(Clearwisdom) In her opening statement at the Foreign Affairs Committee hearing on November 3, 2011, in Washington, D.C., Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, condemned the Chinese communist regime’s ongoing persecution of Falun Gong and disregard for human rights.

The hearing, titled “Congressional-Executive Commission on China: 2011 Annual Report,” focused on the findings documented by the Commission, which was established to monitor human rights and the rule of law in China, in its tenth annual report. 

Ros-Lehtinen highlighted the regime’s “abysmal human rights record, unfair trade practices, and disdain for the rule of law,” and called on the members of the Foreign Affairs Committee to develop an appropriate action plan to deal with the findings of the report.

“Documented in the Commission’s report is a clear picture of a China where human rights lawyers disappear, ‘black jails’ illegally imprison those who seek to voice dissent, Falun Gong practitioners are mercilessly persecuted, and the Internet is censored by thought police,” Ros-Lehtinen said.

“In just the past twelve months, Beijing has sought to disrupt the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony for Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo, kept news of the Jasmine Revolution in the Middle East from the Chinese people, and disrupted a Christian service on Easter morning, the holiest day in the Christian calendar,” she continued.

Ros-Lehtinen pointed out that the communist regime has continued to suppress the rights of various ethnic groups in mainland China. “Whether it is a Mongolian herder on the grasslands, a Tibetan monk praying in his monastery, or a Uyghur Muslim seeking fair and equal employment, all face the harsh backlash of Beijing’s oppression. In recent months, the desperation has intensified so greatly that several Tibetan monks and nuns have set themselves on fire to protest China's rule in Tibet,” she noted.

The congresswoman stressed that despite superficial appearances, the Chinese communist regime “has no respect for its people, and a complete disdain for workers’ rights.” The Commission’s report shows that “factory owners and local officials conspire to poison the environment of the people who live in the vicinity, and to exploit the workers who labor in deprivation and filth,” she said.

Ros-Lehtinen added that “the report points to ‘a lack of respect for the rule of law extended into the international arena.”

“How can a ruling clique which causes human rights lawyers to disappear, which persecutes and tortures Falun Gong practitioners, which drives Tibetan monks to such despair that they set themselves on fire, and which hunts down North Korean refugees on its northeast frontier ever expect to be regarded as anything but a barbaric regime, certainly unworthy of the name responsible stakeholder?” asked the chairwoman of the Foreign Affairs Committee.