suspended from a key United Nations body after China condemned its presentation of a "torture device" used by Chinese "interrogators" against "Christian prisoners."
"…We received the frustrating news that China countered our demonstration" [of the device] "by filing a complaint at the United Nations NGO Committee in New York" aimed at "suspending A Woman’s Voice International (AWVI)," from UN activities, said US-based Jubilee Campaign in a statement to BosNewsLife News Center.
"Given less then five days to respond, we were unable to overcome the complaint despite the submission of four sworn affidavits to counter China’s charges. Some of the worst violators of human rights including China, Cuba, Iran, Sudan, and Zimbabwe out-voted [our supporters] the United States." It said the proposed one year suspension would make it impossible for AWVI to participate in the 2006 annual meeting of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) in Geneva, Switzerland.
Jubilee Campaign, which investigates the plight of persecuted Christians, noted the tension with Chinese delegates began during the recent UNCHR gathering in April. "One of the [Christian] women who managed to escape China…described the use by Chinese secret police of a torture device the size of a flashlight and emitting electrical shocks on her body." at an AWVI sponsored meeting. Rev. Bob Fu, a former Chinese House Church leader and prisoner, later showed the device during a plenary session of the UNCHR.
CHINESE PRESSURE
Under Chinese pressure "after finishing his speech, Rev. Fu was promptly ushered out of the assembly room, guards confiscated his credential badge, and he was ultimately escorted [from] the UN grounds," Jubilee Campaign said.
"China silences all opposition at home with brutal measures and has sought to crush the unregistered house church movement by eliminating its leaders, " added Ann Buwalda, USA Director of Jubilee Campaign. "By its action against AWVI , it has expanded its reach to silence an international organization deeply committed to justice for the oppressed poor. Yet, truth will triumph, and AWVI will continue to speak truth with or without the United Nations stamp of approval."
Chinese and UN officials were not immediately available for comment. However UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said April 7 that his organization needs a new human rights body. Although he did not mention the expulsion incident by name, Annan stressed that "nobody has a monopoly on human rights virtue."
WOMEN DIGNITY
Jubilee Campaign said AWVI has defended "the dignity of women worldwide, particularly to counter culturally permitted acts of violence and inhumanity. The past three years, AWVI took the lead amongst non- governmental organizations at the UNCHR to raise the plight of North Korean refugees who flee the tyranny and starvation of Kim Jong Il to China where over 90% of North Korean women find themselves trafficked before help can be found."
AWVI also sponsored meetings where defectors and survivors of labor camps, including Christians, shared their experiences with the UN. "During this year’s parallel meeting, AWVI also showed a video in which a defector returned by China to North Korea can be seen pronounced "guilty" by a North Korean judge and executed by firing squad for his ‘illegal border crossing’", Jubilee Campaign stressed.
The NGO Committee’s vote recommending a one year suspension of AWVI was to be "reviewed" by the full meeting of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) in July, Jubilee Campaign said. "There is some hope that with a Swiss lawyer assisting us, we could overcome China’s complaint that the presence of the device at the UN in Geneva violated Swiss law and reverse the NGO Committee vote. To do this, we need a Swiss or French lawyer with access to Swiss law to help us." (With BosNewsLife Research, BosNewsLife News Center and reports from China, Switzerland and the United States)
