Torch relay highlights abuses
Tue 06 November 2007
Carlos Robinson, Bachelor of Journalism
Human rights abuses in China were highlighted when the global human rights torch relay came to Lions Park, Noosaville, on Sunday November 4.
The relay aims to pressure the Chinese Government into addressing issues such as religious persecution, live organ harvesting, and censorship in the lead-up to next year's Beijing Olympic Games. 
The human rights torch had travelled up the Sunshine Coast all morning, and reached Noosaville late in the afternoon. Around 50 people gathered by the Noosa River to see the torch and hear Noosa Councillor Frank Wilkie, local federal candidates, and live music.
Cr Wilkie thanked the organisers for creating an opportunity to show that people "gave a damn" about the human rights situation in China. He said that although it might seem like a small gesture, this event did make a difference because it showed that people were standing up and caring.
The Democrats candidate for Fairfax, Janette Hashemi, said that silencing dissenters in China would not silence those who point out human rights abuses. She described China's human rights record as "appalling", and said the torch relay should put pressure on China to make changes before the Olympics begin.
The Greens candidate for Wide Bay, Katherine Webb, said that reports of organ harvesting in China were "horrific and surreal". She promised to take action if elected, and said the current Australian government was putting no pressure on China because of our strong economic relationship. "It seems that the current prime minister is a lost cause," she said.
The human rights torch relay began in Athens on August 9 this year, exactly one year before the Beijing Olympic Games. The torch has already travelled through Europe, and will next travel to New Zealand.
Event co-ordinator Gerard Traub said they aimed to carry the human rights torch into China itself in time for the Olympic Games. The official Beijing Olympics torch relay will begin in March next year.
The human rights relay is the work of the Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong (CIPFG), which is a worldwide group of 300 members, including Queensland Senator Andrew Bartlett.
The group was formed to investigate allegations that practioners of Falun Gong, an ancient form of Chinese meditation, were being executed for their organs. Mr Traub said the Chinese Government outlawed Falun Gong in 1999, after it became clear that the religion was gaining more members than the communist party.
The CIPFG commissioned an independent Canadian study in 2006 which concluded that large-scale organ harvesting of unwilling Falun Gong members was taking place. More than 40,000 organ transplants with no explainable source for the organs took place in China between 2000 and 2005, the CIPFG said.
Mr Traub said China did not deserve to host the 2008 Olympics, since it has helped support the genocide in Darfur, as well as oppressive regimes in Zimbabwe and Burma.
He said that incarceration without due process is another issue, with several million people in forced labour camps. Although some are genuine criminals, many are political or prisoners of conscience, he said.
Mr Traub agreed there were parallels between the 2008 Beijing Olympics and the 1936 Berlin Games, which dictator Adolf Hitler used to promote Nazi Germany. "There are certainly similarities," Mr Traub said. "Rather than for the good of the people, it's to make the state look good."
Ironically, the Olympic torch relay was the brainchild of Hitler, and was first used in the 1936 games to symbolically link the ideals of classical Greece to the nascent Aryan-supremacist state.
The relay was such a success that it has become a tradition of the modern Olympics, although it now symbolizes the unity of nations as the relay travels the world.
And now the human rights torch relay has added another layer of meaning, turning it into a beacon for change. Mr Traub said, "This torch is the symbol of hope for China."
Image(s) designed by Carlos Robinson