Members of Congress will hold three days of hearings related to China’s one-child policy this week and the human rights abuses such as forced abortions and sterilizations that accompany it.
Chai Ling, founder of humanitarian organization All Girls Allowed and a former Tiananmen Square activist, informed LifeNews of the hearings, which will spotlight the coercive family planning policy for three days straight. The hearings comes as new reports have surfaced that Chen Guangcheng, a blind attorney who exposed one campaign of more than 100,000 forced abortions and sterilizations in Linyi, China, has been killed by local family planning officials who had subjected him to home confinement.
Tuesday’s hearing is an emergency hearing, devoted to exposing the beatings, four years of imprisonment on false charges and other abuses Chinese officials subjected Chen and his family to since he brought to light the brutal population control campaign. Chen and his wife were recently beaten almost to the point of death, in front of their elementary school-age daughter and activists are concerned he may have been killed.
Chai Ling will ask U.S. leaders to take action — to speak out on his behalf as he spoke out for women and men victimized by the one-child policy.
The House Judiciary Committee, Subcommittee on Immigration Policy and Enforcement will hold a hearing Wednesday where members will hear more about the China Democracy Promotion Act of 2011 (HR 2121) and why this proposed bill (that gives the U.S. president the right to deny entry to human rights abusers) is so important. The legislation, introduced by Congressman Chris Smith, the pro-life New Jersey Republican who headed a September hearing on the one-child policy, gives the president of the United States the right to deny entry into the U.S. any people who have been directly involved in the population control program — including members of the Family Planning Commission who engage in forced abortions, jailing dissidents, and sterilizing men and women who disobey the family planning policy.
Ling says the hearings are important as, two weeks ago, a mother pregnant with an “over-quota” child was killed in China along with her 7 month old unborn child. The full report will be given at the Wednesday hearing.
Thursday’s hearing is before the full Foreign Affairs Committee to discuss the new CECC 2011 Annual Report. This report reveals shocking details about gender imbalance, forced abortions and other human rights abuses throughout China.
“What a way to start a new month, with three back-to-back One-Child Policy hearings,” says Ling. “We have never seen so much attention given in one week and are thankful to all the Members of Congress who find time to attend these important meetings.” Chai Ling says that the bill would make a deep impression on human rights abusers in China, especially high-ranking party officials whose children study in the U.S., as the bill extends to family members of these certain wrongdoers.
“When it comes to human rights in China, it’s time for a change,” says Ling. “Not saying a word when government officials kill mothers like Ma Jihong and hold blind fathers captive is making a statement, and the silence has been deafening.”
Ling was nominated twice for the Nobel Peace Prize for her role as Commander-in-Chief of students in the Tiananmen Square Student Democracy Movement. In her new memoir, A Heart for Freedom, Ling shares details of her personal story: the building of a movement, the escape, and her current quest to free China’s girls and mothers.
