(Minghui.org) The Chinese communist regime has been under increasingly great pressure from the international community since the organ harvesting atrocities it perpetrates against living Falun Gong practitioners were first exposed in 2006. On the one hand, the regime brazenly denies the accusations, and on the other hand it adamantly refuses to cooperate with independent investigators.

A Chinese soldier tells this story of what he observed:

“One day in December 2000, at around 1:00 a.m., our army unit was suddenly called for an emergency rendezvous, and we rushed to Dandong Railway Station in full arms. We tightly surrounded the station. A little while later, a train from Tianjin came in. A number of army officers and doctors got off the train and spoke with our officers secretly. Then part of our unit was sent to escort the train, with two soldiers in charge of each carriage. We had no idea what was being transported before we got on the train, just felt that the atmosphere was abnormally intense. When we got on the train we were shocked to find that the freight train, normally used to transport cattle, was filled with Falun Gong practitioners. There were men, women, old and young. We heard that they were Falun Gong practitioners who had been to Beijing to call for justice for Falun Gong. They were all cuffed to a steel bar fixed to the top of the carriage, like chickens … I didn't know how long it took us, but finally we arrived at the destination-- Sujiatun in Shenyang City.” 

The train's destination, Sujiatun, is where the organ harvesting atrocities first came to light.

No matter who is in office, the CCP remains the CCP and its evil nature will never change. It is absolutely impossible for the CCP to shirk responsibility for the monstrous crimes it has committed, and the crimes cannot be erased. Unless the evil CCP is completely abandoned, and all detained Falun Gong practitioners are released and victims and their relatives compensated, the crime of the century – the Party-sanctioned systematic organ harvesting from living Falun Gong practitioners –  can never be cleared.

Minghui welcomes kind-hearted people from mainland China to provide specific evidence about these organ harvesting atrocities, and asks people around the world to tell their friends, relatives, colleagues and neighbors about these crimes against humanity. 

Sections in this report:

Part A: The regime develops tactics to divert attention from its crimes

1. The CCP's claims

2. Recollection by a soldier: Practitioners transported to Sujiatun

3. Falun Gong practitioners targeted for organ harvesting

Part B: The sharp rise in organ transplants

1. International pressure should not abate: Get to the bottom of the crimes of live organ harvesting

2. Is the organ harvesting still going on?

3. How many organs were truly donated by death row prisoners in China per year?

“Death row prisoners” in the broad sense

3. Where did the organs come from? The big jump in organ transplants between 2003 and 2006

4. Missing Falun Gong practitioners have been the main source of organ harvesting. Hospitals affiliated with the PLA and Armed Police were the main force behind the live organ harvesting

 

 

Part A: The regime develops tactics to divert attention from its crimes

1. The CCP's claims

Of course the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), by its very nature, will not sit still and wait for its own demise. In the last few years, it has taken a series of actions on the issue of organ transplantation.

- In 2007, the Human Organ Transplant Regulation was passed by the State Council of China, banning sales of human organs;

 

- In the same year, the People's Supreme Court of China retrieved the power to re-examine capital punishment, which it had delegated for 27 years;

 

- In 2009, for the first time the CCP regime admitted that organs were sourced from executed prisoners (earlier the CCP had repeatedly denied this);

 

- In January 2010, the regime started pilot programs of posthumous human organ donation in ten provinces;

 

- In 2012, it claimed that in two years the sourcing of transplant organs would not rely on executed prisoners;

 

- In 2013, it further claimed that it would implement an organ donation system across China and expected that the system would be well in place in two years' time;

Since the “Two Congresses” of NPC and CPPCC, China's Ministry of Health has been integrated into another body (the National Health and Family Planning Commission) and Huang Jiefu has been dismissed from the position of Deputy Minister of Health.

Before his dismissal, Huang Jiefu drew the following picture in a media interview: In two years' time China will not rely on “executed prisoners” for organs; China's organ donation system will be well-established and Chinese organ transplantation doctors can finally show off their skills on the international stage—they will feel proud when operating to harvest organs and no longer hold the fear of killing their fellow compatriots.

However, do the facts support this?

2. Recollection by a soldier: Practitioners transported to Sujiatun

Not long ago, the Minghui website published a short message: “Evidence of Live Organ Harvesting by the CCP: Recollections of a Soldier from Dandong” (Chinese article)

“One day in December 2000, at around 1:00 a.m., our army unit was suddenly called for an emergency rendezvous, and we rushed to Dandong Railway Station in full arms. We tightly surrounded the station. A little while later, a train from Tianjin came in. A number of army officers and doctors got off the train and spoke with our officers secretly. Then part of our unit was sent to escort the train, with two soldiers in charge of each carriage. We had no idea what was being transported before we got on the train, just felt that the atmosphere was abnormally intense. When we got on the train we were shocked to find that the freight train, normally used to transport cattle, was filled with Falun Gong practitioners. There were men, women, old and young. We heard that they were Falun Gong practitioners who had been to Beijing to call for justice for Falun Gong. They were all cuffed to a steel bar fixed to the top of the carriage, like chickens … I didn't know how long it took us, but finally we arrived at the destination-- Sujiatun in Shenyang City.”

3. Falun Gong practitioners targeted for organ harvesting

The top secret “policy” made by the top CCP culprits Jiang Zemin, Luo Gan, Liu Jing and Zhou Yongkang was: Around the year 2000, millions, even tens of millions of Falun Gong practitioners who went to Beijing to call for justice for Falun Gong could be defined as convicts for execution.

Transplant doctors only cared about profits from organ harvesting, while Jiang Zemin's clique wanted to eliminate Falun Gong. The two groups, each using the other, colluded for windfall profits (Now the doctors are even attempting to cover up their crimes as achievements and want to publish their “academic success” to gain fame.) Their crimes are unprecedented and are too numerous to record!

Who could have possibly imagined such evil was taking place—to treat Falun Gong practitioners who went to appeal in Beijing as “death row inmates for live organ harvesting”?!

The crimes of organ harvesting from live Falun Gong practitioners on a massive scale were committed by a production line, with Jiang Zemin, Luo Gan, Liu Jing and Zhou Yongkang at the top, down to the PLA (Chinese army), the police, the courts and hospitals. All those who have participated are guilty, and because of this they all keep their mouths shut, thinking that as long as they keep their mouths shut, people outside of the circle will never find out what happened.

Their current tactics are: First, the CCP openly admits that they have used executed prisoners as the source of organs (they adamantly denied this in the past), and then they lie that in two years' time they will no longer rely on executed prisoners for organ transplants, so as to gain positive feelings and recognition from the international community.

However, the “executed prisoners” are only a cover-up to conceal monstrous crimes. The regime wants to gain recognition from the international community so that people will forget its crimes. This is its real, but concealed motive.

Whatever forms of cover-up the CCP tries to use, they still remain nothing more than cover-ups. The habitual hoodlum tricks played by the CCP are determined by its evil nature.

No matter who is in office, the CCP remains the CCP and its evil nature will never change. It is absolutely impossible for the CCP to shirk its responsibility for the monstrous crimes committed and the crimes cannot be erased. Unless the evil CCP is completely abandoned, and all detained Falun Gong practitioners are released and victims and their relatives compensated, the case of the century concerning the CCP's systematic organ harvesting from live Falun Gong practitioners will never be settled.

We welcome kind-hearted people from mainland China to provide specific evidence in relation to live organ harvesting by the CCP, and ask people overseas to tell their friends, relatives, colleagues and neighbors about the CCP's crimes against humanity.

Part B: The sharp rise in organ transplants

1. International pressure should not abate: Get to the bottom of the crimes of live organ harvesting

There are two main facts that the CCP tries to ignore and blur out: one is that the organ harvesting from live Falun Gong practitioners is still happening, even if on a smaller scale; the other is the large scale organ-harvesting from live Falun Gong practitioners before 2007, especially between 2003 and 2006.

The international community has always opposed the CCP's use of executed prisoners as organ resources. Now that the organ-harvesting from live Falun Gong practitioners has been exposed, the international community has become even more alert and taken quicker and stricter actions against this.

For example,

- Some scholars have published articles in prestigious journals calling for “no acceptance, no publication, and no cooperation” against articles and research projects from organ transplant doctors in mainland China;

 

- Taiwan's Health Ministry requires doctors not to recommend their patients go to mainland China for organ transplants;

 

- Australia has banned organ transplant cooperation projects with mainland China;

 

- MPs in Belgium and Canada have proposed bills to ban organ transplant tours to China;

 

- In France, some MPs proposed a law to require patients who seek organ transplant overseas to provide documentation before they return to France that certifies they have not been involved in any organ sales;

 

- Israel has passed legislation to ban organ transplant agents and require insurance companies not to make any payments to patients who have been to China for organ transplant;

 

- In the US, starting in June 2011, applicants for non-immigrant visas are required to fill in an additional item on Form DS-160 to state that they have not been directly involved in any coercive organ or body tissue transplant.

It is of course a very good thing for the international community to exert pressure on the CCP regime. However, the focus is on organ harvesting from executed prisoners.

If we limit our efforts to this area, then we may deviate from our goal of exposing the CCP's crimes in organ harvesting of live Falun Gong practitioners and completely exposing the evil CCP so that people will know the truth.

Furthermore, it will provide the CCP with an excuse to “whitewash” its crimes of live organ harvesting. The CCP has established a variety of policies (whether or not they will be implemented is another matter) to cater to pressure from the international community, causing the international community to be deceived once again, so that the evil CCP can step away from it all by turning huge crimes into small crimes and small crimes into nothing.

However, human history does not exist for the sake of the CCP. We must urge the international community to organize independent investigation teams to go to mainland China to investigate in order to completely reveal the dark secrets. We need to build up momentum around the world and persevere in such efforts.

Most importantly, we must make it impossible for the CCP to think that it can “whitewash” its crimes. The evil crimes committed are an intolerable injustice. No matter how the CCP tries to play tricks, the CCP and the participants in the crimes will not escape punishment by history.

2. Is the organ harvesting still going on?

Huang Jiefu said on the Video Conference of the National Human Organ Donation Task Force held on February 25, 2013 that “the number of death penalty sentences in our country is reducing by an annual rate of 10%.”

Death Row figures in mainland China, provided by US Dui Hua Foundation

We have noticed that even though there has been a reduction in the number of organ transplants from a total of 20,000 per year during the peak period between 2003 and 2006, the number of organ transplants is still maintained at 10,000 cases annually in recent years, much higher than 5 or 6 thousand cases per year before 2003, when the live organ harvesting had not yet become a large-scale operation.

When they launched the national pilot program of human organ donation on February 22, 2013, CCP authorities admit that since January 2010, they have achieved a total of 659 organ donation cases in three years, with 1,804 organs donated.

Then, with the steady reduction in death penalty sentences and the slow progress in human donation, how does the CCP still maintain its number of organ transplants (about 10,000 annually)? The CCP's explanation is: “live organ donation.”

The CCP claims that in recent years, live organ donation accounts for 35% of organ transplants, much higher than in any other country. Statistics from China Liver Transplant Registration (CLTR) show that from January 1, 2009 to December 31, 2009, 2,529 cases of various types of liver transplants were conducted in mainland China, including 299 cases of live organ transplants. According to their statistics, live organ transplants accounted for only 11.8%.

The issue of live organ transplant remains controversial. France suggests that it is better not to use live organ donation, because by doing so, it is likely that you will end up having two patients instead of just the original one. In cases of adult live liver transplants, 30% of donors face the danger of multiple complications, including death.

Is it really true that live organ donation, which is treated with such care by other countries, has increased so rapidly in China? We do not know for a fact. However, as long as the CCP has failed to make a complete confession of its crimes of organ harvesting from live Falun Gong practitioners, we have abundant reasons to believe that the “live organ donations” include organs from live Falun Gong practitioners against their will.

3. How many organs were truly donated by death row prisoners in China per year?

In 2011, Huang Jiefu published an article in the internationally prestigious medical journal The Lancet, titled “A Pilot Programme of Organ Donation after Cardiac Death in China,” in which he said that around 65% of organs came from dead bodies (over 90% from executed prisoners), and the remaining 35% came from live donation.

We have done a simple calculation to see just how many organs are from death row prisoners in China per year. Since 2008, around 10,000 organ transplants have been conducted in China annually. Based on Huang Jiefu's claim that 90% of the 65% of organs were from death row prisoners, prisoners donated around 5,850 organs.

In another article by Huang Jiefu published in 2008 in The Lancet, titled “Government policies and organ transplant,” he revealed data for the time period of 2000-2002, saying that annual cases were between 6,000 and 6,500. Considering that the number of death penalty sentences was a bit higher at that time, we can say that the figures were consistent with the number of death row prisoners after 2008. At most, there could have been 6,500 cases of organ donation from death row prisoners, and the number should have decreased as time went on.

Then, how can it be explained that during the time period from 2003 to 2006, when there was nothing like “live organ donation” in place, the number of organ transplants sharply increased to 15,000 to 20,000 per year?

2000 - 2008: Three phases in China's Organ Transplant Market

The above is chart is based on statistics provided by Huang Jiefu (former Deputy Minister of Health) and Shi Bingyi (Director of Organ Transplant Centre of the PLA)

Graphic representation of the data presented
in the table above

In 2009, the Minghui website published an in-depth report, titled “Falun Gong Practitioners Systematically Murdered for Their Organs: Refuting the Chinese Regime's 'Death Row' Explanation,” stating that the excuse of “death row prisoners” could not possibly support the development in organ transplant in China in the last ten years.

“Death row prisoners” in the broad sense

Which group in China is being treated as “death row prisoners”? In terms of scale, it is none other than Falun Gong practitioners.

The case of a university student being beaten to death by police at a house of refuge stirred up waves of condemnation on the Internet against the police involved and the system of house refuge, resulting in the latter being abolished; whereas voices against the brutal and persistent slaughter of tens of thousand of kind-hearted Falun Gong practitioners are very few.

One reason is that people have formed many misunderstandings of Falun Gong, and are taking an indifferent attitude towards the group due to the rampant defamation and lies against them by the CCP. The CCP is also trying its hardest to cover up the truth so that people cannot see what is really happening in the persecution of Falun Gong.

By the CCP's definition, who are the “death row prisoners”? Detained Falun Gong practitioners, who are regarded as their biggest “enemy,” are in fact the death row prisoners in the broad sense.

4. Where did the organs come from? The big jump in organ transplants between 2003 and 2006

If it were not for the persecution of Falun Gong launched almost single-handedly by Jiang Zemin, Falun Gong practitioners would not have been used as abundant organ resources and there would not have been the crazed “organ transplant tourism.” Organ transplantation in China would have taken a very different path. An organ shortage crisis (instead of an explosive increase in organs) could have occurred in 2004, and the establishment of an organ donation system might also have had been put on the agenda in 2005 instead of later in 2010.

Therefore, if there had not been a huge additional source of organs, the increase in organ transplants from 1999 until now would have been gentle and steady, without any sharp increase or decrease.

However, the above diagram shows a different situation. There was a sharp increase between 2003 and 2006, undeniably indicating that organ-harvesting from live Falun Gong practitioners was taking place. The fact that the CCP tries to cover up the crimes it committed during this time period is only increasing the weight and adding more guilt to those crimes.

Missing Falun Gong practitioners have been the main source of organ harvesting

People frequently mention blood tests being done on Falun Gong practitioners in forced labor camps or prisons. These tests are in preparation for their organs to be harvested. In fact, these labor-camp practitioners were not the main source of organs.

The real large-scale tragedy took place in the “concentration camps.” From 1999 to 2001, the main channel that Falun Gong practitioners took against the persecution was to go to Beijing to appeal and call for justice for Falun Gong by unfolding banners in Tiananmen Square.

Due to the policy of persecution by implication initiated by Jiang Zemin and the CCP regime and which included sacking Falun Gong practitioners' family members from their employment, punishing the leaders of their workplaces, depriving the entire staff at their workplaces of their bonuses, or forcing the local governments to take responsibility, many Falun Gong practitioners opted to refuse to tell their names or home addresses.

Labor camps and prisons in China could not detain the so-called “prisoners” without a name for long. Because they could not register these practitioners according to normal procedures, they had to transfer them elsewhere.

Where had these missing Falun Gong practitioners been transferred to? The CCP followed its usual procedures, and thus it was not surprising that they were handed over to the army. Thus these numerous missing Falun Gong practitioners became victims of organ harvesting by the CCP.

Hospitals affiliated with the PLA and Armed Police were the main force behind the live organ harvesting

A major characteristic of the operation of live organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners is that the organ resources were controlled by the PLA and most participating hospitals are military hospitals. Due to the PLA's secrecy, it is even harder for any outsider to know the whole picture.

The organ transplant center of Tianjin No.1 Central Hospital saw fast development within a few years and changed its name to Oriental Organ Transplant Center, the largest center of its kind in Asia. The center director and founder Shen Zhongyang established the Liver Transplant Research Center of the Armed Police at the General Hospital of the Armed Police in 2003 (a benchmark year which marks the increase of organ harvesting) and became its director.

Shen Zhongyang's close liaison with the Armed Police played an important role for the several organ transplant units under his leadership to be able to access a new source of organs.

Another active player in organ transplantation in China is Shi Bingyi, director of the PLA Organ Transplant Center, which is located in the General Hospital of the PLA Chief of Staff Department (also known as 309 Hospital). Military hospitals are not under the administration of the Ministry of Health, but belong to the PLA's General Logistics Department (GLD).

As the top leader of the PLA Organ Transplant Center, Shi Bingyi may have more information and data at hand than former Deputy Minister of Health Huang Jiefu. The data center of the Chinese Scientific Registry of Kidney Transplantation (www.csrkt.org), established by the Ministry of Health in August 2008, is managed by the No. 2 Hospital Affiliated to the General Hospital of the PLA, where Shi Bingyi works.

The international community must remain alert and be aware of the frequent actions taken by the CCP in relation to organ transplants and see through the CCP's true motive, which is to whitewash its crimes of organ harvesting.

As long as the CCP's persecution of Falun Gong is ongoing and its crimes of live organ-harvesting are not completely settled, everything it tries to do amounts to deceiving the world.

For more information on live organ harvesting, please read:
Falun Gong Practitioners Systematically Murdered for Their Organs: Refuting the Chinese Regime's "Death Row" Explanation.

Source: “Government policy and organ transplantation in China”
by Huang Jiefu, 2008

Number of Organ Transplants in China (by year)
-Data for 2005, 2006, 2008 provided by Shi Bingyi,
director of the Organ Transplant Center of the People's Liberation Army
-other years are "best estimates"