DAFOH: China Must not be Granted Sanctuary for Crimes Against Humanity

WASHINGTON, DC, USA, July 30, 2023 — Today, on the World Day Against Trafficking in Persons, Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting (DAFOH) calls the attention of the world to China’s unethical practice of removing organs from non-consenting living prisoners of conscience.

“’Reach every victim of trafficking, leave no one behind,’ is the theme for this year’s United Nation’s World Day,” says DAFOH Executive Director Dr. Torsten Trey. “To that end, we must highlight that for over two decades, China has forcibly harvested organs from living Falun Gong practitioners as part of the state-sanctioned persecution of the group.”

The body of data revealing these horrific acts is extensive, beginning with the first report in 2006 and culminating in a 562-page final judgment in 2020 from the China Tribunal, which states that the panelists were certain, “unanimously, and sure beyond reasonable doubt,” that China has been killing mainly Falun Gong practitioners for their organs for a “substantial amount of time.”

In 2021, twelve UN Special Rapporteurs co-signed an open statement calling for independent monitoring by international human rights mechanisms, given the credible information they have received.

Regrettably, the international community has largely ignored the plight and the persecution of Falun Gong – a group that the Chinese government has attempted to systematically dehumanize, demonize, and destroy. Falun Gong, a peaceful Buddhist discipline rooted in the universal principles of truth, compassion, and tolerance, deserves the same awareness and protection as that of other human lives that the UN seeks to protect.

DAFOH calls upon the international community to demand that China immediately end the practice of forced organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners and any other prisoners of conscience.

“China must not be allowed special status to neglect and bypass ethical standards that the United Nations wishes to implement worldwide,” Dr. Trey states. “China must not be granted a sanctuary status for crimes against humanity. If China wishes to remain a member state of the United Nations, it must also conform to zero tolerance against human trafficking.”

Contact: Dr. Torsten Trey, Executive Director DAFOH
E: torsten.trey@dafoh.org

Joint statement with:

CAP Liberté de Conscience (CAP), NGO with special United Nations Consultative Status
Contact: Thierry Valle, Director
E: contact@coordiap.com

Romanian Independent Society of Human Rights (SIRDO), NGO with special United Nations Consultative Status
Contact: Lucica Humenuc, Director
E: sirdo1@yahoo.com

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Nov. 3, 2019; Mumbai, India – Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting, DAFOH, was honored to receive the prestigious Mother Teresa Memorial Award for Social Justice 2019, for exemplary work in raising awareness and helping to combat forced organ harvesting. Initiated by the, Harmony Foundation, and endorsed by Missionaries of Charities, the recognition has been awarded each year since 2005.

The Harmony Foundation selected Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting this year due to the organization’s achievements in the advancement of social justice and human rights, in “strong support for the nomination in the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize list, for DAFOH’s continued upholding of ethical practices in medicine, and above all, in its fight against organ trafficking.”

A representative of the Harmony Foundation stated in a communication, “The organization’s decade-long struggle for raising awareness and informing the medical community along with the society at large is truly notable. The focus given on the unethical organ harvesting, particularly on Falun Gong ethnic group, wherein some observers have reported tens of thousands being killed for this heinous trade, is much needed in the current world. Noteworthy and admirable is DAFOH’s ability to initiate a petition to the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, by gathering more than 2 million signatures worldwide within 3 years calling for an end to China’s forced organ harvesting of Falun Gong prisoners of conscience. DAFOH’s report at the 3rd UK Round Table Briefing of Forced Organ Harvesting at Westminster Parliament in October 2018, about the organization’s findings was a spine chilling account on the new form of ‘cold genocide’ normalizing this crime against humanity perpetrated against this marginalized group.”

Accepting the award on behalf of the international medical NGO at the ceremony in Mumbai, India, DAFOH executive director Dr. Torsten Trey expressed his appreciation and highlighted the organization’s work to raise awareness of forced organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience in China. China is reliant on taking prisoners organs for lucrative fast track transplant operations, with different groups and minorities targeted as victims.

(Photo courtesy of the Harmony Foundation)

“In the case of Falun Gong, forced organ harvesting became a self-financing, self-propelling method to silence and eradicate the spiritual practice with the potential purpose to prevent Falun Gong practitioners from telling the world about its good, peaceful practice and its universally endorsed principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance”, Trey said.

The forced organ harvesting of practitioners started after the persecution of Falun Gong began in 1999. “The systematic, state run persecution and forced organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners, carried out nationwide with the help of the notorious 610 Office, was aimed at eradicating the practice in China”, Trey added. “Once, we understand that the intention behind the forced organ harvesting is not limited to financial profiting but the eradication of a spiritual practice, it also leads to solutions to combat it. For example, publicly stating that Falun Gong is a notable spiritual practice that appreciates positive, universal values like truthfulness, benevolence, and tolerance would unhinge the intent of silencing and eradicating the practice, and contribute to ending the forced organ harvesting.”

(Photo courtesy of the Harmony Foundation)

The award was noted internationally:

• Times of India
• The Hindu
• Indian Express
• Catholic News Agency
• The EpochTimes

Founded in 2005, Harmony Foundation is an international NGO, which works in the realm of Social Justice. Its raison d’être is the unbiased establishment and strengthening of social cohesion among various communities for the benefit of all without any discrimination. Now in its 15th year, its awards are part of an annual event that celebrates and commemorates the legacy of Mother Teresa who was canonized a Saint by Pope Francis.

Previous recipients have been Ms. Malala Yousufzai, a Nobel laureate; H.H. The Dalai Lama; the current Ghanaian President, Nana Akufo-Addo; Prime Minister of Malaysia, Dr. Mahathir Mohamad; former Deputy Speaker of the United Kingdom’s House of Lords, Baroness Caroline Cox; and Aid Groups like Medicines Sans Frontiers (Doctors Without Borders), the largest volunteer medical organization worldwide, and White Helmets, who provided aid to war-ravaged Syria.

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“The tribunal’s judgment demonstrates beyond all doubt that China is continuing to kill prisoners of conscience for their organs. We believe that forced organ harvesting in China is linked to other prolific abuses of this target group and amounts to a deliberate campaign of genocide against Falun Gong practitioners,” said Dr. Torsten Trey, executive director of DAFOH.

The tribunal’s findings recognize that some elements of a genocide are “clearly established” and explicitly invites further investigation concerning genocide.DAFOH echoes the tribunal’s call for further investigations and urges Congress to launch formal proceedings to determine the extent of the practice and the degree to which it constitutes genocide.

The tribunal’s report coincides with the one-year anniversary of an academic article, co-authored by members of DAFOH, which first described the organ harvesting campaign as a ‘cold genocide’ against Falun Gong practitioners in China.

One characteristic of a ‘cold genocide’ is that the eradication of the targeted group occurs in a slow-moving manner, said Trey. The Chinese government’s framing of Falun Gong as a ‘cult’ has misled the Chinese people and the international community preventing unbiased investigations of the genocide carried out against practitioners. “The campaign to label Falun Gong as a ‘cult’ has become part of the cold genocide, as it tries to conceal the eradication of the group,” said Trey.

Falun Gong is known worldwide as a peaceful, orthodox Buddhist Qigong practice. The debunking of the false ‘cult’ designation is an important first step to objectively examine the occurrence of crimes against humanity. An unbiased, fair investigation of the forced organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners will contribute to ending the malpractice and may benefit all other prisoners of conscience subjected to this transplant abuse, including Uighurs, Tibetans, Christians, and others.

Contact:

Ann Corson, MD

Email: Ann.Corson@dafoh.org

The post DAFOH Calls Upon U.S. Congress to Investigate Genocide of Falun Gong in China appeared first on Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting (DAFOH).

Resolution 210, submitted to the American Medical Association on November 11^th by the Medical Society of the District of Columbia calls for:

1. Transplant surgeons, especially those who come to the United States for training in transplant surgery, must agree to AMA’s Ethical Guidelines, and that American medical and hospital institutions not be complicit in any ethical violations or conflicts of interest;
2. An independent, interdisciplinary, transparent investigation must be conducted into China’s organ transplantation practices; and
3. The U.S. government must protect the large number of transplant tourists by implementing legislation that would blacklist countries that do not meet the same transparency and ethical standards practiced in the United States.

Joseph Gutierrez, Chair of the Medical Society of the District of Columbia’s delegation to the AMA, said, “We are very concerned with the increasing reports, out of China being particular, regarding forced organ harvesting for transplantation.”

Raymond Scalettar, Clinical Professor at George Washington University Medical Center and former Chair of the AMA Board of Trustees, supported the resolution saying, “This is a very important resolution on what is being called ‘cold genocide.’ The AMA has a significant representation at the World Medical Association. Hopefully, they can go forward and explore what else they can do in order to end this cold genocide.”

DAFOH Executive Director Dr. Torsten Trey told the committee, “The world saw medical abuse during the Holocaust, but it has never seen a genocide in which organs were systematically harvested and used for a profitable transplant business. Resolution 210 provides an opportunity to establish global leadership in ethics. The U.S. Congress passed House Resolution 343 calling for an end to forced organ harvesting in China, and the medical profession should do no less to stop this transplant abuse.”

DAFOH Deputy Director Dr. Weldon Gilcrease said, “Forced organ harvesting is systematic. It is carried out at the governmental level.” He added that, due to ignorance, American physicians and the public are at risk of complicity. American medical institutions train Chinese surgeons in transplant medicine who then return home and participate in unethical organ procurement and transplant practices. American citizens travel to China to buy organs obtained through acts of genocide.

The post DC Medical Society Submits Resolution at Interim Meeting of the AMA Raising Awareness of the Medical Profession’s Implication in a Cold Genocide appeared first on Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting (DAFOH).

Petition for the International Day Against Forced Organ Harvesting on October 1, 2016

A printable signature form of the petition for the International Day Against Forced Organ Harvesting is open for any supporter and volunteer. We ask any volunteers or supporters to email scanned copies of the signed signature forms to the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights until October 7, 2016 to:

[unordered_list style=”bullet”]

• petitions@ohchr.org
• civilsociety@ohchr.org

[/unordered_list]

Further instructions for the petition for the International Day Against Forced Organ Harvesting are available.

Statements of Support:

I sincerely express my condolence to those who were victims of the forced organ harvesting.  We will take an action from Japan so that this holocaust which challenges the sublime spirit of medicine will be eliminated as soon as possible through strong solidarity of people with consciences in the whole world.

ー　Hiroshi Yamada, Member of the House of Councillors, the Japanese Diet, Sept. 28, 2016

強制的な臓器収奪の犠牲になられた全ての人々に対して、心からの哀悼の意を表します。崇高な医の精神に真っ向から挑戦するこのホロコーストが、全世界の人々の良心の力強い連帯によって一日も早く根絶されるよう、日本からも行動を起こします。

ー   参議院議員　山田宏

Dear Members of the United Nations Human Rights Commission.

For many years, I have been deeply troubled by the mounting evidence of forced organ harvesting in China and elsewhere in the world.

The U.N. Human Rights Commission has a moral duty to do everything in its power to bring an end to this outrageous scourge, an affront to civilization and an affront to humanity itself.

I add my voice to the petition you are receiving, in the solemn hope that you will have the moral courage to act.

Respectfully yours,

State Rep. Michael F. Curtin

17th Ohio House District

Columbus, Ohio

“Mr. Speaker, October 1 is designated as an International Day of Remembrance Against Forced Organ Harvesting. Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting organized the Day of Remembrance and a petition to be presented to the United Nations calling for an immediate halt to China’s forced organ harvesting from detained Falun Gong practitioners, other prisoners and prisoners of conscience in China. Nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize 2016, Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting, is seeking an immediate end to this practice, as well as objective investigations leading to the prosecution of the perpetrators. And urging the Chinese government to end the 17-year persecution against Falun Gong, believed initiated by former President Zemin in 1999 and cited as the cause and source of forced organ harvesting from prisoners. By ending the genocide of the Falun Gong group, other populations in China will be safeguarded. This practice is another form of evil in our time and the United Nations will be further alerted to this crime against humanity, as are we.”

— Hon. Michael G. Fitzgerald, in the House of Representatives, Sept 30, 2016

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