Nestle toy rabbits, described by Jennifer Zheng as those produced under slave labor conditions in China

First Broadcast 28/5/2005

Negotiations have begun began on a free trade packet between Australia and China, a deal that could boost the Australian economy by US$18 billion over the next decade. But Australian unions warn of a dramatic downside. They say Australia’s domestic manufacturing sector will not be able to compete against cheaper imports. It is claimed that a lot of these Chinese goods have been made or assembled in laogai, or prison camps, in the People’s Republic. Followers of the self-help spiritual movement, Falun Gong, who have been rounded up by Chinese authorities have told Focus they were forced to make goods for export in the prison camps.

Helen Vatsikopoulos reports.

Helen Vatsikopoulos, Reporter: It is 7 am on a Sunday morning in Sydney’s inner west, and practitioners of Falun Gong are now gathering for two hours of meditation and exercise.

They have deliberately chosen to do this around the Chinese consulate and residential compound. If they practised anywhere in China, they would be immediately arrested and sent to a detention centre and then a labour camp until they renounced their beliefs. Author Jennifer Zheng says this is what happened to her and many of the others.

Falun Gong is a form of Chinese traditional Chi Gong exercises, one of many variations. This one, which includes eastern spirituality, was started by a former government clerk, Li Hongzhi, in 1992. Initially he was feted by the authorities and the Falun Gong craze spread quickly.

Jennifer Zheng, Author “Witness to History”: Everyone can come and learn, and everyone can go as you like and we don’t have registration system. We don’t have any other administrative structure, organizational structure, and we’re only trying to follow truth, compassion and forbearance and be better people.

Helen Vatsikopoulos: It’s not political.

Jennifer Zheng: No, not political. We don’t have any political agenda.

Helen Vatsikopoulos: In 1999, the Chinese government banned Falun Gong as an evil cult, even though its leader had moved to New York three years previously. Its followers, at around 100 million, had outstripped the membership of the Communist Party.

Jennifer Zheng was born in 1966, the year the Cultural Revolution began. Trained in science at Beijing University, she found the answers to her questions about life and the universe in Falun Gong, and it has cost her dearly.

She has written Witness to History, the first insider’s account of her ordeal at the hands of Chinese authorities. And it reads like a thriller.

Jennifer Zheng: I was also arrested four times and then sent to a labour camp for one year without trial.

Helen Vatsikopoulos: This is what former Falun Gong detainees want the world to see. They say 2,164 followers have died from torture.

Jennifer Zheng: I was shocked until I lost my consciousness with the electric baton I was forced to help the police to do the same kind of torture to my fellow practitioners to help them to reform. Any person with a little bit consciousness left could not do such a thing. But if I didn’t, they wouldn’t release me.

Helen Vatsikopoulos: Jennifer Zheng says 95 per cent of inmates at the Beijing labour camp where she was held were Falun Gong practitioners.

They were made to work seven day as week from 5.30 in the morning until 1 or 2 am. If there were quotas to fill, they would work for days without sleep. She says her record is 15.

Jennifer Zheng: We were forced to knit sweaters. And what I want to emphasise is that all the sweaters we knitted in the labour camp were for export purposes, because the sizes were quite large. It is not for Asian people. “We also made products for, say, international companies such as Nestle.

We made rabbits, stuffed toy rabbits.” – Jennifer Zheng, Falun Gong Practitioner and former prisoner.

Helen Vatsikopoulos: So people in Australia could be wearing sweaters that you knitted while you were in the camp?

Jennifer Zheng: In the labour camp, yes. We also made products for, say, international companies such as Nestle. We made rabbits, stuffed toy rabbits. Each piece needs at least more than 10 hours and more than 30 different procedures to finish. For each piece the labour camp only received 6 Australian cents for one piece, for more than 10 hours. And we received nothing

“Sometimes we worked so hard our hands are bleeding.” – Zhang Cui Yin, Falun Gong Practitioner and former prisoner.

Helen Vatsikopoulos: Nestle’s head office in Switzerland has confirmed that an order for 110,000 of these bunnies was placed with a Beijing toy manufacturer in 2001.

Nestle Australia told us it found no conclusive proof of the allegations and that it received assurances from the Ministry of Justice that no such alleged activity had occurred. Nestle has since contacted its agencies and suppliers in China further stipulating that “no subcontracting was to be undertaken without the prior consent of the company”.

China makes 70 per cent of the world’s toys, exporting over US$7.5 billion worth annually. It also makes much of the world’s Christian merchandise, exporting $1 billion worth annually of products like rosaries and Christmas lights. Former detainees remember making the products.

Zhang Cui Yin, Falun Gong Practitioner: The Christmas lights have very small bulbs. And we have to make thousands of lights a day. Sometimes we worked so hard our hands are bleeding.

Ying Li, Falun Gong Practitioner: You know the Christmas lights, the colours are red, blue, green. It’s very beautiful. But the smell is very strong and the lights are very bright, and I couldn’t see things clearly. I had a headache all day.

Helen Vatsikopoulos: The Soviets called them Gulags. The Chinese laogai. Re-education through labour was a way of suppressing any dissent. Human rights groups claim that today there are about 1,100 operating in China, holding 6.8 million people, convicted criminals and political prisoners.

“The Chinese prison camp is a profit-making centre.” – Harry Wu, Laogai Research Foundation.

Harry Wu, Laogai Research Foundation: The Chinese prison camp is a profit-making centre. Chinese government documentation said they offer tax advantages and benefit the central government. And they also covered prison production and police salaries. Secondly, they call this “special enterprises”. The products are not for domestic but also for the international market.

Helen Vatsikopoulos: After spending 19 years in the laogai, Harry Wu has now made them his life’s work. As repositories of free labour, he says the Chinese authorities attempt to get around international conventions forbidding enforced labour by mixing the assembling of products with legitimate labour.

For the past three years, Falun Gong followers practising before the Chinese Embassy in Canberra have been prevented from displaying protest banners. Australia is the only democracy in the world to do so. Each month, Foreign Minister Alexander Downer signs a certificate banning such signs because they would “impair the dignity of the mission”. Falun Gong followers say the government is restricting the rights of its citizens so as not to offend the Chinese.

Jennifer Zheng: The outside world believes that China has changed. China’s human rights state has improved, and everyone is so eager to do business with China without really knowing the real state of China, with knowing that so many people were tortured and murdered in the labour camps.

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