``dedication to the cause of religious freedom and his 
     amazing work in the documentation of so many thousands of 
     cases of the persecution of China's Christians.'' Freedom 
     House, an advocacy organization founded in 1941 by Eleanor 
     Roosevelt, plans to make extensive use of the archive.
       China scholar Brent Fulton, head of China Source in Los 
     Angeles, is aware of the archive but has not examined its 
     contents. He says the documents indicate the ``degree of 
     seriousness'' with which China approaches unregistered 
     religious groups. ``They see the unregistered groups as a 
     national security threat.''
       Li and the New York committee believe that going public 
     with the archive will build international political pressure 
     on China's leaders to end their repression of religion. 
     Fulton foresees the government searching for those who leaked 
     the documents. He also expects more crackdowns. But, he says, 
     ``The long-term response to the release of these papers will 
     be good.''


                            A Sensitive Time

       The revelation of the archive comes at a sensitive time for 
     China. Political leaders say that the nation of 1.3 billion 
     people faces wrenching changes related to its entrance into 
     the World Trade Organization (WTO) last December. WTO 
     membership will lower trade barriers, enabling China to 
     compete for trade on a more level playing field. Certain 
     parts of China's economy, such as high tech, are expected to 
     do well. Others, such as the inefficient and subsidized 
     industrial and agricultural sectors, may be pummeled. 
     Millions of unskilled laborers could be thrown out of work.
       Seeking to maintain its grip on society, the Chinese 
     government since 1999 has been waging a campaign against 
     ``cults,'' such as the Falun Gong movement. (Falun Gong 
     adherents use physical exercise as a spiritual discipline.) 
     China's officials are trying now to eliminate what they 
     consider undesirable movement, because WTO membership will 
     bring additional international pressure on China to improve 
     its poor record on human rights. ``[China's] officials spell 
     out that the anti-cult campaign is a preparation for the 
     further opening of society because of China joining the World 
     Trade Organization,'' Hamrin says. But, Fulton adds, ``There 
     are in fact a lot of cult groups that are doing bad things.''
       Says Eric Burklin, president of Colorado-based China 
     Partner, ``China wants to have a positive image with the rest 
     of the world. The government can't really discern the cults 
     from the non-cults because [China's top leaders] are 
     atheistic.''
       The archive makes it clear that repression of religion is 
     official state policy at the highest levels--not merely a 
     local and sporadic phenomenon, as China usually claims. In 
     the documents, officials say the cults are ``soaking into'' 
     and weakening the foundations of state authority. Officials 
     link rising religious influence to the increased influence of 
     Western cultural values of democracy and equality.
       In public, Chinese leaders are vague on what actually 
     constitutes a cult. ``Cults are not religions,'' Premier Zhu 
     Rong Ji said in a December meeting on religion. Critics say 
     this approach allows authorities to crack down on any groups 
     they do not like--including many house churches. These 
     churches typically do not register with the government-
     sponsored Three-Self Patriotic Movement.
       While there is no consensus on the number of Christians in 
     China, Operation World estimates the presence of 45 million 
     people in house churches and another 40 million members and 
     adherents in the official church. There are about 12 million 
     Catholics in China, in both state and unofficial groups.
       Hamrin, who favors improving trade relations with China, 
     says that this latest government repression will worsen 
     matters. ``This massive campaign against millions of their 
     people will exacerbate social tensions''


                           Aggressive Actions

       In a recent public pronouncement, China's government 
     declared that religion has never fared better. Ye Xiaowen, 
     the head of the Religious Affairs Bureau, toured the United 
     States last year. Ye claimed that the government had 
     initiated a ``golden time'' for religion. China's president, 
     Jiang Zemin, recently told a U.S. congressional delegation in 
     Beijing, ``I am looking forward to seeing a church on one 
     side of every village and a mosque on the other side.''
       During the second week of December, top communist leaders 
     gathered in Beijing to discuss religion policy. Jiang led off 
     with a speech declaring, ``The influence of religion on 
     political and social lives in today's world should never be 
     underestimated.''
       In lower-profile gatherings, however, the talk tilts toward 
     intensive surveillance of religion, according to Li's 
     archival materials. In a speech, a local public security 
     official in charge of religion quoted Hu Jintao, likely to be 
     the next leader of China, on the proper approach to a 
     ``cult'': ``Watch and follow its direction and deal with it 
     by law at the proper time.'' As the orders filter down, local 
     leaders often act aggressively. A provincial security chief 
     says, ``Talk less and smash the cult quietly.''
       Li's archive documents how the anti-cult campaign was 
     quickly broadened to include
       ``The central government is defining whole groups as 
     targets of extreme measures,'' says Hamrin, who produced the 
     U.s. State Department's first annual reports on religious 
     freedom and persecution in China. For example, more than 300 
     Chinese associated with the Falun Gong movement have died 
     while in China's custody.
       Increasingly, groups are targeted not just for breaking 
     civil laws on registration and holding unauthorized meetings, 
     but for their beliefs and religious doctrine. The government, 
     the archive shows, especially dislikes preaching about ``the 
     end of the world'' or teaching that ``the Lord can heal a 
     person of disease.''
       According to the archive, the Ministry of Public Security 
     spells out five characteristics of a cult, ranging from the 
     clearly defined ``deifying its top leader'' to the grab bag 
     of ``stirring up and deceiving others.'' (See ``What China's 
     Secret Documents Reveals'')
       The documents show that officials are especially wary of 
     unregistered church groups that attempt to link with other 
     unregistered groups. In such cases, the archive shows, 
     officials are returning to the fierce battles from the era of 
     Mao Zedong, China's first communist ruler, from 50 years ago. 
     This has led to tremendous abuses. In April 2000, officials 
     put Peter Xu's Born Again Movement on their cult list. 
     Officials set quotas for arrests, putting pressure on local 
     police to obtain confessions. Police often beat, slap, and 
     use electric shocks to obtain those confessions.
       Leaders of the large South China Church organization also 
     have been hit hard by recent arrests. A document from a 
     police official in the provincial religion office hints that 
     poorly trained police in Hebei Province are resorting to 
     abusive interrogation methods instead of quiet information-
     gathering. The archive reveals several recent cases of local 
     police trying to bribe the families of people they had killed 
     under interrogation. Leaders of the South China Church 
     report, ``On July 20, 2001, we heard the news that Yu Zongju 
     was tortured to death. The police did not inform her family 
     until her body started to smell. They asked her family to 
     meet them in a restaurant. They paid them $8,000 and warned 
     them to keep quiet.''

[[Page E288]]

                     Christian Networks ``Mutate''

       Last year, the Bush administration sponsored a resolution 
     for the United Nations Commission on Human Rights that 
     condemned Beijing's human rights record. Amnesty 
     International reported in 2001 that China's use of torture 
     was widespread and systematic.
       China analysts such as Hamrin say that the Chinese 
     government, wishing to improve its image internationally, 
     probably will respond favorably to pressure to improve human 
     rights.
       ``China has really developed and they have tasted too much 
     freedom to go back,'' says Eric Burklin of China Partner. 
     ``There would be major bloodshed if they tried to go back to 
     Maoist times.''
       But Li's archive shows that China's emerging strategy for 
     dealing with the house-church movement is comprehensive and 
     difficult for outsiders to counter. Officials gain access 
     through informants, harass leaders, block communication, and 
     strip churches of financial assets, including church 
     buildings and homes.
       The government notes in the documents that house-church 
     Christians already have a means to resist these new efforts 
     at repression. House-church leaders reportedly are creating 
     networks that constantly mutate. Leaders communicate with 
     wireless phones and hard-to-trace Web sties. In response, the 
     government has begun building a national computer network 
     known as the ``Golden Shield'' in order to conduct Internet 
     surveillance and information-gathering.
       Meanwhile, the impact of Li's archives promises to be 
     seismic. ``It's a bombshell,'' Shea says.

     

                          ____________________