Newsletter B1/16 — February 29, 2016

In this Issue

The British Medical Journal’s online publication, Medical Ethics of BioMed Central(December 9, 2015) published the work of Kirk Allison PhD, Arthur Caplan PhD, Michael E. Shapiro MD, Charl Els MD, Norbert Paul MD, and Huige Li MD. The authors reported that forced organ procurement has not stopped in China and that authorities have simply relabeled prisoner organs as “voluntary donations from citizens,” in attempts to whitewash sourcing from both death-row prisoners and prisoners of conscience. “China can gain credibility only by enacting new legislation prohibiting use of prisoner organs and by making its organ sourcing system open to international inspections,” wrote the authors. “Until international ethical standards are transparently met, sanctions should remain.”

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BMC MEDICAL ETHICS

DAFOH director, Dr. Torsten Trey at a human rights event in Los Angeles, 2013
Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting has been nominated for the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize. This distinguished honor acknowledges a decade of leadership and diligent effort in promoting awareness of the human rights crisis of forced organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience in China, and efforts to preserve transplant ethics globally. China is the only nation that uses its military and civilian hospital systems in coordination with its judiciary and prison systems to illegally and systematically supply organs from non-consenting prisoners of conscience to fuel a lucrative transplant tourism industry.
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DAFOH member, author and professor at Sydney University Medical School, Maria Fiatarone Singh, MD, discussed the profound implications of inaction in response to the screening of Hard To Believe at NSW Parliament in Sydney, Australia: “There is complicity in our silence.”

A medical doctor and an international press journalist examine the responsibility of U.S. leaders and the international community to pressure China to end unethical organ harvesting from living prisoners of conscience.

Famed Miss World candidate from Canada, Anastasia Lin, spoke about the intricacies of Chinese Communist Party propaganda against religious groups, forced organ harvesting in China and the consequences of collusion.

Australian DAFOH member Sheridan Genrich, BHSc, ND, CGP, CHWC, discusses the very real and hideous world of forced organ harvesting in China in an interview with actor-director Ted Lyde.

Dear Colleagues and Friends,

Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting is deeply honored to be nominated for the 2016 Nobel Peace Prize. We are grateful for the collective dedication and effort of our board of directors, advisory board, nursing liaisons, and volunteer staff, as well as the many investigators, law makers, advocacy groups and journalists calling for an end to forced organ harvesting. A non-profit organization established by doctors in 2007, DAFOH remains dedicated to the promotion of medical ethics around the world.
Central to our NGO’s work has been addressing the state-sanctioned crime against humanity in China that primarily targets the practitioners of Falun Gong. We hope that this nomination will bring even greater global attention to the plight of the innocent people being killed to this day.

China is the only nation that uses its military and civilian hospital systems in coordination with its judiciary and prison systems to systematically impose blood testing and medical examinations on illegally detained prisoners of conscience and subsequently harvest their organs to fuel a lucrative transplant tourism industry.

DAFOH reported in 2013 that thousands of implausible forced medical exams and blood tests have been performed on unwilling prisoners of conscience held illegally in China’s notorious Laogai labor camp prisons.

In December 2015, the advocacy group, World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of the Falun Gong (WOIPFG), presented evidence from a recorded phone conversation with a medical doctor from China who disclosed that “countless” organs have been forcefully harvested from Falun Gong practitioners.

The Red Cross Society of China (no relation to the International Red Cross) reported a sudden and implausible increase of 25,000 newly registered, voluntary organ donors in just one day, from December 30-31, 2015, suggesting that the official transplant-related numbers are unreliable and artificial.

The Nobel Peace Prize nomination brings attention and adds momentum to another powerful advocacy effort to end this unprecedented evil. Bipartisan U.S. House Resolution 343, with 164 co-signors, is being widely discussed in the 114th Congress. DAFOH encourages our readers in the U.S. to contact their federal representatives and urge them to support the quick passage of this urgent, life saving resolution. Our website (www.dafoh.org) contains articles, related links, and a newsletter archive that can be shared with members of Congress and their staffers, as well as with state, county and municipal representatives and lawmakers.

Thank you for your continuous support in helping to bring the world’s attention to this ongoing humanitarian crisis. Your voice does make a difference.

Sincerely,

Torsten Trey, MD, PhD
Executive Director, DAFOH

News in Review

Governments and Parliamentarians
 
Federal Labor MP, Melissa Parker, placed a motion urging the Australian government to demand that China cease sourcing transplant organs from prisoners of conscience based on a decade of evidence and actions taken by other nations.
The 2016 African General Assembly’s Charter on Human and People’s Rights calls China’s healthcare system a “mecca for wealthy foreigners in need of transplants,” a market-driven system with a hierarchical flow of organs and hospitals designed to generate income and limit ethical accountability.
Rep. Paul Cook (R-CA 8th) of the Foreign Affairs committee recently joined the growing list of concerned members of Congress who are co-sponsoring H.Res.343 concerning forced organ harvesting in China.
AU parliamentarians and the Labor Party call on the government to urge China to end organ harvesting and improve voluntary donation rates at home.
Pushing for legislation to stop patients from going to China for organ transplants, MPs protest the ongoing persecution.
Famed Miss World candidate, Anastasia Lin, spoke about the intricacies of the Chinese Communist Party’s propaganda against religious groups, forced organ harvesting in China and the consequences of collusion.
Evidence revealed university leaders placed business interests and branding before medical ethics when they renewed a controversial honorary professorship given to China’s transplant chief. MP David Shoebridge stated: “The university has willfully ignored Dr. Jeifu’s history and even his current views on using executed prisoner’s organs, until pressed by external campaigns.”
In an unprecedented ruling, organs donated by Indian citizens can no longer be transplanted in the bodies of foreigners, with the overseers of India’s procurement system given judicial authority. With an eye for human rights, the Maharashtra state government also amended its organ donation law in attempts to encourage same family donations and protect vulnerable populations.
In 2015, almost 20,000 Californians in Rep. Ed Royce’s 39th congressional district signed a petition to support House Resolution 343, condemning forced organ harvesting in China. Congressman Royce, Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, reaffirmed his support for the resolution while speaking with reporters at a recent California State University, Fullerton event. Royce acknowledged the need to create disincentives for forced organ harvesting and calls for public education in America about the unethical practice of China’s reliance on prisoners of conscience to source organs.
Despite first hand accounts of evidence contradicting the U.S. diplomatic position, the State Department’s official trafficking report did not downgrade China to Tier 3, a status shared by serial abusers of human trafficking, on the U.S. Watch List of the world’s worst human rights offenders. China remains at Tier 2, a watch list without sanctions, for the second year in a row.

Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting Actions
DAFOH has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for a decade of determination in raising awareness, especially within the medical community, of unethical organ transplant practices in China and around the world.
DAFOH’s Wen Chen, PhD, human rights activist and biologist, spoke to a civic group in CA about forced organ harvesting of prisoners of conscience in China. Chen discussed how communities can help by reaching out to congressional representatives to co-sponsor bipartisan H.Res.343.

DAFOH member, author and professor at the Sydney University Medical School, Maria Fiatarone Singh, MD, discussed the profound implications of inaction in response to the screening of Hard To Believe at NSW Parliament in Sydney, Australia, “There is complicity in our silence.”

This new report examines China’s organ harvesting practices and notes that organs from executed prisoners are still being used for transplantation in China.
Australian DAFOH member Sheridan Genrich, BHSc, ND, CGP, CHWC, discusses the very real and hideous world of forced organ harvesting in China in an interview with actor-director Ted Lyde.

Investigators and Media
In the midst of an unprecedented crackdown on human rights attorneys by Chinese authorities, Taiwan’s lawyers urgently turn their attention to pressing the Chinese government to allow investigations on the ground in China, and agree to the immediate release of Falun Gong practitioners and all prisoners of conscience.
Journalist reviews the background on organ harvesting crimes in China and discusses the documentary Human Harvest with a passionate dedication to raising awareness of our collective complicity, calling for strict legislation and individual action.
The Insider, the UK’s highly acclaimed and largest independent news source, reported in Uganda on the current organ harvesting news saying Chinese authorities rake in billions. Transplants in China range from about US$60,000 to over US$170,000.
The Blaze questions whether any substantial changes have actually been made towards reforms in China’s transplant medicine. The author encourages Americans to show support for H.Res.343, urging their congressional representatives to join with international human rights advocacy groups and demand an end to forced organ harvesting in China.

Luo Yu, son of a Chinese communist revolutionary leader, acknowledges forced organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience and advises Chinese leader Xi Jinping to bring the officials responsible to justice.

A 32-page full color printed guide to the film, Hard to Believe, includes thought-provoking questions surrounding issues of medical ethics, forced organ harvesting, and religious persecution that generate discussion for your class, group or community. (English and French)
China declared it would abolish forced labor camps in November, 2013. But extrajudicial detention centers have reportedly replaced dismantled camps. Documents leaked from State Department human rights experts cited the new centers as reason to downgrade China to the ranks of the world’s worst human rights offenders. Top American diplomats disagreed.
Has China established an internationally acceptable voluntary organ donation system or just renamed “prisoners” as “citizens” who may “donate” organs? Despite semantic manipulations, evidence points to ongoing use of organs from non-consenting prisoners of conscience for the majority of transplant operations.
American investigative journalist and author, Ethan Gutmann, launched the Czech version of his book, The Slaughter, lecturing extensively on the state of the problem and how the issue of medical confidentiality hinders investigators of forced organ harvesting in China with privacy laws that do not consider crimes against humanity.

The Epoch Times found sufficient evidence in publicly available documents to raise serious concerns regarding organ sourcing in China. The rapid growth of Tianjin First Central Hospital’s transplantation department suggests an abundance of readily available organs without procurement documentation. This investigation indicates that the hospital has transplanted many more organs than officials revealed, pointing to the likelihood that tens of thousands of prisoners of conscience have been killed for their organs.

In 2015, Dr. Huang Jiefu, director of China’s organ transplant system and head of the China Organ Donation Committee, received an award from a private Filipino entrepreneur for his “contributions” to “peace, respect for human life and dignity.” Jiefu received the Gusi Peace Prize under the category of Human Rights despite having endorsed and engaged in organ harvesting from prisoners for years.

Reuter’s: Twelve Iraqi doctors missing after refusing to engage in forced organ harvesting
In early 2015, Iraq’s ambassador to the United Nations, Mohamed Ali Alhakim, urged the UN Security Council to investigate the reported deaths of 12 doctors in the Islamic State-held city of Mosul. Alhakim believes the doctors might have been killed after refusing to remove organs from ISIS victims. Reuters is following the case and reports a UN investigation is pending with Alhakim now requesting the Security Council revisit the allegations.
China rated top transplant tourism destination for Saudis: Doctor issues safetywarning
According to the Saudi Center for Organ Transplantation, Pakistan and China top the list for Saudis seeking organs. Agency director, Dr. Faisal Shaheen, disclosed that 120 to 200 Saudis recently received organ transplants illegally from other countries.

Multilingual News Briefs
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中共活摘法轮功学员器官系列报导
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COSECHA SANGRIENTA 
Swedish:

BLODIG SKÖRD

Petition till FN:s Kommissionär för mänskliga rättigheter

 

Turkish:

KANLI KAMPANYA Çin’deki Falun Gong Uygulayıcılarından, Organ Toplanmasına Yönelik Suçlamalara İliskin Gözden Geçirilmis Rapor

   

  
Human Harvest Documenatry

  

   

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Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting (DAFOH) aims to provide the medical community and society with objective findings of unethical and illegal organ harvesting. Organ harvesting, the removal of organs from a donor, without free and voluntary consent, is considered a crime against humanity, as well as a threat to the integrity of medical science in general. This edition of our newsletter offers up-to-date information on international efforts to stop unethical organ harvesting.