Falun Gong 2000 day-vigil at Vancouver Chinese Consulate

MEDIA ADVISORY

February 9^th marks 2000 days since Falun Gong practitioners started their peaceful vigil on Granville outside the Chinese Consulate

Today (February 9^th) marks 2000 days of probably what constitutes one of the longest vigils in history. Falun Gong practitioners gather in front of the Chinese Consulate on Granville to mark this important day. They have one goal in common: to bring a halt to the inhumane persecution of Falun Gong by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), now in its seventh year. Falun Gong teaches meditation through exercise. It begun in 1992 and has grown to include more than 70 million adherents before it was banned by the Chinese government in July 1999.

Around the year 2000, the persecution of Falun Gong entered a new phase and became magnified considerably. A 2006 independent study by David Kilgour, a former MP and cabinet minister, and David Matas, an international human rights lawyer, confirmed the practice of organ snatching from live Falun Gong practitioners in China. According to their most recent study, “Bloody Harvest”, China’s military is harvesting organs from unwilling live prison inmates, mostly Falun Gong practitioners, for transplants on a large scale, including to foreign recipients.

“We have concluded that the government of China and its agencies in numerous parts of the country, in particular hospitals but also detention centers and ‘people’s courts,’ since 1999 have put to death a large but unknown number of Falun Gong prisoners of conscience. Their vital organs, including hearts, kidneys, livers and corneas, were virtually simultaneously seized involuntarily for sale at high prices, sometimes to foreigners, who normally face long waits for voluntary donations of such organs in their home countries.” Mr. Kilgour said that “hospitals in Canada's biggest cities - Vancouver, Calgary and Toronto - confirmed "a substantial number'' of Canadians had traveled to China for dubious organ transplants.”

In light of these findings, the BC Falun Dafa Association urges our government to investigate and stop the atrocities. Canada’s support is vital in the international effort to stop this heinous practice. For this effort to succeed, we need everybody's participation--it will help save many lives.

The newest version of the report, “Bloody Harvest,” is available here.

For more background information, visit:

AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL – Falun Gong Fact Sheet

World Transplant Congress and Chinese Protests