Letter sent to the President of the International Olympic Committee:
Dear President Rog
Letter sent to the President of the International Olympic Committee:
Dear President Rogge,
The Chinese government's crackdown and the media blackout in Tibet have alerted the world to the lack of human rights progress in China just a few months before the Olympic Games are to take place in Beijing.
We, the undersigned organizations, call on you personally and on the rest of the international Olympic movement to act now and side with the Olympic ideals of "human dignity" and "respect for universal fundamental ethical principles".
China must immediately ensure freedom for the international as well as Chinese media to investigate and report on the recent crackdown in Tibet, as it publicly pledged full media freedom by the time of the Olympics when it was bidding for the Games in 2001.
China must also release all Tibetans and others who only peacefully exercised their freedom of expression, prevent torture and other kinds of ill-treatment of all detainees, and ensure the right to fair trial to all. The world remembers China's public pledges of human rights improvements in 2001.
The International Olympic Committee and National Olympic Committees must publicly state that Olympic athletes enjoy full freedom of expression if and when they come to Beijing. Their peaceful support for human rights and Olympic ideals is their human right and duty and they can in no way be prevented from doing so.
Only an active, responsible approach by the IOC in defense of human rights can prevent further possible calls for boycott by concerned citizens of the world. Stop hiding behind absurd statements about not mixing sports and politics. Human rights are not politics. Human dignity is not politics. Human life is not politics. People are dying. You need to speak out now.
-Jan Ruml, chairman, Olympic Watch
-Wei Jingsheng, chair, Overseas Chinese Democracy Coalition (OCDC)
-Karl Hafen, managing director, International Society for Human Rights (IGFM/ISHR)
-Willy Fautr, director, Human Rights Without Frontiers Int'l.
-Robert Mnard, secretary-general, Reporters Without Borders (RSF)
-Zhou Jian, president, Independent Federation of Chinese Students and Scholars
Prague / Washington / Frankfurt / Brussels / Paris, 19 March 2008
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Added: 3 months ago
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A letter from Mr. Wei Jingsheng
Dear Friends:
As you know, the 1936 Olympic Games
A letter from Mr. Wei Jingsheng
Dear Friends:
As you know, the 1936 Olympic Games were hosted by the Nazi Party in Germany. Being awarded the Olympics encouraged the Nazis, and no one did anything to stop them from holding the games. They then went on to kill 20 Million innocent people.
Do you know who will be hosting the 2008 Olympics?
It will be hosted by Mao Zedong's party, The Chinese Communist Party.
The same party that killed over 80 million innocent people.
Mao Zedong's picture today still hangs on the Gate of
Eternal Peace at Tiananmen Square.
In the name of the Olympic Games, and in order for the conscience of humankind to know peace, we ask you to please write the IOC and demand that the Chinese Government keep the promises it made in order to obtain the 2008 Olympic Games.
Those promises included improving human rights conditions in China, releasing political prisoners, and allowing free speech.
And further we ask that for 17 days in August 2008, the picture of Mao Zedong be taken down off the Gate of Eternal Peace and replaced with the Olympic emblem of the 5 rings.
Please write to Jacques Rogge, President of the International Olympic Committee. He is obliged to press the Chinese Government to honor the promises they made when applying for the 2008 games, and encourage them to show good will by taking this photo of Mao Zedong down.
Sincerely.
Wei Jingsheng
Mr. Jacques Rogge
President International Olympic Committee
Chateau De Vidy
Case Postale 356
1007 Lausanne, Switzerland
Fax- +41 21 621 6216
jacques.rogge@ioc.olympic.org Overseas Chinese Democracy Coalition Wei Jingsheng Foundation
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Added: 5 months ago
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Biography of Wei Jingsheng
http://www.weijingsheng.org/index.html
Wei Jingsheng is the
Biography of Wei Jingsheng
http://www.weijingsheng.org/index.html
Wei Jingsheng is the best-known Chinese human rights and democracy fighter and is the leader for the opposition against the Chinese Communist dictatorship. He was praised as "Father of Chinese Democracy" and "Nelson Mandela of China".
Wei was sentenced to jail in China twice for a total of more than 18 years due to his democracy activities, including a ground breaking, well publicized essay he wrote in 1978: "The Fifth Modernization".
He is the author of "Courage to Stand Alone" - letters from Prison and Other Writings", which compiles his articles written initially on toilet papers in jail.
Wei Jingsheng is a winner of numerous Human Rights Awards, including:
- The Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Human Rights Award in 1996
- The European Parliament's Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought
- The National Endowment for Democracy Award in 1997
- International Activist Award by the Gleitsman Foundation in 1993
- The Olof Palme Memorial Prize in 1994
Wei Jingsheng has been nominated seven times for Nobel Peace Prize since 1993.
Born in Beijing China in 1950, he is the eldest of four children. His parents were longtime Chinese Communist Party cadres. He was brought up in the prestigious Party schools, and was exposed to the internal dramas of the Beijing party elite.
At the beginning of the Cultural Revolution in 1966, the sixteen-year-old Wei left Beijing to explore the country for himself. He traveled throughout north and northwest China. Seeing firsthand the true affects that Communism had on the Chinese people. It was during this time that he first began to formulate his opinions on the Chinese Communist Party and the future of the Chinese people.
Retuning to Beijing in 1978, a series of workers, intellectuals and artists posted their thoughts and statements on a piece of wall in Beijing. The place, and period became known as "The Democracy Wall Movement". At this time, Wei wrote an essay entitled "The Fifth Modernization" which stated that without democracy, China could not truly modernize.
His essay caused a sensation, not only because it openly assaulted the "People's Democratic Dictatorship" and the propaganda of the Communists, but also because the author dared to sign the essay with both his real name and address. Wei joined a few friends in publishing an underground magazine called "Exploration". In its last edition, Wei wrote another article, "Democracy or a New Dictatorship?" which identified Deng Xiaoping, then Communist leader of China, as the new dictator.
Three days later, Wei Jingsheng was arrested.
In 1979, Wei was charged with having passed "secret" information concerning the 1979 Sino-Vietnamese war to a foreigner, and engaging in "counter-revolution propaganda."
He was sentenced to 15 years. He spoke in his own defense, and a copy of his statement was smuggled out of the courtroom and distributed in China and to the foreign press.
He was first on death row for eight months, and then in solitary confinement for nearly five years. He was kept in two other forced labor camps under strict supervision in a two by two and a half meter cell, from both guards and prison handlers.
September 1993, just nine days before the International Olympic Committee was to vote on Beijing's bid for the games, the PRC released Wei on probation
Within six months he was arrested a second time. He was tried again, convicted of "counter-revolution" and sentenced to another 14 years. In 1997, after a total of 18 years in prison, Wei was taken from his cell and placed on a plane bound for the United States as a bargain result between then U.S. President Clinton and the Chinese President Jiang ZeMin. Wei maintains that he was not freed, but that his exile is further punishment.
Currently residing in Washington DC, Wei Jingsheng has not been silenced by his forced exile. Many of his articles are published in major newspapers including English, more in Chinese. Every week, he gives speeches and commentaries through various radio and TV stations, especially to the Chinese audience via Radio Free Asia, Voice of America, and BBC and many others.
In 1998, he founded the Overseas Chinese Democracy Coalition (OCDC), which is an umbrella organization for many Oversea Chinese democracy groups. The OCDC has members in dozens of countries. He has been serving as its chairman since then. He is also the president for the Wei Jingsheng Foundation, which is a non-profit organization registered in New York.
For more information on Wei Jingsheng go to: http://www.weijingsheng.org/index.html
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Added: 6 months ago
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