Fri, June 23, 2006
By Brookes Merritt, Staff Writer
David Kilgour hopes a report documenting allegations of illegal organ harvesting from Falun Gong prisoners will entice China to open its borders to international human rights investigators.
But the former Edmonton MP says he was given the run-around when he met with a political officer at the Chinese embassy in Ottawa Friday, to discuss conditions of an entry visa.
"I knew they weren’t going to allow me the type of access we need. But I’m hoping our report will generate enough international pressure for them to let us in," he told the Sun.
Kilgour is investigating allegations that an underground network of Chinese surgeons, nurses, and hospital administration staff are harvesting organs for sale.
Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a quasi-religious movement that was banned in China in 1999 "Falun Gong members are (allegedly) being held in pens, waiting to be butchered for the highest bidder in need of a cornea, a kidney, or a heart.
"Some of these organs are immensely expensive. This is becoming an export business for China, and the world is doing nothing about it."
International human rights lawyer David Matas of Winnipeg hopes to travel to China with Kilgour.
Two years of investigation has netted the lawyer piles of testimony from people like the former spouses of Chinese harvest surgeons.
"I’ve heard of things being done to the Falun Gong prisoners so horrifying I can’t repeat them," Kilgour said, adding China recently admitted to the international community that its government executes Falun Gong prisoners.
Kilgour said it took one UN official 10 years before he was granted a ‘full access’ visa to investigate torture in China, and the conditions of his visa were not respected when he arrived.
Matas and Kilgour will release a preliminary report exposing the organ harvesting network July 6. A subsequent report substantiating or debunking those claims would follow any future investigative visit.
http://www.edmontonsun.com/News/Canada/2006/06/23/1650160.html