FAIT Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS AND INTERNATIONAL TRADE

COMITÉ PERMANENT DES AFFAIRES ÉTRANGÈRES ET DU COMMERCE INTERNATIONAL

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Thursday, November 27, 1997

• 1048

[English]

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier (Brampton West—Mississauga, Lib.)): I call to order the meeting of the Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Trade.

It's with a great deal of honour that we welcome Harry Wu, the executive director of the Laogai Research Foundation. I think I speak on behalf of the entire committee, Mr. Wu, in saying that it is a great honour to have you here today.

With Mr. Wu is Michael To. I believe Michael would like to introduce the rest of the panel, and I will give the press a few minutes to leave the room.

Mr. Michael To (International President, Federation for a Democratic China): Good morning, Madam Chairwoman and committee members. My name is Michael To. I'm the current international president of the Federation for a Democratic China.

This morning our team is very happy to be here and to have the opportunity to present to you our view of the relationship between trade and human rights required between China and Canada. But first allow me to introduce my team: Professor Brian Given, who is the research consultant to the Canada Tibet Committee; Jume Wangda, the president of the Canada Tibet Committee, Ottawa chapter; Tom Mann, who is a freelance journalist and our media relationship chairman; Frank Woo, the current international president for the Chinese Alliance for Democracy, based in the United States, and who has come up here to support our effort, particularly for this trip; and of course our foremost dissident, Harry Wu, the executive director of the Laogai Research Foundation.

• 1050

With this introduction, I pass the floor to Harry.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Thank you.

Mr. Wu, I'll tell you what we'll do. You will make your presentation, and then we'll give each party an opportunity in rotation to ask questions of you. I think you'll find some very interesting and perhaps even controversial questions today, as many of us are very interested in the human rights situation.

Could the electronic media please withdraw from the room at this time?

Mr. Harry Wu (Executive Director, Laogai Research Foundation): Mrs. Chairman, I will submit my testimony for your record.

I'm very grateful to you for giving me the opportunity to appear before this committee. I will be very short and make a short statement. I prefer to take questions from your committee members.

My name is Harry Wu, and I am the executive director of the Laogai Research Foundation. I'm a native of China. In 1985 I came to the United States as a visiting scholar at the University of California at Berkeley.

Since then, particularly in 1991, I went back to China with CBS 60 Minutes, and also in 1994, with a BBC crew. I tried to document the Chinese labour camp system and tried to tell the world that, not only as there was in Europe in the 1930s and 1940s, there is a huge concentration camp system. Not only under Stalin, in the Soviet Union, did they have a gulag system. Communist China also has an extensive labour camp system they call Laogai.

You know, before 1974 “gulag” was not a word. Today it is, in every dictionary, in every language, in every country, except the Chinese Communist dictionary. They don't take the word “gulag.”

Laogai means “reform” and “labour,” or you can say “re-education through labour.” It's the most extensive forced-labour slavery system in the world.

Since 1950 and to this moment, we estimate about 50 million Chinese have entered into the Laogai. Half of them disappeared. Today we still identify more than 1,100 labour camps that exist in mainland China. Probably six million people are still under this terrible system.

Today I am very happy to be here as a free man. I'm a survivor. I feel I have a mission to tell you what is going on.

Probably recently you heard that a famous dissident, Wei Jingsheng, was released from China. This is the victory of the human rights advocates' tireless fighting. All of the democratic countries of the world, including the Canadian government, have fought against the atrocities in China. But we Chinese have an idiom: If you see only a tree and ignore the forest, then you're ignoring the truth. In other words, we are happy to see a man freed from the machine, but we would be much happier to see the machine ended.

• 1055

If today you're talking about human rights violations in China, probably you are talking about birth control, about workers' rights, about Tibetan fighters, about student demonstrations, and about the people seeking their religious freedoms. If anyone today in China disagrees with the government the government puts them into the Laogai system, the so-called “we want to reform them” system.

I hope the Canadian government and the Canadian people are aware that a huge unacceptable institution, the Laogai, exists today in our society, our society of human beings. If you denounce the gulag, if you denounce the concentration camps, then you have to—you must—say no to the Chinese Communist government about Laogai.

I spent 19 years in this camp. When I was 20 years old I was a college student. I was invited by the party—and of course everybody knows this is a trap—to speak out. They asked everybody to express their mind.

When in a class meeting I disagreed with the Soviet invasion of Hungary in 1956 and criticized the member of the party treating the common Chinese as second-class citizens, right away I got a label as a counter-revolutionary rightist and they deprived me of my freedom. I lost my future.

My father was humiliated, tortured, and died. My mother committed suicide, because she was really scared when she heard I would be arrested. My youngest brother was also killed. At the beginning he was beaten, and his brain damaged. He became mentally disabled. Finally they killed him in 1981.

I want to emphasize the point that in 1957 this persecution, this political movement, was designed by Chairman Mao and directed by Deng Xiaopeng. At that time Deng Xiaopeng was head of the anti-rightist movement of the party committee. He's responsible for my suffering, responsible for this persecution. In that political campaign one million Chinese intellectuals were labelled counter-revolutionary rightists. I'm one of them. I'm one of the million.

Some 22 years later, many of them have disappeared. I'm very lucky I survived, and that today I have come to a freedom country.

In China there's no way you can treat yourself as a human being, because Chinese dictators never treat human beings as human beings. They ignore their rights. They never allow people to choose their future, choose their society, choose their religion.

• 1100

Today China is at the crossroads of history. In 1976, when Mao died, Deng Xiaopeng came to power. Because of Mao's disastrous policies, Deng Xiaopeng had been left with no other choice than to give people a break economically. That's why Deng Xiaopeng said “I don't care if the colour of the cat is white or black. If the cat can catch the mouse, it's a good cat.” Deng Xiaopeng was fighting for one thing, to have the communist system survive in China. That's why he allowed capitalism back into the communist society. That is why in 1979 he released many political criminals, including me, Harry Wu.

Probably you have heard that Wei Jingsheng was released. Remember, I was released in February of 1979. The next month, March 1979, they arrested Wei Jingsheng, and he spent another 18 years in prison. That is another generation of so-called counter-revolution there. Then you have another generation of so-called counter-revolutionaries, such as the student leader Wang Dan, today still in jail, who in 1989 peacefully demonstrated in Tiananmen Square.

It is true that today the living conditions of Chinese people have been improved. They even have some rights. For example, today they have the right to choose what kind of shampoo they want. They have some rights, such as travel to a foreign country. But they don't always have the right to choose what they want. They don't have the right to choose what kind of religions they want, for example.

There is no religious freedom at all in China. Religion was totally destroyed in the 1950s. After some thirty years, the common people are seeking their truths, and religion has come back to China. Today the Chinese government is using two hands—one, suppression, and the other one setting up their controlled so-called patriotic churches system.

The Roman Catholic Church until this moment in China is illegal. Even Cuba, communist Cuba, allowed the Roman Catholic Church. In China, no.

Today I particularly want to mention a barbaric issue to you. Here is the Chinese document. This document is issued by the Supreme People's Court, the Supreme People's Procuratorate, Ministry of Public Security, Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Public Health, and Ministry of Civil Affairs.

I hope if Jiang Zemin comes over here, the Canadian government, the Canadian Prime Minister will show this document to him, because he is the president of the country, and is responsible for this policy. This is a national policy. The title of the policy is “On the Use of Dead Bodies or Organs From Condemned Criminals ”, issued October 9, 1984.

Madam Chairman, this is the first time in our human being society that a government has set up a law, set up a policy, to extract the organs from death row prisoners for sales domestically and internationally.

Today there are 90 hospitals in China that can do that operation—transplants—and many of them are military hospitals. A couple of months ago a Chinese broker located in the United States made advertisements in Chinese-language American newspapers, trying to sell the organs. An ABC documentary will tell you what it is. The BBC and the CBC in 1994 also made the same report. Making money from body parts—it is the first time it has happened in our human society.

According to communist revolutionary purpose set up the in constitution, set up in the criminal code, they arrange the politically necessary arrest of people, sentence them to death, and then make arrangements with the hospital. The hospital is a government-operated hospital, owned by the government. All the doctors are Chinese government employees. They stand by the execution ground and remove the organs for market, at $30,000 a kidney.

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In the last couple of years, 47 Thai patients went to China and received a kidney. Everybody can tell you the story; they know about it coming from executed prisoners. Some Chinese doctor testified in the American Senate that before the execution they removed the kidneys. Yet today we want to do business with this country. Today we want to have a red carpet for this president.

People try to tell us businesses can change them, that money can buy over the communist authoritarian system. Engage them in business, in trade, get capitalism thriving, and finally defeat socialism so that the people get to a democratic society. Are you sure? Nobody wants to say capitalism means democracy. Nobody agrees today that the capitalism existing in China is the same as yours, as Canada's, or the United States' is a capitalist system. It's a state-controlled, bureaucratic capitalism.

These capitalists are rare capitalists. They are members of the party or officials of the government. Yes, they have property in the United States and Canada. They have big money accounts in your bank. But they are members of the Communist Party. I don't think they have any interest in democracy or human rights in China. Your money today is just like the fuel in the tank. It's driving this communist vehicle.

This communist regime almost collapsed in the late 1970s, and today people from the west, like the former Secretary of State for the United States, Warren Christopher, are calling this country a superpower. Last December, in Shanghai, he said the U.S. has to seek a partnership with this country because they are a superpower. How come? The communists fell everywhere, the Berlin Wall peacefully was torn down, but the communist system today in China has become become stable. That's your money.

I would say that in the next few years you will have a very serious debate over rebuilding this communist giant. When you're talking about the market, when you're talking about the communist economic giant, listen, there's a military giant and also a communist giant.

Money, it is true, is improving the common people's living conditions. The people's living conditions, when compared with the past, are much different now. But also you have to understand the major part of the profits from the west are enjoyed by the Chinese communist government. If the Chinese policy is only based on money, on trade, it's no different from the appeasement policy of Munich. Appeasement never makes peace. Appeasement never improves human rights.

Thank you.

The Vice-Chairman (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Thank you.

Mr. Grewal.

Mr. Gurmant Grewal (Surrey Central, Ref.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mr. Wu, I welcome you and all your delegates to this committee. Today is the first time I have heard you here, and you have shown a human hurt attached to human rights. It's appalling to hear the whole story of how human rights are violated in your part of the world, and to hear your personal story of how your father was tortured and murdered, how your mother committed suicide, and how your brother was killed. This is not only your family, because we know there are other families these things are happening to in that country.

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I have something I don't like to say, but I have to, because recently at the APEC summit we noticed that the human rights agenda was not there. Our prime minister made a strong statement that human rights is not part of the agenda on APEC, whereas the foreign minister has been taking a different version. He made a statement yesterday that human rights was part of the agenda to be discussed at APEC. So we have a flip-flop situation here, which is unfortunate. The red carpet that is laid out for these brutal killers of human life in those countries is quite appalling. We want to do business with the developing markets in the world. The East Asian market is coming up and we want to do business there, but that is the second priority. The first one should be human rights.

I have a couple of questions and I will be brief on those questions and I would like you to be brief in your answers. The release of Mr. Wei Jingsheng was not reported in the media in China. This raises the concern that the release was simply for diplomatic purposes and not for human rights purposes. What are your comments? Do you agree with this statement?

Mr. Harry Wu: Communist China, the same as the Soviet Union, is always using dissidents, human beings, as a bargaining chip. They make a deal all the time. This is not fresh, it is not new. But the release of Wei Jingsheng was a victory for the human rights advocates and their tireless fighting. This also shows you that the communist regime is weakening. Under international pressure they're withdrawing. But as I said, Wei Jingsheng's release does not mean the human rights violations are going to stop in China.

Mr. Gurmant Grewal: That's right. Do you mean that this is not a single step forward towards the direction that human rights should be respected; it is simply a deal to make them pleased so they can proceed further based on this particular release using it as a stepping stone?

There are forced abortions and sterilizations under the one-child policy in China. We know that Amnesty International and Freedom House report at least thousands of political prisoners and prisoners of conscience in China. The Chinese government then was welcomed and given the red carpet treatment at the APEC summit. What would you recommend to China and America? Do you think that in APEC or any other further dealings human rights should be the number one issue and trade should be the following issue? Or do you agree with what our governments are doing here?

Mr. Harry Wu: You just mentioned forced abortions. Let me give you some information. The Chinese government report said every year there are 14 million to 20 million. What's the total population of Canada, 30 million? There are between 14 million and 20 million abortion cases every year.

APEC is talking economics. Nobody is interested in talking about human rights. I don't think human rights can be an issue at APEC. But if you ignore the human rights issue in China you ignore your own principles. We want to see a democratic, peaceful and prosperous China, not a prosperous Communist China. If this populous country is still under communist control of course this is not good for Chinese, but also it is not good for everyone, including Canadians.

China is a huge country and it can only be changed by the common Chinese. If we always deliver our concerns and messages to both the Chinese government and the Chinese people that we are concerned about human rights violations, we are concerned about human rights abuses, it will keep the Chinese awake. We are the same as the Canadians. We are the same as the British. We are the same as the Japanese. We deserve rights as human beings, and then the people could become an opposition to the dictatorship. That country could be going more quickly toward a democratic society. That's what we hope.

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Mr. Gurmant Grewal: One day before the APEC summit, I was interviewed by one of the TV channels here. I brought this up as the first issue on APEC. Before we do business with anyone, we need to see with whom we are doing business. I brought up the issue that human rights should be on the agenda.

The other members who were there with me in that interview the other day said that human rights had nothing to do with APEC. After two days, the same members said that human rights should be on the agenda. People were flip-flopping.

Consider even our foreign affairs minister. When he used to be in the official opposition, before 1993, he was the loudest in saying that there had been inconsistencies between the principles of human rights and trade policies as far as the Tory government was concerned. We see the same inconsistencies with our responsible people who are supposed to be initiating those types of deals. We see those ones.

What's the important issue? How far are our governments going? As for America, China, and other countries, how far are they going? We saw the Berlin Wall come down. The former Soviet Union disintegrated, but China and Indonesia are not opening up. What are the factors that we must highlight and stress for bringing those countries on line to talk about human rights?

Mr. Harry Wu: We will just tell the Chinese partner that we will not serve them a free lunch. Simply, no free lunch.

We want to see the human rights violations stopped. We want to see an improvment in their political system. At any time in any meeting, if you deliver the message to your partner, it's very good for you, the Chinese, and everyone.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Thank you.

[Translation]

Ms. Debien.

Ms. Maud Debien (Laval East, BQ): Mr. Wu, let me first address the most warmful welcome to you and to all members of your delegation to this meeting of our committee. I would also like to thank you wholeheartedly for all the efforts you are making to enhance the world's awareness on the issue of human rights in China.

I have two questions for you. I will try to be very brief. My first questions occurred to me after hearing our minister of External Affairs mention at the University of Ottawa, last November 6, that we sometimes have to apply soft diplomatic action and at other times hard diplomatic action when we raise the human rights issue in our dealings with other countries.

Soft diplomatic action applies to issues such as the development of democracy, the strengthening of peace, the improvement of our trade relations, bilateral dialogue, and so on, whereas hard diplomatic action is mostly taken at the international level and include the adoption of United Nations resolutions, sanctions, and so on.

As you can see, our government uses a double standard policy towards countries which violate human rights. What was not mentioned in that statement, though, is that soft diplomatic action is applied to countries like China and Indonesia which offer very good economic opportunities for Canada, whereas hard diplomatic action is used for countries like Nigeria or Burma, which offer almost nonexistent economic potential for Canada. I would like to hear what you think of that kind of double standard policy?

My second question concerns that famous cultural factor which several countries that are known to violate human rights, including China, are referring to. What they are telling us is that we must take into account those cultural factors in the application of human rights standards in their countries. I would like to have your comment on that.

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[English]

Mr. Harry Wu: Let me answer your second question first.

Everybody understands that the United Nation's Universal Declaration of Human Rights has only one version. There aren't two versions. And they don't divide it into a Chinese version, an eastern version, a western version or a Canadian version. There is one version. And as a human being, you deserve those rights. The colour of your skin doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if you're rich or poor. It doesn't matter where you come from.

Why talk about human rights issues in China and suddenly change the tone and say “Don't impose our western value system on theirs because they have their own culture, their own tradition.”

It is true. In Chinese tradition they never consider human rights and democracy, but it doesn't mean that the Chinese, as human beings, don't deserve the rights. This is a double standard. Shame on these western politicians if they're using this language.

Second, you were talking about so-called “soft language” and “hard language”. I think measurement and principle are two different things. You can change your measurement, change your way, to approach one or two things. In different times and in different situations, sometimes you play hard, sometimes you play soft. But principles are principles. Principles should not be changed. If you change your principles, you've lost your standing.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Thank you.

Mr. Robinson.

Mr. Svend J. Robinson (Burnaby—Douglas, NDP): Thank you.

I too want to join in welcoming Mr. Wu and those who accompany him, and to say—and Mr. Wu, I'm sure you're aware of this—that there is a very strong movement for democracy and human rights here in Canada. There are people like Michael To and others who've been working for many years to try to influence our government to take a much stronger position on these fundamental questions. I want to take this opportunity not only to thank Mr. Wu for his very eloquent evidence but to pay tribute to those who have been working here in Canada to achieve those objectives.

I recall, for example, that in 1992 I led an all-party delegation of members of Parliament to China. It was cut slightly short—

Some hon. members: Oh, oh.

Mr. Svend Robinson: —but one of the issues that I raised with government officials in China, in Beijing, was Laogai. I asked them how they could defend this policy and so on. As my friend and colleague, Ms. Finestone, has reminded the committee, shortly after raising that issue I was kicked out of China. But that certainly hasn't silenced me.

I just have to note, as well, that Mr. Grewal talked about certain inconsistencies on the part of some Liberals. I commend him for his concern for human rights, but since he raises the issue, I would just note ever so gently that some of his own Reform Party colleagues have made statements that are diametrically opposed to those he's made, such as a glowing tribute from one of his Reform Party colleagues about trade with China, without a word about human rights.

[Translation]

It's a bit like Mr. Lucien Bouchard who, at some other time, used to talk about the importance of the issue of human rights in the case of China, but who, in the course of his recent trip to that country, didn't utter a single word and remained quiet about it. Not a single word. Apparently, once in power, things are seen differently.

[English]

I want to ask a couple of brief questions. First, Mr. Wu, has there been any improvement in real terms over the course of the past five years in the human rights situation, in the situation of Laogai and in some of the other concerns that you've addressed for many years? Because what we've heard, of course, is that constructive engagement, trade and strengthening commercial relations will in fact improve the human rights situation in China. We've heard from Amnesty International and others that it's not the case, that it's not happening. I'd like to hear from Mr. Wu whether there has been any significant improvement in the situation.

Perhaps I'll just put my second question, then, because I know others will want to ask questions. My second question is with respect to the issue of human rights, and specifically, internal pressure within China. In the course of your evidence, you say, “In China, the only force that will really change things is internal pressure.” We know that any internal dissent is quite ruthlessly suppressed. So I'd ask you to indicate whether you see any hope, any signs of renewed or strengthened internal pressure despite those terrible odds people face, and what we can do outside China to reinforce and to work with those who are trying so bravely within China—people like Wei Jingsheng—to change things from within.

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Mr. Harry Wu: In response to the question about whether there's any improvement, fundamentally there's no significant change. The American State Department issued a human rights report in 1997 that said the economy is growing and the human rights record is going down. One up, one down, because the economy growing gives the Chinese government a lot of facility and possibility to strengthen their power.

It is changing. The country is rapidly changing because they learn from their experience. In 1950 my father was a wealthy banker. He chose to stay in China because it seemed to him this is his motherland. The majority of Chinese at that time upheld communism. It seemed to them in China that communism was paradise. We treated Mao as a god. We sacrificed everything for this communist revolution because it was the only future for us. After 30-some years we find out that communism is a joke. The people today do not trust communism any more. There's a very serious ideological crisis over there. Even the members of the party don't trust what is communism. This is a significant change today in China affecting all kinds of areas.

The second question asked whether there is any hope, any change. Human rights violations in China affect many different areas—not only the students or dissidents. This is a part of it. For example, Tibet: the tireless, endless fighting today has become so popular a movement in the world, supported by all kinds of people of the world. Tibetans never give up. I think this is one issue the Canadian government especially has to take care of, because you guys respect the Quebec people seeking their independence. You respect the people speaking the French language; they have their rights. I think you also have to respect that the Tibetans have their rights in seeking their future, in determining what kind of a society they want and what kind of a religion they want. If you only respect the French-language people in Quebec and ignore a Tibetan, what are you doing?

Second is the religious movement. It has never happened in Chinese communist history that religion was so seriously widely spreading in China. Five years ago we estimated only about four million underground Catholic Church activities. Today it's doubled into eight million, and there are maybe another ten or twelve million Christian underground church activities. Communists came to power and destroyed all the church systems; there was no religious freedom at all. We uphold one religion, which is communism. Now we say it is a joke and the people are seeking their new faith. Religion today is widely spreading in China.

I want to say that you can become a dissident in Tiananmen Square, oppose the government, and maybe tomorrow you can turn to the other side, you're pro-communist. Many students today can say they're for Deng Xiaopeng's policy, yet in Tiananmen Square they opposed the government as dissidents. You have to know one thing: once you practise as a Catholic you never become a communist; you're definitely in opposition to the communists.

So I think the thing is dramatically changing, and that's why I'm using only one sentence there: Today China is at a crossroads of its history.

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Mr. Svend Robinson: Thank you very much.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Ms. Finestone.

Mrs. Sheila Finestone (Mount Royal, Lib.): I thank you very much, Madam Chairman, for allowing me the privilege of sharing this morning with you.

It's strange, Svend. I have to build on what you said. That's amazing.

I do want to make one observation, Mr. Wu. Along with the tremendous sense of pride and privilege we feel for having you here to share your perspective with us as a world famous dissident, you bring a message of hope about humanity and human strength in diversity. The sense of tenacity of spirit and principle that you are able to maintain under extremely difficult circumstances, personal, physical and emotional, makes you a model to many.

You indicated many things in the points that you made, and a couple have struck me quite strongly. The first has to do with religion. We're kind of a naive, young country, and we've been enriched by a very large influx of Chinese, as well as Taiwanese, Tibetans and Cambodians. As an Asia-Pacific nation, we have had the pleasure of that growth; because we're not particularly growing from internal sources, we're growing from immigration.

Canadians, I think, are the kind of people who have the pleasure of enjoying, learning from, and respecting difference. We are a very mixed group of people. We are a very multicultural people. In fact, I don't think there's any place on the earth from which we do not have representation and for which we have not,

[Translation]

as we say in French "étendu notre réseau".

[English]

We have really a glorious tapestry of multicultural strands.

Into that has flown the blood and the faith and the hopes of many people from countries that have been under stress, that are living under dictatorships, that have horrible stories to tell. We have the Holocaust survivors among us, we have the Somalians, we have the Yugoslavians, the Bosnians. We know what dissent brings and how dissent tries to effect change.

You've indicated—and I think Svend said this—that the change has to come from inside. I don't think it is the interest of the people in this room, nor the interest of Canadians, to particularly share with you the problems that we have in Canada. They are quite minimal compared to the problems that you have brought to our attention for major numbers of people in China. I don't want to touch the political parties' particular perspective. I don't care about them, because my interest is what you represent here as a human being and as a survivor and as a dissident. But more in particular, my interest is in the message that you bring.

I happen to be of the school that believes that if you don't knock on the door, if you don't do business, and if you don't display Canadian values in the way that you do business—which, for me, is the key—then you cannot start that internal questioning and that internal sense of change. You've indicated that you need that internal sense of change, and that the motivation must come internally. You've talked about the incredible growth of the Catholic religion. I hope the Catholic Church is supporting that growth, if that's the way in which some of the internal dissent can build.

As for the Tibet question, Canada has had some very strong views and support for the Tibet situation. The Dalai Lama has been a welcomed and honoured guest here in Canada.

To come back to you, in what kind of concrete way, other than the moral language of dissent, can we enable the kind of change that will treat human beings with dignity, that will not sell body parts because it will bring money to the economy? I mean, you tell us there are 1,100 labour camps—I think that's what you said—with six million people within these camps, and the only way things have been changing is due to economic improvement. That's how they're becoming interested in developing themselves, because of the economy.

• 1135

What is, from your perspective, other than the moral tone of support for human rights...? The United Nations Human Rights Charter was written by John Humphrey, a man in my riding who recently died. I think we've had a very significant input into the civil rights code, but—

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Mrs. Finestone, could you...?

Mrs. Sheila Finestone: Yes, I'd be happy to. I want some guidance.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Mr. Wu is going to have to be brief as well.

Mr. Harry Wu: I have a proposal that the member of this committee can consider. You mentioned the six million people under the Laogai. According to Chinese policy, Chinese prison camps have two different names. One name for the judicial system is Laogai, a detachment or prison. The other name is the enterprise name—a factory, a mine, a farm.

It's true that these are profit centres. These are production centres. According to Chinese government information, there are 200 different kinds of products exported to the international market, including the Canadian market.

Recently the American customs service issued 26 detention orders against illegal products. In the United States products made by forced labour imported from any country is illegal, but not in Canada. I wish the Canadian government had the same policy, the same legislation, and would not allow in any of these types of products. It's unethical. The products are made with blood and tears.

Mrs. Sheila Finestone: I like what you're saying, but you have to know that Canada did take a strong position, and continues to do so, with respect to child labour.

Now, we're talking about prisoner labour—

Mr. Harry Wu: Forced labour.

Mrs. Sheila Finestone: —and I'd like to hear more on this.

Mr. Harry Wu: I testified last June before the European Parliament. They are taking care of this issue. I hope the Canadian government also follows up on this issue.

Second, when you ask the Chinese government to participate in the Three Gorges dam program, why don't you just say the same thing: Do you want my money? Do you want my technology for your big program? Well, I have a small program I have to attach to it. I want to have observers in your country to contact the underground church activities. As well, can we have a cooperative program about forced abortion, about birth control? We're concerned about it. There are many military personnel today in Canada doing business. We like business, and welcome all countries, but no military business.

They're selling mountain bikes and rubber shoes in Canada, but the profit goes back to support the military, the same military that you know rolled tanks over student bodies in Tiananmen Square.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Thank you.

Mr. Sauvageau.

[Translation]

Mr. Benoît Sauvageau (Repentigny, BQ): Like my colleagues already did, I want to thank you for your presence at this meeting of our committee. We all have great respect for your efforts to make people aware of those issues, and you deserve all our consideration for your courage. I think that after your departure, it will be incumbent on parliamentarians to convey your message to the interested parties.

I partly agree with what Ms. Finestone said earlier, that your appearance before this committee should strengthen our determination to fight for human rights. But it remains for the government to put forward policies, and I think it's for them also to denounce loudly, clearly and vigorously the way human rights are abused, particularly in your country, and in any other country we are trading with and where that is an actual issue.

• 1140

Since you personally experienced the way prisoners are treated in China and since you are well aware of the situation in the work camps and of the numerous human rights violations that are committed in your country, I would like to ask you first two questions directly related to those issues. If I have some time left, then, I will ask you a third one.

First, you said earlier in your presentation that the Chinese government was presently aware of the sale of organs from executed criminals and that they were actually taking an active part in it. I think that everyone here was outraged by such a thing, which we all consider as being very serious. Could you give us more details about what you know of that traffic and, if possible, tell us who are those foreigners who benefit from it? Are there any Canadians who buy those organs? Are you aware of any foreign governments who showed their disapproval of such a practice to the Chinese authorities? That is my first question.

Second, could you describe the living conditions imposed upon prisoners who are forced to produce those consumer goods which are sold in Switzerland and in Canada?

[English]

Mr. Harry Wu: Thank you for your question.

On the question about the organs, let me take the liberty of quoting an article from the Chinese document on the use of dead bodies and organs from condemned criminals, October 9, 1984. Article I says:

Those criminals who are sentenced to death and executed immediately must be executed by means of shooting....

Article III:

The dead bodies or organs of the following categories of condemned criminals can be made use of:

1. The uncollected dead bodies or the ones that the family members refuse to collect;

What is that? In my 19 years in a camp, if I did anything wrong they could have executed me and my body would not have been collected because my family would not have come to collect it. They would have already been separated from me and would have condemned me. They would have had to stand together with the communist government. So my body would have become government property.

Paragraphs 2 and 3 of article III:

2. Those condemned criminals who volunteer to give their dead bodies or organs to the medical institutions;

3. Upon the approval of the family members.

It's easy in the camp to produce a paper. I think everybody understands. Up to last year there were close to 20,000 killings, and most of them were prisoners. We don't know how many organs were sold to foreign countries, but we interviewed patients from Canada, United States, Japan, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Thailand, and France who received organs from Chinese death row prisoners.

We heard they sell organs in India and the Philippines because people want money for their families. It's a human tragedy. We heard that in Mexico and some other places like the Philippines the Mafia murders people to make money. These are evil activities.

But this is fundamentally from Communist China. This is a government operation, government policy. Jiang Zemin is coming. Why don't you just ask the president “Is that your document? What are you doing under this document? How many organs are really removed and sold? Please tell me about it. We not only want your economic development information and your contracts, we also want to know about human beings, please.”

Mrs. Sheila Finestone: Would you mind asking that the document be tabled with the committee, please?

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): We'd like to have that document tabled with the committee.

Mr. Harry Wu: Yes, definitely.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Thank you.

• 1145

Mr. Harry Wu: The second question was about the products. In black and white, in the paper, it says 10 to 12 hours a day. For example, my first labour camp was a chemical factory, two shifts a day, 12 to 12. Then later I worked on a farm. When the sun rises, you go out to the field. When the sun sets down, you come back. Everyone has a full ration. Prisoners have a full ration. The warden says, “Good labour, good food; less labour, less food; no labour, no food.” If you refuse to labour, they remove your food. And everyone has a daily production labour quota. If you cannot complete the quota, you receive punishment. This is the way they so-called reform the prisoners.

When you become a prisoner, you're not allowed to exercise your religion. You have to deny your political viewpoints. The Chinese communists say, “We are helping you become a new social person.” I think you know that there is a slogan in front of the Laogai camp: “Labour makes freedom”. I want to tell you there's another slogan in China: “Labour makes new life”. The products are made by blood and tears. I don't think everyone has to buy them and has to ignore that.

Thank you.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Mr. Wu, the export of products made by forced or prison labour has been prohibited under the rules of GATT since 1947. We're looking at perhaps enforcement being the problem. But also I'd note that China is not currently a member of GATT, and they're seeking to accede to GATT, the World Trade Organization.

Do you think that perhaps this can be a tool? We've had trade embargoes for years against China. Have human rights violations increased since trade has been opened up to China? I understand where you're coming from, and certainly in my heart and soul I agree with you that we should ban, but practically speaking, trade embargoes haven't worked either.

I'm sorry. Mr. Reed, it's your turn next.

Mr. Harry Wu: I already mentioned that the American state department has the report, and it's very clear. The economy is growing in China and human rights violations are more serious. The violations are increasing, particularly in Tibet, in the minority area, including Uighurs in Xinjiang. Also, the religious underground activities are more serious than before.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Would conditionality on China's joining the World Trade Organization be an effective tool?

Mr. Harry Wu: Mrs. Chairman, I'll be honest with you. In the diplomatic area, I have very small knowledge. What is the GATT, and if the Chinese joined the GATT, what impact would it have...I don't have comments at this moment.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Okay, thank you.

Mr. Reed.

Mr. Julian Reed (Halton, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chairman.

Mr. Wu, we watched the collapse of the Soviet Union not too long ago, and of a totalitarian regime that had been in power for very many years. The collapse was so complete that it hasn't really been replaced with anything. So we went from one lawless regime that was practised by government to another lawless regime that is practised on the street.

• 1150

It is the hope of many that communism in China will disappear. The concern is, I suppose, how suddenly it will disappear. You've stated that China is at a crossroads and that certain things are beginning to move now.

Can you help us by shedding some light on how that transition can take place without the repetition of the problems that took place when the Soviet Union collapsed?

Mr. Harry Wu: The Soviet Union and the Russian people today pay a high price to bury the communist system, but people die and we have to buy a coffin for them. You have to pay the price. The difficulties, the problems, that exist today in the Soviet Union, in Russia, are not coming from the new system. They're coming from the old system. They were under communist rule for 75 years. They have to pay the price.

We Chinese also have to pay the economic price for transferring the state ownership system to a private ownership system, for transferring the dictatorship system to a democratic system, and for transferring the whole society from a totalitarian, bureaucratic society to a democratic society, a people society. It's a big job. We have to pay the price, but nobody can avoid the price, however high or low.

We wish China could peacefully evaluate it and upgrade it to a democratic society. You wish. I wish. The problem is the person and the party controlling the power. I don't think they're willing to peacefully give up their power, so the Chinese future is really unpredictable. The Chinese communist regime is actually one of the dynasties in our traditional feudalism dynasty system, since a couple of thousand years ago, and to this moment China is still in that circulation. Mao and Deng were just without crowns. They employed this empire system.

How does China transfer to a people's republic, a democratic country of freedom? There's a very long way to go. The people were totally polluted, educated by the system. Communism can collapse tomorrow, just like the Berlin Wall can be peacefully torn away, just like what's happening in Russia today and what's happened in Poland. The communist power has come back to Poland again. It takes a while.

History never goes on a straight path. It goes forward and backwards, and forwards and backwards, but fundamentally, it goes forward.

Mr. Julian Reed: You give us cause for hope in the words that you've shared with us. I guess the concern that I'm trying to express is that the transition will be more peaceful than it has been in Russia.

Mr. Michael To: May I respond to this question?

Mr. Julian Reed: Sure.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Quickly.

Mr. Michael To: Unfortunately there are two examples we know of in regard to transition, particularly in the Asia area; one is Taiwan and one is South Korea. So in the movement for democratization of China, in the movement to systematically change for human rights improvements and democracy, it is not a big secret to us as to how the transitional step can be taken.

One very easy step is to allow press freedom without the multi-party system. Even without the multi-party system, the people, the press, will function in a supervisory role to uncover the crimes being done. Then of course we have a great example available to us of how the one-party system of Taiwan and Korea allows a multi-party system to exist. They are not there yet. But these are nevertheless good examples of transition. My movement and all my colleagues are working on those issues. They're basically addressing how do we safely transmit it.

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Thank you.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Thank you. Mr. Wu, we're scheduled to end at 12 o'clock, but do you have five minutes or so longer? We have three more people who would like to ask questions.

Mr. Harry Wu: Madam Chair, I have one request.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Yes.

Mr. Harry Wu: I wanted to submit a videotape, which includes three documentaries: one for NBC and one for BBC 1994, and one is ABC from last October. I hope that goes on your congressional record.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Thank you. But will you have a few minutes to spare?

Mr. Harry Wu: Yes.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Past twelve? Okay, thank you.

Mr. Gurmant Grewal: Madam Chair, I have a comment for the record. My NDP colleague has alleged that a colleague from my party has no concern for or consistency on human rights. I am aware that my colleague has always respected the responsibility of the government and the importance of the government to recognize and respect human rights.

Thank you.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Mr. Turp.

Mr. Daniel Turp (Beauharnois—Salaberry, BQ): I'll put the question in English. You're a free man; you've proved you are free now. You've proven to be a freethinker. You have no relations with any government. What do you think about the Canadian policy as it now stands with its relationship with China?

Mr. Harry Wu: My view about Canada's China policy is that it is fundamentally similar to the Clinton engagement policy. In my view, it's a kind of appeasement policy: human rights in the secondary situation and on many occasions human rights under the rack. Canadian policy today is mostly focused on trade, focused on business.

Mr. Daniel Turp: Is that satisfactory?

Mr. Harry Wu: It is not satisfactory for me. I think it's also not satisfactory for the common Canadian. For example, the Bush administration and the Clinton administration year after year gave the Chinese most-favoured-nation trading status. But the polls say 68% of common Americans say no. I think in the next couple of years, whether in Canada or in the United States, there will be a very serious debate on what is our China policy.

Mr. Daniel Turp: Thank you.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Ms. Augustine.

Ms. Jean Augustine (Etobicoke—Lakeshore, Lib.): It seems to me there were a number of questions I wanted to ask of you, and this is coming at the tail end. A lot of the concerns you have, and following through on many of the statements that Mr. Wu challenged us with, or made to us.... I'm trying, Mr. Wu, to struggle with what can we do as a country, what can we do as nations, to put the kind of pressure on China to make the kinds of changes you're asking for, apart from saying to them here are the infringements and these are the things we want you to do. It seems to me that allowing CNN to get in there—and I'm using that in the sense of engagement, of having the world look in—would create more of the internal pressures to create the change rather than nations standing up and saying they won't deal with you, talk with you or do whatever until you allow them to see your records and examine your structures.

• 1200

I'm grappling with all of this, trying to find out what exactly you are hoping we can do as Canadians to bring about what are for you the desired results.

Mr. Harry Wu: I have an idea, or perhaps a suggestion, for your consideration. I hope Canada becomes the first country in the world to publicly condemn the Chinese Laogai system. Just say one sentence: We know it; quit denying. That's a very high level of condemnation to face in this human rights issue.

Second, I hope the Canadian government puts in legislation to disallow and make illegal any types of products made by forced labour from being sold in your country.

Third, I hope Canada will make a very serious announcement to condemn the birth control policy.

I hope the Canadian government will make a policy to support the underground church activities, because this country respects religious freedom. You have to deliver your message to the Chinese government that you don't like that policy.

I cannot give you particular suggestions, but I want to use one other example. The Canadian government, along with many other western governments, refused to give the rights of the 2000 Olympic Games to Beijing. The response from inside China at the beginning was very strong. They said the western countries discriminated against them—imperialist activities.

Later, however, the Chinese asked one question: Why? Why was the west boycotting them? It was because of human rights violations. The people right away were aware that, yes, we really had a problem with our human rights. Our Olympic site was boycotted because of the human rights violations.

So that was a very good case.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): Thank you.

Mr. Robinson.

Mr. Svend Robinson: To follow up on Ms. Augustine's question, one of the things I would note as well is that I think it's important that while we engage in that kind of trade, we also take every possible opportunity within international human rights fora to voice our deep concern. Many of us were profoundly concerned that Canada earlier this year, for the first time since the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989, refused to co-sponsor at the UN Human Rights Commission the resolution on China.

I hope perhaps in the spring this committee might be able to provide some very strong impetus to our government to at least show some leadership at that international forum on human rights and to speak out with other nations that in fact did co-sponsor. That was a rather sorry episode, frankly, in our foreign policy.

I'd like to make a brief parenthetical note that I wouldn't want my silence to be construed as.... While I have profound respect for the position you've taken on human rights issues, there will be debate and difference on some of your economic prescriptions. In terms of the issue around massive deregulation and privatization and so on, the way in which it's happened, for example, in the former Soviet Union and eastern Europe, we've seen a massive increase in the level of child poverty. UNICEF has documented terrible problems there. So I think we have to be cautious about that approach.

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Today the President of China is being wined and dined by Prime Minister Chrétien. The red carpet is being rolled out a few hundred metres from here. If you were in that room with the Prime Minister and President Jiang Zemin, what would be the most powerful message, Mr. Wu, that you would want to bring to the President of China at this point? This is after you have experienced terrible tragedy in personal terms, and yet you have tremendous courage in continuing to speak out. What would you say directly to Jiang Zemin at this meeting?

Mr. Harry Wu: I think Jiang Zemin would recognize me. This is what I would say to him: “All that time, you tried to destroy me, but you could not. That means you cannot destroy all human beings. You destroyed many human beings, but finally you will see the people still standing on their own feet. This is a lesson for you.”

At this moment, particularly if Canadians wanted to talk to the Chinese, I would ask Jiang Zemin: “Is this your document? You are the president of the country. Are you responsible for this policy? Tell me about it. Under this policy, how many people have been executed? How many executions? How many prisoners' organs have already been removed? How many of them were sold to international patients?”

It's simple, but I don't think Canadians would like to do that.

Mr. Svend Robinson: Thank you.

The Vice-Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): We thank you very much for extending your time. It was most interesting. I think you have a commitment from everyone in this room that none of us has a monopoly on caring. We'll just start looking for solutions that will work. I salute your courage, and thank you very much for being here today.

Mr. Harry Wu: Thank you. It was my honour.

The Vice Chair (Ms. Colleen Beaumier): The meeting is adjourned.