Australians Rally Against China’s State-sanctioned Organ Harvesting
NTD Television
The local Falun Gong community from all over Australia gathered on Wednesday for a rally in Canberra, the country’s seat of government.
[Jansin Goldring, Falun Gong Practitioner]:
“I’m from Melbourne, it took me ten hours to get here, but I think it’s a very worthwhile journey for me.”
They are voicing their concern about state-sanctioned organ harvesting and transplant abuses in China.
[Xiao Lee, Falun Dafa Association Spokesperson]:
“The organ harvesting actually is unacceptable by human beings. So this sort of things we need to stop as soon as possible.”
Inside parliament, former Canadian Secretary of State to Asia Pacific, David Kilgour, raised the issue with lawmakers in a private forum.
[David Kilgour, Former Canadian Secretary of State to Asia Pacific]:
“We certainly suggested to them this morning that the parliament of Australia should be passing legislation too on this issue, all kinds of legislations.”
Recently a New South Wales member of parliament, proposed a bill to criminalize organ tourism, where obtaining an organ through illicit means would be equivalent to manslaughter.
[David Shoebridge, Member of New South Wales Parliament]:
“We would hope that it would make people think twice before they go overseas and take an organ from someone who hasn’t voluntarily donated it.”
This potential bill is a significant step forward according to Falun Gong practitioners, who recently collected over 30,000 signatures from concerned Australians.
[Xiao Lee, Falun Dafa Association Spokesperson]:
“The response is very warm and so many kind hearted Australian people, and they are willing to sign the petition, that’s why in this short period we have so many signatures.”
This is part of a worldwide push from Falun Gong, who in late 2012, got 166,000 people across 36 European countries to sign a similar petition that was later delivered to the United Nations.
According to independent investigators, Falun Gong practitioners make up a large portion of the Chinese regime’s illegal organ pool for their forced organ harvesting scheme. It also includes other prisoners of conscience like Tibetans, Uighurs and house Christians.