Global Human Rights Hunger Strike Comes to New Zealand

Residents in New Zealand are joining a world-wide hunger strike movement to condemn the Chinese Communist Party's (CCP) severe human rights abuses, in particular the home invasion of Epoch Times chief technician, Li Yuan, where he was severely beaten last week.

Li Yuan's home was broken into by at least four Asian men wielding guns and knives on U.S soil on the 8th of February. He was tied up and viciously beaten, resulting in Mr Li requiring 15 stitches in his face. Only two laptops and some documents were stolen during the invasion.

One Aucklander who joined the hunger strike for 60 hours, Mr Sam Murphy, said the home invasion was obviously conducted by CCP secret agents.

"If this were a typical home invasion, they would have taken more than a couple of laptops," said Murphy. "The only thing they were interested in was sabotaging his technical capabilities.

Mr Li is very active in exposing human rights abuses using this equipment, so who else would want to disable his technical capabilities?"

The trio went without food for two days, joining a global effort to raise awareness of human rights issues in China, arguably the most severe seen in our modern age.

"The human rights abuses have been so severe over such a long time, if we do nothing it will continue, because they (the CCP) are certainly not going to stop of their own accord," commented hunger striker Sam Murphy.

The hunger strike movement was initiated by a famous Beijing lawyer, Gao Zhisheng, who is renowned for his efforts to defend human rights in China (particularly for Falun Gong practitioners).

Since composing three (unanswered) open letters beseeching the power behind the CCP to stop torturing and killing it's citizens, Gao has been under heavy surveillence, continually harrassed, and his law firm closed by the CCP. The last straw was an attempt on Gao's life last month.

"A lot of the people around the world see it as someone else's problem, but it's not, it's up to all of us to help these people who are being tortured and killed every day in China," explained Charlotte Cuthbertson, who joined the hunger strike for 60 hours.

The group of Aucklanders agreed the hunger strike was instrumental in letting the public know about the atrocities happening in China and the threat the CCP poses to people around the world.

"We can't sit back and let this happen otherwise we will regret it in future," said Mr Murphy, "This is an issue for everyone."

Other lawyers and many citizens from around the world have now joined the hunger strike relay as a peaceful demonstration against the Communist Regime.