The U.S. House of Representatives sent a message to China last week about the country's notorious Laogai (forced labor camp) system. H. Con. Res 294 reminds China's government that forced labor and torture practices carried out in Laogai violate international laws, standards, and treaties to which China is party.
They include the United Nations Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment. The Resolution passed with a vote of 413-1.
"People often forget, that the People's Republic of China is still a repressive and autocratic country," said Congressman John Hostettler (R-IN) in a press release on his official website. "Religious and political freedom does not exist in China, and the Laogai prison system is evidence of that fact. We need to use our relationship with China as an opportunity to continue to raise the issue of this human rights disaster. China cannot be allowed to grow in influence in the international community while it retains its vast Stalinist prison system where most of the prisoners are likely not criminals but people who have expressed religious or political views that challenge the ruling Communist Party."
The Resolution also asks for the release of information about the Laogai, including the total number of Laogai camps and prisoners throughout China, the exact locations of the camps, and the business production activities taking place at the camps are being requested by the U.S. Congress. Exact numbers are not known.
It is also asking China to release information about the number of executions of prisoners at the camps that are carried out every year, and the extent of the harvesting and transplanting of organs of executed prisoners while urging the Government of the People's Republic of China to allow unrestricted visits by international human rights inspectors, including United Nations inspectors, to Laogai camps throughout China.
The Laogai was created by the Chinese Communist party (CCP) under Mao Zedong and modeled after the Soviet Gulag system. It serves the one-party system of the CCP as a method to threaten and control Chinese citizens.
The forced labor camp system, which forces prisoners to perform unpaid labor for long hours in unsanitary conditions, has tormented more than 50 million people since its inception. There are as many as 4 million prisoners still being held in the Laogai today.
The Laogai not only provides the CCP a source of free labor, it also serves to instill fear in its citizens lest they be forced to go through "reeducation'' through hard labor and compulsory political discipline.
Some of the work done in the Laogai includes mining asbestos and other toxic chemicals with no protective clothing, tanning hides while standing naked in vats filled with chemicals used for softening of animal skins, and working in mining facilities where explosions and other accidents are a common occurrence.
The Fanjiatai Prison in Shayang City, Hubei Province, forces the prisoners to work long hours under slave labor conditions, assembling products for export. This prison has many contracts with companies in the provinces of Zhejiang, Jiangsu and Fujian.
Some products made in Fanjiatai and exported to foreign country for resale include strings of colored Christmas lights in several different styles and colors.
Two major aims of the Laogai are to generate economic resources for the state from free labor, and to force prisoners to give up their spiritual, religious or political views to become a "new socialist person" and to uphold communism and the CCP, through hard labor and political indoctrination.
According to the Resolution, the CCP relies on forced labor as an essential part of China's economy while continuously encouraging the export of goods produced through "laogai." In recent years more than 100,000 religious believers have been unjustly and illegally imprisoned in one Laogai camp alone, where they are often beaten, tortured, and often killed. The real number of Laogai camps are unknown due to the media blockade of the CCP.
The unspeakable trade in human organs from China is the latest expansion of the Laogai system. Prisoners are shot, but not killed, and moved to awaiting ambulances to begin the process of removing their organs for harvest and transplantation in China or exported around the world for money.
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