City Councillors, MPs, monks, ethnic groups and ordinary kiwis came out in droves over the Christmas holiday to support a global push for basic human rights in China before the Beijing Olympics this year.
The Global Human Rights Torch Relay travelled from Auckland to Invercargill during December before leaving for Africa via Los Angeles on January 1. The torch carries the message that, "Olympics and crimes against humanity cannot coexist in China."
Auckland City Councillor and CIPFG (Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong in China) member Dr Cathy Casey was New Zealand's first torch bearer at the Auckland ceremony.
Dr Casey said the torch is a symbol of solidarity for the plight of the Chinese people, and particularly Falun Gong practitioners.
Dr Cathy Casey, Auckland City Councillor and NZ CIPFG (Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong) member proudly holds the Human Rights Torch in Auckland on Sunday 16 December. (The Epoch Times)
"The symbolic torch relay shines for all victims of the Chinese Communist Party," she said.
Dr Casey became involved in CIPFG after the Hon. David Kilgour -- co-author of Bloody Harvest, an investigation report of state-sanctioned organ harvesting of living Falun Gong practitioners -- visited New Zealand 18 months ago.
Dr Casey had a kidney removed two years ago and said she could understand why people travel to China for a transplant.
"What China will not tell you is that [the organ] may have come from a Falun Dafa practitioner," Dr Casey said.
She said China needs to allow into the country independent investigators to research the organ harvesting allegations, including Amnesty International, who is barred from China.
Green Party MPs Keith Locke and Nandor Tanczos supported the torch in Auckland and Hamilton respectively.
Politicians Support in Wellington
Green Party co-leader Russel Norman welcomed the torch in a ceremony at Parliament in Wellington.
He said China's significant influence in global economic relations means it is so important they embrace democracy and basic human rights.
"And it's going to be putting pressure from outside China with events like this as well as putting pressure inside China, that will put pressure on the government to open up to have more democracy and more free speech, to give people an opportunity to exercise their democracy and their human rights."
Wellington City Councillors Celia Wade-Brown and Andy Foster raced out between meetings to ensure their support for the torch relay.
Cr Wade-Brown said meeting the Hon. David Kilgour had made her very concerned about the organ harvesting allegations against the Chinese Communist Party.
"We were convinced there was a case to answer," she said.
Cr Foster said, "We think it is very important that we are seen to support human rights and free speech," he said.
Four wakas from Nelson's Maitahi and the Motueka outrigger canoe clubs paddled the Greek Goddess of Justice carrying the Human Rights Torch into Tahunanui Beach, Nelson on 27 December, 2007. (Don Chen/The Epoch Times)
He was deeply concerned at the political issues surrounding Tibet and Taiwan, and hoped the Olympics would be an opportunity to push for change in China.
Olympics Used as Political Tool
Former professor at Shanghai International Studies University and CIPFG member Li Dong supported the torch in Palmerston North, Upper Hutt, Lower Hutt and Wellington.
He said the actions of the Chinese Communist Party have nothing in common with the "lofty principles" of the Olympic Games.
"The Beijing Olympic Games is being used as a mammoth PR exercise to paint a false picture of China," he said.
He said China's police have named 11 categories and 40 sub categories of people as 'enemies of the Olympic Games'.
"The Beijing Olympics will be the most political games since Hitler's 1936 Olympic Games," he said.
Auckland's Marie Leadbetter, from the Indonesia Human Rights Commission, said China's slogan for the Olympics 'One China – One Dream' was inappropriate as the human rights abuses continue in the lead-up to the Games.
Radio India broadcaster Amrit Singh Masuta said in Christchurch that the Torch Relay signified solidarity with China's Christians, Buddhists, Falun Gong practitioners, and the 1.5 million people who had been evicted from their homes to make way for Olympic stadiums.
Free trade questioned
Helen Tiller, from Amnesty International, supported the Human Rights Torch Relay in Christchurch.
She questioned the New Zealand Government's involvement with the Chinese regime when so many groups of people were being persecuted.
"Human rights in China are just appalling," she said. She said over 10,000 people are executed every year in China.
"There are mobile execution buses, journalists are detained and there is no freedom of the press."
Ms Tiller was concerned about the speed that the New Zealand Government was trying to push through a free trade agreement with China.
"New Zealand is in the final stages of a free trade agreement with China and they are not even taking these human rights violations into account," she said.
Christian communicator Peter Laing, who works as a liaison between different denominations in Palmerston North said he supports a boycott of the Beijing Olympics.
Mr Laing called for the public to avoid buying cheap Chinese products - to use their power as consumers to speak out against the severe human rights abuses and labour standards. "I am against the hypocrisy that our country and other western countries propagate," he said.
Human Rights Reaches New Heights
A trip up to Aoraki/Mt Cook's Liebig Dome on Christmas Day saw the Human Rights Torch being taken to the snow to capture footage for a documentary intending to cover the historic global tour.
Pan Qing, a Director of the NZ Asia Human Rights Foundation and documentary supporter, said that when China was awarded the Olympics in 2001 they promised to improve their human rights record.
"The past seven years have shown that promise has been nothing but a lie," he said.
Mr Pan, who attended the torch lighting ceremony in Athens, Greece on August 9, 2007, said the Chinese regime has a long list of crimes against humanity to answer for, but the worst is the organ harvesting and sale of organs from living Falun Gong practitioners.
First to See the Sun 2008
In a special ceremony in Gisborne on New Yeas Eve, musician Cherry Gemstone played Ring of Fire and Diamond in the Rough for the crowd of about 200 people.
"There shouldn't be an Olympic Games in a place where they are killing people like they are in China, it's just so wrong.
"Killing is not a sport," she said.
The Human Rights Torch is travelling to 130 cities across five continents, calling for a boycott of the Beijing Olympics if human rights do not improve in China.
It was initiated by the CIPFG in response to increasing human rights violations in China, especially against the spiritual discipline of Falun Gong.
Continued coverage can be viewed at www.humanrightstorch.org as the torch travels through Africa, North America and Asia.
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