The Wake

There are so many injustices being committed in the world today, so many causes on which to hang one’s hat, that it can be hard for the average Wake-reading, peace-loving hippie to know where to direct his or her compassion and action. If our own country’s war and health-care system aren’t enough to worry about, there’s always the Israeli-Palestine conflict or the genocide in Darfur to get anxious about—not to mention the pressing concerns of worldwide food shortages and global warming. Luckily for those activism-minded individuals looking for a sign to wave, there’s China and its myriad sins, now conveniently spotlighted by the forthcoming Beijing Olympics.

All glibness aside, the Chinese government’s human-rights violations aren’t just a cause célèbre to activists like those who gathered in front of Coffman Union on April 16. The rally, staged by local politicians, professors, students and other activists, was part of the Human Rights Torch Relay, an international movement designed to raise awareness about China’s abuses in light of the upcoming Olympics. The day began with a relay of groups and individuals traveling from the Capitol to Coffman, continued with speeches from representatives of various organizations and causes, and culminated in a march across the Washington Avenue bridge with flags and banners.

The charges against the Chinese Communist Party center around three major issues. Most prominent at the rally and in news coverage is China’s control of Tibet, whose people desire independence. The Dalai Lama, Tibet’s spiritual leader, has been in exile since 1959, when the putdown of a rebellion forced him and other leaders to flee to Tibet. The situation flared earlier this year when protests by Buddhist monks in Tibet prompted the Chinese government to crack down harshly on supporters of Tibet independence.

China has also come under fire for its ties to Sudan. Most of Sudan’s oil goes to China, so the Chinese government plays a large role in financing the Sudanese government. That government, in turn, finances the Janjaweed militia responsible for carrying out atrocities against the people of Darfur. As Sudan’s biggest investor, China is funding the genocide when it could be using its leverage to help the situation, University of St. Thomas student Ben Nebo said. Instead, the Chinese government has not acknowledged the situation in Darfur as genocide.
Nebo, who studied six months in China, noted that the slogan of this year’s Olympics is “One World, One Dream,” which he calls ironic. “People in Darfur are not having their dream of accomplishment, they’re having a nightmare,” he said. “Whose dream are we pursuing?”

Perhaps less well known than the situations in Tibet and Darfur is the persecution by the Chinese government of practitioners of Falun Gong. The spiritual meditation practice, which became popular in China during the 1990s, follows the three principles of truthfulness, compassion and tolerance. The Chinese government banned Falun Gong in 1999 and has since imprisoned and tortured many of its followers. A 2006 investigative report by Canadian politicians and activists David Matas and David Kilgour published an investigative report which told of the Chinese government illegally harvesting organs from imprisoned Falun Gong practitioners. The Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong was one of the major organizers of the April 16 rally.
A counter-protest led by supporters of China, mostly Chinese students, was just as visible and vocal during the event as the anti-China demonstrators. While representatives of local government and various human rights groups spoke, many of the pro-China demonstrators cried “Lies, lies,” and at one point the group broke out in singing the Chinese national anthem.

Most of the Chinese students said they support the Chinese government and do not want protests to disrupt China’s chance to shine this summer.

“Being Chinese, I have the responsibility to support my country,” medical school researcher Nan Zhang said. “China should be united. We cannot tolerate any separation.” Zhang agreed that China needs to improve its human rights record, but said, “Without a peaceful, united China, we cannot achieve that. If you look at the history, our government is better than in the past. I know it’s not perfect, but we still need to support it.”

Most of the pro-China protestors wore shirts and carried signs with the slogan “Go Olympics—No Olympolitics.” The Olympics are about sports, not political issues, said Yan Zhang, a university staff member and Chinese immigrant to the United States who held a sign reading, “Stop playing the human rights card.”
Many of the speakers, however, said that protesting China’s violations is not political or intended to dishonor the Olympics, but a simple call for human rights to be respected.

“We want to send the message that we’re sympathetic to the athletes who have trained for years to get to this one special moment,” Mei Ling Lee, the Minnesota representative for the Human Rights Torch Relay, said. “But we can’t turn a blind eye to the fact that the Communist regime in China has broken its promise of improving human rights.”

The International Olympic Committee awarded Beijing the honor of hosting the Olympics in 2001 in the hope that the attention of the world would prompt the Chinese government to improve its policies, Lee said. Since then, however, the Chinese government has increased surveillance and clamped down on Internet use, she said. Persecution of Falun Gong practitioners, human rights advocates, and other groups has also increased.

The Chinese Communist Party is using the Olympics as “a public display of its own legitimacy,” to validate its regime—just as the Nazis did when Berlin hosted the 1936 Olympics, said Ben Grinberg, an American student and Falun Gong practitioner.

After the formal part of the rally, the protesters both supporting and criticizing China clustered in front of Coffman, crossing the lines between the two groups to discuss the issues at hand. Circles of people knotted around those who argued with raised voices and jabbing fingers, but many people spoke quietly and respectfully, urgent with the fervor of their causes but open to other opinions.

Several of the pro-China protestors questioned the validity of the claims against the Chinese government, saying that the supporters of Tibet and Falun Gong have not seen firsthand the violence of which they speak. Actually living in China shows a different story, they said.

Yajin Wang, a student whose father is a teacher in China, said that her own experience has shown that the Chinese system protects rather than persecutes minorities. Tibetans, for example, are exempt from the one-child policy to which most Chinese citizens must adhere, Wang said.

Those protesting China’s human-rights violations, however, said that they don’t have to see crimes against humanity being committed to know that they happen.

“How can you deny the killing of your own people?” asked one pro-Tibet protestor, who asked that his name be withheld. “You were alive when Tiananmen Square happened. You saw it, your parents saw it, the whole world saw it.”

Ben Grinberg said that students from China who are able to study here tend to be from the upper and middle class. But millions in China live in poverty, and there is “an enormous amount of discontent and resentment of the Communist government,” he said.

Westerners tend to focus on China’s economic success at the expense of criticizing its human-rights violations, Grinberg said. But the Chinese government, he said, is less powerful and stable than people might think. He said that the Soviet Union crumbled quickly despite being seen by the rest of the world as very powerful, and that the same upheaval is inevitable for the Communist government in China.

“As more pressure is put on the Chinese Communist Party to give people freedom, they will be less able to stifle dissent,” Grinberg said.

Student Nan Zhang is hopeful that reform and openness can happen in China. He said that China can use the United States as a model for improvement, pointing out that many people from China come here to study. “The current politicians [in China] learned from the former USSR. The next generation will learn from the U.S.,” he said. “That’s a good trend.”