Wednesday, July 31, 2013

Safety for Xi Jinping Lies in Choosing Justice

The core issue involved in Bo Xilai’s case is the persecution of Falun Gong.

Offering Bo Xilai leniency could be a deadly mistake for his opponents

By Zhang Tianliang | July 30, 2013

In this file photo Secretary General Xi Jinping is pictured in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on June 27, 2013. With criminal charges having been brought against former high-flying official Bo Xilai, Xi now must decide how to punish him. (Wang Zhao/AFP/Getty Images)
 In this file photo Secretary General Xi Jinping is pictured in the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on June 27, 2013. With criminal charges having been brought against former high-flying official Bo Xilai, Xi now must decide how to punish him. (Wang Zhao/AFP/Getty Images)
After more than a year’s delay, criminal charges were brought on July 24 against Bo Xilai, the once rising Chinese Communist Party (CCP) star, now disgraced.
The long delay speaks to the high stakes involved. Now that charges have been brought, Communist Party head Xi Jinping must face the risks involved in sentencing Bo.
According to state-run media, he will be tried for bribery, embezzlement, and abuse of power. The official charges mask the true character of this trial. Bo could have been charged with far more serious crimes, and this trial is not about simple misconduct in office.
This is a political trial that affects the fate of a large clique of individuals who were recently the most powerful figures in the CCP: the former paramount leader Jiang Zemin, who formed this clique; the long-time powerbroker and head of the intelligence services, Zeng Qinghong; and the former heads of the domestic security forces, Luo Gan and his successor Zhou Yongkang.
Bo was part of this group. They and other officials who followed their lead are responsible for the crimes against humanity committed in persecuting practitioners of the spiritual discipline Falun Gong. If Bo is given a light sentence, then this clique could breathe easy knowing they would not be held accountable for what they have done to Falun Gong practitioners.

Usurper-in-Waiting

Everyone in the CCP’s high levels knows why Xi Jinping should be wary of letting Bo Xilai get off easy. He was a usurper-in-waiting.
In the spheres of politics, economics, propaganda, and the military, Bo had laid the groundwork for taking power, and was only waiting for the right opportunity to unseat Xi Jinping. Had he done so, Xi Jinping can be sure that those whom Bo hated, such as Xi himself, former premier Wen Jiabao, and others, would have met quick deaths.
In this situation, if Xi lets Bo off, Xi can forget about any campaigns he has in mind to end corruption or rectify the CCP. By letting Bo off easy, Xi would be welcoming all comers to conspire against him at any time.
Perhaps Xi meant to send a signal that he is not that kind of fool by his recent handling of Jiang Zemin. On July 22, Jiang praised Xi’s leadership during a meeting with former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. The next day, Jiang’s name could not be found on a list of CCP officials honoring a deceased scholar.
The CCP uses such memorial lists to communicate who has power. The list was juggled, and Jiang, who likes to show his continued existence through his presence on memorial lists, fell completely off.
Jiang Zemin’s praise of Xi Jinping had been condescending. Like a compliment from a supreme ruler to a young child, it might have given people the illusion that Xi Jinping needs Jiang Zemin to hold himself firm. This insult only added to the list of reasons Xi Jinping has for opposing Jiang.

Persecution Not Sustainable

Top CCP officials know the core issue involved in Bo Xilai’s case is the persecution of Falun Gong.
Jiang Zemin’s clique had put their hopes in Bo Xilai. If he had taken power, he could have continued the persecution of Falun Gong, and the reckoning the Chinese nation will one day demand of them would have been postponed.
In considering Bo’s case, Xi needs to realize that continuing the persecution of Falun Gong is not an easy thing to do.
Consider the money involved. In 1998, the year before the persecution began, the total expenditures for public security in China totaled 40 billion yuan (US$6.56 billion), as calculated from the overall revenues and the funding ratios in the Statistical Yearbook. By 2012, the cost of public security had increased to 701.8 billion yuan (US $115 billion).
These expenses cannot be sustained. Whether one looks to media inside China or reports from think tanks or governments abroad, the message is the same: gloom about the Chinese economy’s prospects. The money is not going to be there to continue to fund this exorbitantly expensive persecution.
At the same time, the institutional basis for continuing the persecution has been uprooted, most likely at Xi Jinping’s direction.
The persecution has been carried about by the Political and Legal Affairs Committees (PLAC) at all administrative levels. Prior to the transition of power in November 2012, the secretary of the Central PLAC had a place on the Politburo Standing Committee, the small body that runs the Chinese regime, giving him a good deal of independence. Since November, the head of the PLAC has been merely a member of the Politburo and thus more easily controlled from above.
At the same time, Xi Jinping appears to be winding down the Reform Through Labor Camp System, which deprives the persecution of organizational and administrative support.
In the battle of ideas, the regime has lost. As early as 2002, the Chinese communist regime had for the most part stopped publicly denouncing Falun Gong.
Meanwhile, independent media outlets have consistently exposed the CCP’s crimes. Especially after the Epoch Times published Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party, the Chinese people lost their trust in the CCP’s state-run media, and increasingly in the Party itself.
Moreover, the regime has lost all belief in itself. Even high-ranking officials try their best to become “naked officials” who send their wives, children, and assets abroad, while securing foreign passports for themselves.
The people of China sense that the regime is on its last legs. Ordinary citizens heap sarcasm and criticism on whatever the regime does, and whatever it opposes, the people enthusiastically support.
Should the CCP try to intensify the persecution of Falun Gong, public opinion will rally to support the Falun Gong practitioners.
In fact, more and more lawyers are stepping forward to defend Falun Gong practitioners. In a recent trial in Dalian, the lawyers even forced the court to make some concessions.
Around the world, the facts about the harvesting of organs from living Falun Gong practitioners are becoming widely known. The book Bloody Harvest: The Killing of Falun Gong for Their Organs is recognized as an authority.
Right now, the United States House of Representatives is considering Resolution 281, which condemns organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience in China.
Du Bin’s movie Above the Ghosts’ Heads: The Women of Masanjia Labor Camp has received widespread coverage from major media outlets around the world and drawn global attention to the tortures that China’s labor camps are inflicting on Falun Gong practitioners.

Cleaning Up the Mess

If the persecution is getting harder and harder to continue, then the only option left to CCP officials is to do something to clean up the mess. Any such efforts will likely occur in a time of turmoil.
Many international investment firms and economists have predicted that 2014 will be the tipping point for China’s economy. It will collapse. Afterward, long-festering social crises will erupt. The people’s discontent will boil over, and they will demand that someone be blamed.
If Xi Jinping were to give Bo Xilai a lenient sentence and let off Jiang’s clique, the latter would seize the opportunity. Just as Gennady Yanayev did in the former Soviet Union, Jiang’s clique would have a good chance to launch a coup. Bo Xilai would regain power, and Xi Jinping and the officials allied with him would be named as the scapegoats.
A safer course for Xi Jinping, and one that is also just, would be for him to punish Bo Xilai commensurate with all his crimes and to apprehend the prime culprits responsible for the persecution of Falun Gong.
Zhang Tianliang, Ph.D. writes on China’s history and politics. He contributes to a variety of publications, including the New York-based New Tang Dynasty Television and Voice of America’s Chinese service.
After more than a year’s delay, criminal charges were brought on July 24 against Bo Xilai, the once rising Chinese Communist Party (CCP) star, now disgraced.
The long delay speaks to the high stakes involved. Now that charges have been brought, Communist Party head Xi Jinping must face the risks involved in sentencing Bo.
According to state-run media, he will be tried for bribery, embezzlement, and abuse of power. The official charges mask the true character of this trial. Bo could have been charged with far more serious crimes, and this trial is not about simple misconduct in office.
This is a political trial that affects the fate of a large clique of individuals who were recently the most powerful figures in the CCP: the former paramount leader Jiang Zemin, who formed this clique; the long-time powerbroker and head of the intelligence services, Zeng Qinghong; and the former heads of the domestic security forces, Luo Gan and his successor Zhou Yongkang.
Bo was part of this group. They and other officials who followed their lead are responsible for the crimes against humanity committed in persecuting practitioners of the spiritual discipline Falun Gong. If Bo is given a light sentence, then this clique could breathe easy knowing they would not be held accountable for what they have done to Falun Gong practitioners.

Usurper-in-Waiting

Everyone in the CCP’s high levels knows why Xi Jinping should be wary of letting Bo Xilai get off easy. He was a usurper-in-waiting.
In the spheres of politics, economics, propaganda, and the military, Bo had laid the groundwork for taking power, and was only waiting for the right opportunity to unseat Xi Jinping. Had he done so, Xi Jinping can be sure that those whom Bo hated, such as Xi himself, former premier Wen Jiabao, and others, would have met quick deaths.
In this situation, if Xi lets Bo off, Xi can forget about any campaigns he has in mind to end corruption or rectify the CCP. By letting Bo off easy, Xi would be welcoming all comers to conspire against him at any time.
Perhaps Xi meant to send a signal that he is not that kind of fool by his recent handling of Jiang Zemin. On July 22, Jiang praised Xi’s leadership during a meeting with former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. The next day, Jiang’s name could not be found on a list of CCP officials honoring a deceased scholar.
The CCP uses such memorial lists to communicate who has power. The list was juggled, and Jiang, who likes to show his continued existence through his presence on memorial lists, fell completely off.
Jiang Zemin’s praise of Xi Jinping had been condescending. Like a compliment from a supreme ruler to a young child, it might have given people the illusion that Xi Jinping needs Jiang Zemin to hold himself firm. This insult only added to the list of reasons Xi Jinping has for opposing Jiang.

Persecution Not Sustainable

Top CCP officials know the core issue involved in Bo Xilai’s case is the persecution of Falun Gong.
Jiang Zemin’s clique had put their hopes in Bo Xilai. If he had taken power, he could have continued the persecution of Falun Gong, and the reckoning the Chinese nation will one day demand of them would have been postponed.
In considering Bo’s case, Xi needs to realize that continuing the persecution of Falun Gong is not an easy thing to do.
Consider the money involved. In 1998, the year before the persecution began, the total expenditures for public security in China totaled 40 billion yuan (US$6.56 billion), as calculated from the overall revenues and the funding ratios in the Statistical Yearbook. By 2012, the cost of public security had increased to 701.8 billion yuan (US $115 billion).
These expenses cannot be sustained. Whether one looks to media inside China or reports from think tanks or governments abroad, the message is the same: gloom about the Chinese economy’s prospects. The money is not going to be there to continue to fund this exorbitantly expensive persecution.
At the same time, the institutional basis for continuing the persecution has been uprooted, most likely at Xi Jinping’s direction.
The persecution has been carried about by the Political and Legal Affairs Committees (PLAC) at all administrative levels. Prior to the transition of power in November 2012, the secretary of the Central PLAC had a place on the Politburo Standing Committee, the small body that runs the Chinese regime, giving him a good deal of independence. Since November, the head of the PLAC has been merely a member of the Politburo and thus more easily controlled from above.
At the same time, Xi Jinping appears to be winding down the Reform Through Labor Camp System, which deprives the persecution of organizational and administrative support.
In the battle of ideas, the regime has lost. As early as 2002, the Chinese communist regime had for the most part stopped publicly denouncing Falun Gong.
Meanwhile, independent media outlets have consistently exposed the CCP’s crimes. Especially after the Epoch Times published Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party, the Chinese people lost their trust in the CCP’s state-run media, and increasingly in the Party itself.
Moreover, the regime has lost all belief in itself. Even high-ranking officials try their best to become “naked officials” who send their wives, children, and assets abroad, while securing foreign passports for themselves.
The people of China sense that the regime is on its last legs. Ordinary citizens heap sarcasm and criticism on whatever the regime does, and whatever it opposes, the people enthusiastically support.
Should the CCP try to intensify the persecution of Falun Gong, public opinion will rally to support the Falun Gong practitioners.
In fact, more and more lawyers are stepping forward to defend Falun Gong practitioners. In a recent trial in Dalian, the lawyers even forced the court to make some concessions.
Around the world, the facts about the harvesting of organs from living Falun Gong practitioners are becoming widely known. The book Bloody Harvest: The Killing of Falun Gong for Their Organs is recognized as an authority.
Right now, the United States House of Representatives is considering Resolution 281, which condemns organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience in China.
Du Bin’s movie Above the Ghosts’ Heads: The Women of Masanjia Labor Camp has received widespread coverage from major media outlets around the world and drawn global attention to the tortures that China’s labor camps are inflicting on Falun Gong practitioners.

Cleaning Up the Mess

If the persecution is getting harder and harder to continue, then the only option left to CCP officials is to do something to clean up the mess. Any such efforts will likely occur in a time of turmoil.
Many international investment firms and economists have predicted that 2014 will be the tipping point for China’s economy. It will collapse. Afterward, long-festering social crises will erupt. The people’s discontent will boil over, and they will demand that someone be blamed.
If Xi Jinping were to give Bo Xilai a lenient sentence and let off Jiang’s clique, the latter would seize the opportunity. Just as Gennady Yanayev did in the former Soviet Union, Jiang’s clique would have a good chance to launch a coup. Bo Xilai would regain power, and Xi Jinping and the officials allied with him would be named as the scapegoats.
A safer course for Xi Jinping, and one that is also just, would be for him to punish Bo Xilai commensurate with all his crimes and to apprehend the prime culprits responsible for the persecution of Falun Gong.
Zhang Tianliang, Ph.D. writes on China’s history and politics. He contributes to a variety of publications, including the New York-based New Tang Dynasty Television and Voice of America’s Chinese service.
After more than a year’s delay, criminal charges were brought on July 24 against Bo Xilai, the once rising Chinese Communist Party (CCP) star, now disgraced.
The long delay speaks to the high stakes involved. Now that charges have been brought, Communist Party head Xi Jinping must face the risks involved in sentencing Bo.
According to state-run media, he will be tried for bribery, embezzlement, and abuse of power. The official charges mask the true character of this trial. Bo could have been charged with far more serious crimes, and this trial is not about simple misconduct in office.
This is a political trial that affects the fate of a large clique of individuals who were recently the most powerful figures in the CCP: the former paramount leader Jiang Zemin, who formed this clique; the long-time powerbroker and head of the intelligence services, Zeng Qinghong; and the former heads of the domestic security forces, Luo Gan and his successor Zhou Yongkang.
Bo was part of this group. They and other officials who followed their lead are responsible for the crimes against humanity committed in persecuting practitioners of the spiritual discipline Falun Gong. If Bo is given a light sentence, then this clique could breathe easy knowing they would not be held accountable for what they have done to Falun Gong practitioners.

Usurper-in-Waiting

Everyone in the CCP’s high levels knows why Xi Jinping should be wary of letting Bo Xilai get off easy. He was a usurper-in-waiting.
In the spheres of politics, economics, propaganda, and the military, Bo had laid the groundwork for taking power, and was only waiting for the right opportunity to unseat Xi Jinping. Had he done so, Xi Jinping can be sure that those whom Bo hated, such as Xi himself, former premier Wen Jiabao, and others, would have met quick deaths.
In this situation, if Xi lets Bo off, Xi can forget about any campaigns he has in mind to end corruption or rectify the CCP. By letting Bo off easy, Xi would be welcoming all comers to conspire against him at any time.
Perhaps Xi meant to send a signal that he is not that kind of fool by his recent handling of Jiang Zemin. On July 22, Jiang praised Xi’s leadership during a meeting with former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger. The next day, Jiang’s name could not be found on a list of CCP officials honoring a deceased scholar.
The CCP uses such memorial lists to communicate who has power. The list was juggled, and Jiang, who likes to show his continued existence through his presence on memorial lists, fell completely off.
Jiang Zemin’s praise of Xi Jinping had been condescending. Like a compliment from a supreme ruler to a young child, it might have given people the illusion that Xi Jinping needs Jiang Zemin to hold himself firm. This insult only added to the list of reasons Xi Jinping has for opposing Jiang.

Persecution Not Sustainable

Top CCP officials know the core issue involved in Bo Xilai’s case is the persecution of Falun Gong.
Jiang Zemin’s clique had put their hopes in Bo Xilai. If he had taken power, he could have continued the persecution of Falun Gong, and the reckoning the Chinese nation will one day demand of them would have been postponed.
In considering Bo’s case, Xi needs to realize that continuing the persecution of Falun Gong is not an easy thing to do.
Consider the money involved. In 1998, the year before the persecution began, the total expenditures for public security in China totaled 40 billion yuan (US$6.56 billion), as calculated from the overall revenues and the funding ratios in the Statistical Yearbook. By 2012, the cost of public security had increased to 701.8 billion yuan (US $115 billion).
These expenses cannot be sustained. Whether one looks to media inside China or reports from think tanks or governments abroad, the message is the same: gloom about the Chinese economy’s prospects. The money is not going to be there to continue to fund this exorbitantly expensive persecution.
At the same time, the institutional basis for continuing the persecution has been uprooted, most likely at Xi Jinping’s direction.
The persecution has been carried about by the Political and Legal Affairs Committees (PLAC) at all administrative levels. Prior to the transition of power in November 2012, the secretary of the Central PLAC had a place on the Politburo Standing Committee, the small body that runs the Chinese regime, giving him a good deal of independence. Since November, the head of the PLAC has been merely a member of the Politburo and thus more easily controlled from above.
At the same time, Xi Jinping appears to be winding down the Reform Through Labor Camp System, which deprives the persecution of organizational and administrative support.
In the battle of ideas, the regime has lost. As early as 2002, the Chinese communist regime had for the most part stopped publicly denouncing Falun Gong.
Meanwhile, independent media outlets have consistently exposed the CCP’s crimes. Especially after the Epoch Times published Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party, the Chinese people lost their trust in the CCP’s state-run media, and increasingly in the Party itself.
Moreover, the regime has lost all belief in itself. Even high-ranking officials try their best to become “naked officials” who send their wives, children, and assets abroad, while securing foreign passports for themselves.
The people of China sense that the regime is on its last legs. Ordinary citizens heap sarcasm and criticism on whatever the regime does, and whatever it opposes, the people enthusiastically support.
Should the CCP try to intensify the persecution of Falun Gong, public opinion will rally to support the Falun Gong practitioners.
In fact, more and more lawyers are stepping forward to defend Falun Gong practitioners. In a recent trial in Dalian, the lawyers even forced the court to make some concessions.
Around the world, the facts about the harvesting of organs from living Falun Gong practitioners are becoming widely known. The book Bloody Harvest: The Killing of Falun Gong for Their Organs is recognized as an authority.
Right now, the United States House of Representatives is considering Resolution 281, which condemns organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience in China.
Du Bin’s movie Above the Ghosts’ Heads: The Women of Masanjia Labor Camp has received widespread coverage from major media outlets around the world and drawn global attention to the tortures that China’s labor camps are inflicting on Falun Gong practitioners.

Cleaning Up the Mess

If the persecution is getting harder and harder to continue, then the only option left to CCP officials is to do something to clean up the mess. Any such efforts will likely occur in a time of turmoil.
Many international investment firms and economists have predicted that 2014 will be the tipping point for China’s economy. It will collapse. Afterward, long-festering social crises will erupt. The people’s discontent will boil over, and they will demand that someone be blamed.
If Xi Jinping were to give Bo Xilai a lenient sentence and let off Jiang’s clique, the latter would seize the opportunity. Just as Gennady Yanayev did in the former Soviet Union, Jiang’s clique would have a good chance to launch a coup. Bo Xilai would regain power, and Xi Jinping and the officials allied with him would be named as the scapegoats.
A safer course for Xi Jinping, and one that is also just, would be for him to punish Bo Xilai commensurate with all his crimes and to apprehend the prime culprits responsible for the persecution of Falun Gong.
Zhang Tianliang, Ph.D. writes on China’s history and politics. He contributes to a variety of publications, including the New York-based New Tang Dynasty Television and Voice of America’s Chinese service.

【陈思敏】薄案开审 举世聚焦活摘器官

图为莫斯科的尸体展。(AFP/Getty Images)
【大纪元2013年07月31日讯】中共开审薄熙来,却没有勇气面对薄案真相。据国内媒体披露薄熙来三宗罪,其中贪污及收贿的数额,合计仅2500万元,且皆涉大连实德董事长徐明案;而滥用职权唯发生在重庆,事涉放纵谷开来和王立军。如此严重缩水的案情,竟敢号称是中共近数十年来最大的政治丑闻?所以国际上不这样看。在近期不约而同的两篇专文和一个巡展,让人一览无遗薄案的实际罪恶与中共的恐惧所在。  
7月23日,美国国际宗教自由委员会(USCIRF)的主席斯维特博士(Katrina Lantos Swett)和副主席戈兰登女士(Mary Ann Glendon)联合撰文,要求美国政府必须就法轮功被迫害问题向中共施压,并且中共当局应该立刻废除“610”办公室和劳教所,立刻停止强迫摘取法轮功学员和其他被关押者器官的恐怖行径。
另在7月29日出刊的The Weekly Standard杂志,美国学人伊森‧葛特曼(Ethan Gutmann)以《在展出中的尸体》(Bodies at an Exhibition)一文质疑,目前正在全球巡回展出的塑化尸体的最初与最主要来源,以及王立军夜奔美领馆的核心内幕,就是被活摘器官的法轮功学员。
曾在中国担任商务顾问多年,对中国局势有着敏锐观察的的伊森‧葛特曼,也曾经通过个人的调查后估计,在2000年到2008年间,被摘取器官的法轮功学员达6.5万人,这与《血腥的器官摘取》两位作者的数字不谋而合。
而在美国国际宗教自由委员会主席与副主席的专文中,还特别指出:令人不寒而栗的证据显示,中国存在着未经同意就从法轮功学员和其他被关押者身上摘取器官的恐怖行径,这让中国的器官旅游业异常发达。
但在薄熙来主政时间最久的地方,这些都是显而易见的事实。苏家屯,有全国最早被曝活摘法轮功学员器官的集中营。沈阳,有全国最早成立的多器官移植中心(CITNAC)。大连,有全球前二大的尸体工厂。辽宁,首创全球史无前例的器官移植旅游的观光项目。在在向国际社会表明,有法轮功学员被活体器官,尸体被在国际行销与贩卖!
而此刻正在奥地利首都维也纳举办的“人体世界”展,展出的标本很多都是缺肾少肝的尸体,相信有一天,它将成为法轮功学员被杀害并被活摘器官的另类证据。
所以伊森‧葛特曼说不容人们忽视的是,与英商海伍德的死相关联的王立军出走美领馆事件,直接导致薄熙来的下台,随后活摘器官在百度上解禁,紧接着中共宣称要在年内摆脱对死囚器官依赖等等的连锁反应,都显示了王、薄案件与强摘法轮功学员器官的密不可分。
然而,薄案活摘法轮功学员器官的终极罪恶若是曝光,中共政权就非垮不可,这才是中共最最害怕面对的致命点。