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DISSIDENTS WHO HAVE SUFFERED FOR HUMAN 

RIGHTS IN CHINA: A LOOK BACK AND A LOOK 

FORWARD 

HEARING 

BEFORE THE

CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE 

COMMISSION ON CHINA 

ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS 

SECOND SESSION 

DECEMBER 7, 2016 

Printed for the use of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.cecc.gov 

CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE COMMISSION ON CHINA 

LEGISLATIVE BRANCH COMMISSIONERS 

House Senate 

CHRIS SMITH, New Jersey, Chairman 

ROBERT PITTENGER, North Carolina 

TRENT FRANKS, Arizona 

RANDY HULTGREN, Illinois 

DIANE BLACK, Tennessee 

TIM WALZ, Minnesota 

MARCY KAPTUR, Ohio 

MICHAEL HONDA, California 

TED LIEU, California 

MARCO RUBIO, Florida, Cochairman 

TOM COTTON, Arkansas 

STEVE DAINES, Montana 

JAMES LANKFORD, Oklahoma 

BEN SASSE, Nebraska 

DIANNE FEINSTEIN, California 

JEFF MERKLEY, Oregon 

GARY PETERS, Michigan 

EXECUTIVE BRANCH COMMISSIONERS 

CHRISTOPHER P. LU, Department of Labor 

SARAH SEWALL, Department of State 

STEFAN M. SELIG, Department of Commerce 

DANIEL R. RUSSEL, Department of State 

TOM MALINOWSKI, Department of State 

PAUL B. PROTIC, Staff Director 

ELYSE B. ANDERSON, Deputy Staff Director 

(II) 

(III) 

CO N T E N T S 

STATEMENTS

Page 

Opening Statement of Hon. Christopher Smith, a U.S. Representative From 

New Jersey; Chairman, Congressional-Executive Commission on China ....... 1 

Statement of Hon. Marco Rubio, a U.S. Senator From Florida; Cochairman, 

Congressional-Executive Commission on China ................................................ 3 

Statement of Hon. Randy Hultgren, a U.S. Representative From Illinois; ........ 5 

Tsering, Penpa, Representative of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Office of 

Tibet, Washington, DC ........................................................................................ 8 

Yang Jianli, Initiatives for China/Citizen Power for China ................................. 10 

Chen Guangcheng, Chinese Legal Advocate; Distiguished Visiting Fellow, 

Institute for Policy Research and Catholic Studies, Catholic University 

of America ............................................................................................................. 12 

Fu, Bob, Founder and President, ChinaAid Association ...................................... 14 

Wei Jingsheng, Chairman, Overseas Chinese Democracy Coalition ................... 16 

Kadeer, Rebiya, President, World Uyghur Congress ............................................ 18 

Wang, Xiaodan, Falun Gong practitioner and daughter of former political 

prisoner Wang Zhiwen ......................................................................................... 20 

APPENDIX 

PREPARED STATEMENTS

Tsering, Penpa ......................................................................................................... 32 

Yang Jianli ............................................................................................................... 42 

Chen Guangcheng .................................................................................................... 51 

Statement submitted by the 709 Lawyers Wives, dated December 5, 2016 ....... 53 

Fu, Bob ..................................................................................................................... 55

Wei Jingsheng .......................................................................................................... 59 

Kadeer, Rebiya ......................................................................................................... 60 

Wang, Xiaodan ......................................................................................................... 62 

Smith, Hon. Christopher, a U.S. Representative From New Jersey; Chairman, 

Congressional-Executive Commission on China ................................................ 67 

Rubio, Hon. Marco, a U.S. Senator From Florida; Cochairman, CongressionalExecutive Commission on China ........................................................................ 68 

SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD

Statement Submitted for the Record by Enghebatu Togochog, of the Southern 

Mongolian Human Rights Information Center (SMHRIC), dated December 

7, 2016 ................................................................................................................... 70 

Letter to Cui Tiankai, the Ambassador of the People’s Republic of China 

to the United States from Representative Christopher Smith and Senator 

Marco Rubio, dated December 7, 2016 ............................................................... 73 

Witness Biographies ................................................................................................ 75 

(1) 

DISSIDENTS WHO HAVE SUFFERED FOR 

HUMAN RIGHTS IN CHINA: A LOOK BACK 

AND A LOOK FORWARD 

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 7, 2016 

CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE

COMMISSION ON CHINA, 

Washington, DC. 

The hearing was convened, pursuant to notice, at 2:11 p.m., in 

Room HVC–210, Capitol Visitor Center, Hon. Christopher Smith, 

Chairman, presiding. 

Also Present: Senator Rubio and Representatives Walz and 

Hultgren. 

OPENING STATEMENT OF HON. CHRISTOPHER SMITH, A U.S. 

REPRESENTATIVE FROM NEW JERSEY; CHAIRMAN, CONGRESSIONAL–EXECUTIVE COMMISSION ON CHINA 

Chairman SMITH. The Commission will come to order. Let me, 

first of all, say I am sorry for the lateness. There is a series of votes 

on the House floor. We just finished, so other Members should be 

streaming in. 

Senator Marco Rubio and the other Senators also have a vote 

right now. So you never plan these things. I want to thank you for 

your patience, forbearance. 

This has been another dark and difficult year for Chinese rights 

defenders and democracy activists and nobody knows that better 

than our distinguished witnesses at this table who have lived and 

suffered for their beliefs, for their convictions, and now others in 

like manner are suffering today in China. Under President Xi 

Jinping’s version of the rule of law, the law is being used to more 

effectively curb freedom of expression, civil society, religious freedom, the forced abortion policy, and other fundamental rights. 

Chinese courts have convicted rights activists and lawyers of 

‘‘subversion of power’’ for simply seeking to represent religious 

groups, petitioners, and democracy activists. China’s diverse religious communities, faced with even more restrictions, as new regulations, and ‘‘sinicization’’ campaign continues, will further politicize religious life and it leads to more repression. 

In Hong Kong, mainland China’s political interference and its abduction of booksellers threatens the rule of law and Hong Kong’s 

promised autonomy, contributing to a growing climate of fear and 

insecurity. Internationally, China continues to push a relativistic 

vision and version of human rights, characterizing universal values 

as ‘‘Western’’ values that do not apply to the Chinese national situVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:27 Mar 16, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00005 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 U:\DOCS\23081 DIEDRE
2 

ation. Even though what we espouse here and what others are 

pushing both within and from without China are all based on the 

Universal Declaration of Human Rights to which China and others 

have acceded to. 

The next Administration faces major challenges in dealing with 

China. A new approach is needed that learns the lessons of the 

past and listens to those who have suffered prison and persecution 

to advance fundamental freedoms in China. The problem is that 

U.S. diplomacy is stuck with policies that no longer match—and 

maybe never did match—Chinese realities. 

For the past two decades—or a little more than that—U.S. policy 

was based on the belief that China’s growing prosperity would 

somehow bring political reforms and the rule of law; that trade matriculates into fundamental freedoms. Many of us argued from the 

beginning, including me and I am not the only one, going back to 

1994, that it was a mistake when President Bill Clinton delinked 

most-favored-nation status with human rights, and by doing so 

said that profits trump fundamental freedoms and fundamental 

rights. 

That was the beginning in my opinion. The Chinese took the 

measure of the United States and said they care more about money 

than they do about values. But that is not the case, certainly on 

this Commission, and that is a bipartisan belief that we have. 

During those times, we focused on integrating China into the 

international system, ignoring clear evidence that China, under the 

Communist Party’s leadership, would play by its own rules. 

China has not become a ‘‘responsible stakeholder’’ in the international system as predicted. I would note parenthetically that I 

also chair the Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights subcommittee; frequently travel to Africa and other parts of the world 

on human rights missions, and I could tell you the bad governance 

model that they promulgate is being accepted by certain autocratic 

governments, if not dictatorships, on those continents. So they are 

not acting as a responsible stakeholder. 

To the contrary, despite decades of remarkable economic growth, 

Beijing’s leaders are increasingly dismissive of ‘‘Western influence’’ 

and outright hostile to both free societies and democratic capitalism. 

A strategy of engagement through trade, investment, and peopleto-people exchanges has not lead to a freer China and remains cold 

comfort to China’s repressed human rights lawyers, religious and 

ethnic minority groups, journalists, and civil society leaders. The 

United States must recognize that China’s internal repression 

drives its external aggression and develop new policy approaches 

that intertwine our principles and interests in the pivotal Asia-Pacific region. 

Working with the Congress, the next Administration should be 

prepared to bolster U.S. strategic advantages in the Asia-Pacific region. This will mean improving military readiness, insisting on a 

freer and fairer trade, strengthening relations with regional partners, and making more robust commitments to advancing democratic institutions, human rights, and the rule of law. 

This last point will require the United States to push China to 

embrace greater transparency and a better adherence to universal 

3 

standards. It will require the next Administration to shine a bright 

light on human rights abuses and level meaningful sanctions in response to these abuses which I say with great sadness, that this 

Administration, the Obama Administration, has not done for the 

last eight years. The United States must also find ways to support 

China’s reformers, their dissidents, and its champions of liberty 

and the rule of law. 

The bipartisan Congressional-Executive Commission on China 

[CECC], which Senator Rubio and I cochair, recently issued its 

2016 Annual Report with specific recommendations for ways to 

pursue human rights and the rule of law within U.S.-China relations. 

This report is the ‘‘gold standard’’ of human rights reports on 

China. I want to publicly commend the CECC staff for their Herculean efforts in producing this important report. It is a big task and 

we appreciate their hard work. The report should be required reading for Members of Congress interested in things related to China, 

journalists writing on China, and for Administration officials looking to develop strategies to engage with China. 

The need for a principled and consistent American leadership is 

more important than ever, as China’s growing economic clout, and 

persistent diplomatic efforts, have succeeded in dampening global 

criticism of its escalating repression and failures to adhere to universal standards. We owe a new approach to the great people like 

Liu Xiaobo, who continues as a Noble Peace Prize winner to sit in 

prison, people like Gao Zhisheng, and the thousands of others suffering as prisoners of conscience. 

Now, we owe it to future generations of Americans, whose security and prosperity will depend on a U.S.-China relationship that 

is open and transparent, free of censorship and persecution, based 

on adherence to universal standards, and, hopefully, increasingly 

democratic. 

It is my honor to turn to Cochair Senator Marco Rubio. 

STATEMENT OF HON. MARCO RUBIO, A U.S. SENATOR FROM 

FLORIDA; COCHAIRMAN, CONGRESSIONAL–EXECUTIVE COMMISSION ON CHINA 

Cochairman RUBIO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I want to 

thank all of the witnesses gathered here today. This is an impressive group of men and women who have important stories to share 

about their own personal suffering and that of their family members and associates at the hands of both the Chinese Government 

and the Chinese Communist Party. 

Their experiences must not be viewed in isolation, but rather 

they are representative of untold numbers of other Chinese, Tibetans, and Uyghurs who daily face repression at the hands of their 

own government. 

Today I joined our Chairman, Representative Smith, in sending 

a letter to the Chinese Ambassador to raise our concern and seek 

additional information about a spate of detentions involving prominent Chinese human rights advocates, as well American citizen 

Sandy Phan-Gillis who has been arbitrarily detained for 21 months 

now. I submit a copy of that correspondence for the record. 

4 

Before going any further, I would also like to take a moment at 

this hearing, the last CECC hearing of the 114th Congress, to recognize Chairman Smith for his capable and principled leadership 

of the Commission. He is an unrelenting advocate for human rights 

and rule of law everywhere in the world, especially in China, and 

I look forward to continuing to partner with him in the new Congress, because as today’s testimony will no doubt make clear, the 

mandate and the mission of this Commission remains as vital as 

ever. 

The Commission, as you just heard a moment ago, recently released its Annual Report and it painted an undeniably bleak picture regarding the deterioration of human rights and the rule of 

law in China, with especially grave consequences for civil society, 

religious believers, human rights lawyers, and labor activists. Since 

the Report’s release in October of this year, those abuses have continued apace in the last two months. 

As the Report documents and as news stories from the last several weeks underscore, Beijing has become increasingly brazen in 

exerting its extraterritorial reach. This was especially true in the 

outrageous abductions of the Hong Kong booksellers last year, including Swedish national Gui Minhai, who is still being held by 

Chinese authorities at an undisclosed location. 

And now more recently in China’s unprecedented intervention in 

Hong Kong’s legal system in the cases surrounding two democratically elected politicians who won seats in the Legislative Council 

on platforms calling for democratic self-determination for Hong 

Kong. The ripple effects of this ruling are not fully known yet as 

the Hong Kong Government has now taken additional steps targeting opposition lawmakers. This is gravely concerning and something which the Commission, and the Congress, will be watching 

closely in the coming year especially as it relates to the Hong Kong 

Policy Act. 

Returning to the focus of today’s hearing, we are at a critical 

juncture in U.S.-China relations, and there is much wisdom to be 

gleaned, for the incoming administration, from dissident voices. 

December will mark 15 years since China gained entry into the 

World Trade Organization. It is past time to take stock of our approach and recognize that despite what proponents at the time believed would happen, China has in fact used the international 

rules-based system to fuel vast economic growth, while further restricting freedom and increasing repression. 

Quite simply, many of the principles which have undergirded 

U.S.-China relations during Democrat and Republican administrations alike in recent decades have simply not yielded the desired 

outcomes. A perennial critique from those who care about human 

rights issues has been that the U.S. foreign policy apparatus risks 

ghettoizing human rights concerns, only giving them the prominence they merit during infrequent, and often ineffective, human 

rights dialogues and then relegating these issues to the sidelines 

in high-level bilateral engagement. 

The Obama Administration struggled to integrate human rights 

issues at the highest levels sending unmistakable signals early on, 

as was famously reported during then Secretary Clinton’s inaugural trip to China in 2009 that human rights issues, ‘‘can’t interVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:27 Mar 16, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00008 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 U:\DOCS\23081 DIEDRE
5 

fere with the global economic crisis, the global climate change crisis, and the security crisis.’’ 

Words have consequences. Mid-level appointees at the State Department and elsewhere take them to heart. As such, it will be critical, during the early days of the new administration, for the Secretary and other senior diplomats to put down markers on these 

issues which are of central importance not only to the Chinese people, but to U.S. national interests. For as history has shown us, 

where rule of law fails to take root, where human rights abuses are 

committed with impunity, where international obligations are violated, the United States should not expect to find a responsible 

global stakeholder. 

I look forward to hearing from our witnesses on this important 

topic. Today’s hearing was scheduled to coincide with the commemoration of Human Rights Day this weekend, and also with the 

sixth anniversary of the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to Chinese dissident and writer Liu Xiaobo—an honor that he has not 

been able to rightfully claim given that still today he languishes 

unjustly in prison, serving an 11-year sentence handed down for 

his essays criticizing the Chinese Government. 

The United States must commit anew to standing with China’s 

reformers and dissidents, embracing their aspirations and consistently pressing the Chinese Government and its Communist Party 

to respect basic human rights and uphold the rule of law. It is my 

hope that this new administration will appoint an ambassador to 

China that reflects these priorities, not simply someone that is 

going there to catch up with old friends. 

I look forward to today’s testimony and to today’s policy recommendations. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and just as a note, the Senate is in 

the midst of a series of votes. I know it is shocking the Senate is 

voting today. I am going to take my second vote and try to get back 

here as quickly as possible. Thank you, Chairman. 

Chairman SMITH. I want to thank the Cochair for his leadership 

over the last two years, and really over the entirety of his tenure 

in the U.S. Senate on behalf of human rights everywhere, including 

and especially in China. Next Congress, God willing, you will serve 

as Chair. The Commission could not be in better hands. You are 

just an extraordinary leader. 

I would like to now yield to Mr. Hultgren. 

[The letter appears in the appendix.] 

STATEMENT OF HON. RANDY HULTGREN, A U.S. 

REPRESENTATIVE FROM ILLINOIS 

Representative HULTGREN. It is so good to be with all of you. I 

especially want to thank our wonderful Cochairmen, Congressman 

Smith and Senator Rubio, two people who could not be more passionate and more effective at fighting for the value of every single 

person, no matter where they are. 

As I look out in the audience, truly we are among heroes. I want 

to thank you. You have lived your lives fighting for freedom, fighting for those who are being persecuted, being imprisoned, and we 

are so grateful that through you, we are able to make sure that 

their voices are heard, that no one is forgotten, and that no counVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:27 Mar 16, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00009 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 U:\DOCS\23081 DIEDRE
6 

try, or leader, or person is left unaccountable for unacceptable actions. 

So this is appropriate, certainly to look back on what has happened over the last few years, some successes, but also somethings 

that did not happen that should have happened, and to take that 

and to look forward to what can we do next. It is my commitment, 

along with the Cochairmen and other members of this Commission, 

to say that this is our responsibility. 

There is opportunity, I think, in a new year and a new administration to make sure that, again, no one is forgotten, no voice is 

left unheard. My hope, my prayer, my commitment is to do everything that I can to make sure that we have that kind of accountability and that we are holding other nations accountable; that we 

are doing all that we can to say that every person deserves to be 

treated with respect, with dignity, and with the ability to pursue 

their dreams, their religion, and their passions that is their right. 

So thank you. Thank you Chairman Smith. Thank you for your 

incredible work, and thank you all for being here today. 

Again, I appreciate the work that has been done, but even more 

so, looking forward to greater impact that we can have coming into 

the new year. 

Chairman SMITH. Thank you, Randy, very much. Thank you for 

your leadership as well. 

I would like to invite to the witness table our other three panelists. We have seven extraordinary women and men who have stood 

up for human rights in China, most of whom have spent considerable time in prison on behalf of their core convictions, and belief 

in human rights and religious freedom. 

I would like to now begin introducing them one-by-one, and then 

invite you to present your testimony. 

We will begin with Mr. Penpa Tsering who is the Representative 

of the Office of Tibet in Washington, and a member of the Tibetan 

Parliament. During his student days, he served as the General Secretary of both the Tibetan Freedom Movement and Nigerian Tibet 

Friendship Association. 

Later, he served as General Secretary of the Central Executive 

Committee in Do-mey. He then worked as executive director of the 

Tibetan Parliamentary and Research Centre in New Delhi before 

being sworn in as the speaker of the 14th Tibetan Parliament in 

2008. During the 15th Tibetan Parliament-in-exile in 2011, he 

again held the speaker’s post. So thank you, Mr. Speaker, for being 

here. 

We will then hear from Dr. Yang Jianli who is president of Initiatives for China/Citizen Power for China. Dr. Yang is a scholar 

and democracy activist internationally recognized for his efforts to 

promote democracy in China. He has been involved in the prodemocracy movement in China since the 1980s and was forced to 

flee China in 1989 after the Tiananmen Square massacre. 

In 2002, Dr. Yang returned to China to support the labor movement and was imprisoned by Chinese authorities for alleged espionage and illegal entry. Following his release in 2007, he founded 

Initiatives for China, a non-governmental organization that promotes China’s peaceful transition to democracy. 

7 

We will then hear from Mr. Chen Guangecheng, a Chinese legal 

advocate and extraordinary activist. Mr. Chen is from rural China 

where he advocated on behalf of people with disabilities and exposed and challenged abuses of population control and defended 

women—as well as their children—from forced abortion and forced 

sterilization. 

Mr. Chen was imprisoned for his activism for four years, followed 

by an extra two years of extrajudicial confinement at his home. 

Chen Guangcheng escaped in 2012, in an escape that still defies 

imagination, how he was able to pull that off, then came to the 

United States with his family. 

In addition to his position as a distinguished visiting fellow in 

the Institute for Policy Research and Catholic Studies at Catholic 

University, Mr. Chen is a senior distinguished fellow in human 

rights at the Witherspoon Institute, and also advisor to the Lantos 

Foundation for Human Rights and Justice. 

This Commission, parenthetically, had four hearings on his behalf during that crisis. We are so glad he is free today. 

We will then hear from Pastor Bob Fu who was a leader in the 

1989 democracy movement in Tiananmen Square and later became 

a house church pastor. In 1996, authorities arrested and imprisoned Pastor Fu and his wife for their work. 

After their release, they escaped to the United States, and in 

2002, he founded ChinaAid Association. ChinaAid monitors and reports on religious freedom in China and provides a forum for discussions among experts in religion, law, and human rights. 

Pastor Fu is frequently interviewed by media outlets around the 

world, has been before the European Parliament and the United 

Nations, and has been a particularly effective advisor to me and 

others, especially during Chen Guangeheng’s crisis, but also on religious freedom. When Frank Wolf and I made our way on one of 

many trips to China, right before the Olympics in this case, we 

were in constant contact with Bob Fu as to which house pastors we 

might be able to meet with. So again, I want to thank him for his 

counsel and insight then. 

Then we will hear from Wei Jingsheng, a longtime leader of the 

opposition against the Chinese Government dictatorship. He was 

sentenced to jail twice for a total of more than 18 years due to his 

democracy activism, including a groundbreaking and well-publicized essay he wrote in 1978, ‘‘The Fifth Modernization: Democracy.’’ 

After his exile to the United States in 1997—and I remember 

meeting him in Beijing when he was let out—one time, he was 

such a high-value political prisoner that the Chinese dictatorship 

thought that if they let out one man to get the Olympics for Beijing—this was the one that was held later on, this would have been 

Olympics 2000—they let Wei Jingsheng out. Then when the Olympics did not go their way, they rearrested him and tortured him. 

He is an incredible, incredible man, president of both the Wei 

Jingsheng Foundation and the Asia Democracy Alliance. I remember meeting with him during that short respite when he was out 

of prison in Beijing, and he told me—and I tell everybody that I 

can ever meet with, particularly on this Commission, that one of 

his pieces of advice to us was that when you kowtow, when you 

8 

placate, and treat with weakness the dictatorship in China, they 

beat the prisoners more. But when you are predictable, and tough, 

and transparent, and lay down clearly what you want to accomplish as a U.S. Government or Western power, they then respond 

and they beat the prisoners less. 

We will then hear from Rebiya Kadeer who is a prominent 

human rights advocate and leader of the Uyghur people. She is the 

mother of 11 children. She spent six years in a Chinese prison for 

standing up to the authoritarian Chinese Government. 

Before her arrest in 1999, she was a well-known Uyghur businesswoman. Ms. Kadeer has been actively campaigning for human 

rights for the Uyghur people since her release from prison in 2005. 

She has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize several times. 

Despite Chinese Government efforts to discredit her, Rebiya 

Kadeer remains a pro-democracy Uyghur leader and heads the 

World Uyghur Congress, which represents the collective interest of 

Uyghurs around the world. 

We will then hear from Danielle Wang, who was born in Beijing. 

Danielle Wang began practicing the exercise of meditation known 

as Falun Gong in her youth with her father, Wang Zhiwen. 

In 1998, she moved to America for her studies. The following 

year, the Chinese Communist Party began its persecution of the 

Falun Gong practitioners. This put her father in prison and set her 

on a path for calling for help in the hopes of rescuing him for the 

next 17 years. He was released in 2014, but was denied exit from 

China when Danielle and her husband attempted to bring him to 

the United States in August 2016. 

A very, very incredible group of leaders. I would like to now turn 

to Mr. Tsering to begin the testimony. 

STATEMENT OF PENPA TSERING, REPRESENTATIVE OF HIS 

HOLINESS THE DALAI LAMA, OFFICE OF TIBET, WASHINGTON, DC 

Mr. TSERING. Thank you Chairman Smith, Senator Rubio, and 

Congressman Hultgren for providing me this opportunity. This is 

my first testimony before the Commission after assuming the responsibility of the Representative of His Holiness the Dalai Lama 

and the Central Tibetan Administration. 

I think this testimony is very timely because it is just before the 

International Human Rights Day, and also when you are going 

through a transition to a new administration at the helm of affairs 

in your country. 

Following the results of your presidential election, His Holiness 

the Dalai Lama has written both to President-elect Donald Trump 

and to Secretary Clinton and has expressed his wish to meet them. 

I am sure the President-elect and Secretary Clinton will meet with 

His Holiness as American presidents have done in the past. 

His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan people are very 

concerned about the well-being of the Nobel Laureate, Liu Xiaobo, 

and demand his immediate release from incarceration. 

As I present the case of Tibet before you, we Tibetans stand with 

Chinese, Uyghur, and Falun Gong friends who are represented 

here and also our Southern Mongolian friends who are, unfortuVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:27 Mar 16, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00012 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 U:\DOCS\23081 DIEDRE
9 

nately, not represented here. We all suffer the same fate under the 

repressive Communist Government of the People’s Republic of China. 

While completely endorsing the findings and recommendations of 

the 2016 Annual Report of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, I wish to briefly touch on the following points. 

Religious freedom. Having to seek the PRC Government’s approval for recognition of reincarnated Lamas is the ultimate political tool to undermine existing Buddhist religious practices. Just as 

is the case of the Chinese appointed Panchen Lama, and even 

though the present Dalai Lama has not been included in the list 

of so-called living Buddhas, the Communist government wants to 

be responsible for the reincarnation of the 14th Dalai Lama and 

they said it is an important issue concerning sovereignty and security of the nation. 

There are many cases, but the ongoing destruction of Larung 

Gar, the biggest center of Buddhists learnings, not only for Tibetans, but also to scores of Chinese and repatriation of thousands of 

monks and nuns from the center forced to pledge never, ever to return is a case in point as to how China views religious freedom in 

Tibet. 

Freedom of movement. Apart from the enormous restrictions on 

Tibetans to move from one part of Tibet to another, particularly 

into or out of Tibetan autonomous regions, Tibetans face tightening 

control to travel abroad. Tibetans who have obtained passports are 

being recalled. Tibetans who are already in India to receive the 

Kalachakra teachings from His Holiness the Dalai Lama in January 2017, have been ordered to return home before the end of December or face consequences. This includes denial of visas to Tibetan Americans to travel to Tibet. 

The use of counterterrorism as a tool to control Tibetans and 

branding allegiance to the Dalai Lama as separatists are the four 

things I want to outline. 

The diplomatic and political actions that have worked in the 

past: 

Number 1. Presidential meeting with His Holiness the Dalai 

Lama. 

Number 2. Appointment and the role of Special Coordinator for 

Tibet. 

Number 3. Hearings and reports of the Commissions. 

Number 4. Financial aid. 

Number 5. Bills and resolutions. 

Number 6. Congressional and State Department visits to Tibet 

and Dharamsala. 

Suggestions to the new Administration and the Congress: 

Number 1. As an integral part of U.S. policy on China, the 

United States should play a pivotal role in highlighting the 

human rights situation in China, Tibet, Xinjiang, and Southern Mongolia. 

Number 2. The United States should advocate for the release 

of all political prisoners, including the Panchen Lama and Liu 

Xiaobo. 

10 

Number 3. The new Administration should implement U.S.-Tibetan Policy Act of 2002, including early appointment of a senior level State Department Special Coordinator for Tibet. 

Number 4. The Administration should impress on China the 

need to establish a U.S. Consulate in Lhasa. 

Number 5. Preserve and increase economic, educational, and 

humanitarian funding for Tibet, including radio broadcasts. 

Number 6. The incoming president should meet with His Holiness the Dalai Lama at the earliest opportunity in keeping 

with precedence. 

Number 7. The Administration should monitor misuse of 

counterterrorism in Tibet. 

Number 8. The Administration and the Congress should urge 

the Chinese Government to resume dialogue with the representative of His Holiness the Dalai Lama without preconditions. 

Number 9. The Administration and the Congress should emphasize to the Chinese leaders the need to teach in the Tibetan 

language. 

Number 10. The Administration and the Congress should raise 

discriminatory policies of the PRC toward Tibetans in matters 

relating to religious freedom and freedom of movement. 

Number 11. The Congress should support and adopt the Reciprocal Access to Tibet Bill to promote access to U.S. officials, 

journalists, and citizens into Tibet, Uyghur, and other minority 

nationalities. 

Number 12. The Congress should organize more bipartisan, bicameral visits to Tibet and Dharamsala. 

Thank you Chairman, Representative Chris Smith and Cochair, 

Senator Marco Rubio for the opportunity. 

Chairman SMITH. Mr. Speaker, thank you so very much for your 

testimony and for your very specific recommendations, because all 

of this will be given to the next Administration. So thank you. This 

is a very important set of recommendations you have made. 

Dr. Yang? 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Tsering appears in the appendix.] 

STATEMENT OF YANG JIANLI, INITIATIVES FOR CHINA/ 

CITIZEN POWER FOR CHINA 

Mr. YANG. Mr. Chairman, I want to first thank you for your leadership and your moral courage and—in speaking out on human 

rights—so consistently and persistently, even when it is not always 

easy or convenient to do so. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman. 

By any standard, America’s China policy has been a failure for 

the past three decades. The primary cause of the failure has been 

a fundamental misunderstanding of China’s strategic objective, 

along with an inability on the part of the United States to respond 

to it with strategic and moral clarity. 

Regime security is the number one concern for China’s Communist Party. It wants to maintain a permanent rule in China, replace Western capitalism with socialism with Chinese characteristics and substitute its so-called civilization in the place of democracy. 

11 

The Trump Administration must take a different approach in 

dealing with the Chinese regime by returning to American values 

by focusing the foreign policy, then by striking directly at the vulnerable spots of the regime to enable a democratic transition. A 

democratic China will avoid inevitable conflict with the United 

States and assure a long-lasting peace in the region and in the 

world. 

I recommend the following specific actions for the next administration. 

Number 1. Use the U.S. market as leverage and threaten to 

withdraw China’s permanent trade status unless serious improvements are made in the areas of human rights, political 

reform, and demilitarization of the South and East China Seas. 

Link continued progress on all three to all future relations, including trade. Deny foreign tax credits to companies that invest in the localities with gross human rights violations, and 

other similar measures to address the unfairness of one-way 

free trade that is resulting in China’s huge trade surplus of $3 

trillion with a resulting loss of millions of American jobs—all 

of which will not only bring back jobs from China, but allow 

the United States to take the moral high ground. 

Number 2. Use Taiwan and Hong Kong as leverage. Modify the 

Taiwan Relations Act and the six assurances to reflect a full 

democratic country status and affirm its legitimacy by allowing 

Taiwan to be a normal member of the international community. Support Hong Kong’s struggle for universal suffrage by 

making it a major bilateral issue with China. 

Number 3. Use Japan as leverage. Encourage Japan to take 

the lead in promoting democracy in the Asia Pacific and return 

it to a normal status of a great power. 

Number 4. Use the Chinese regime’s lack of legitimacy and 

moral standing as leverage, engaged with the democratic forces 

in China, the Chinese, Tibetans, Uyghurs, Falun Gong Practitioners, Christians, representative of this panel as a new level 

by passing the China Democracy Act to ensure all U.S. Government agencies are resolute and consistent in advancing a democracy agenda when engaging with China. 

And by passing China’s Defense of Human Rights and Civil Society Act, a China-specific Magnitsky-like legislation that 

would ban travel and freeze the assets of Chinese human 

rights abusers. And pass the act to rename the plaza in front 

of the Chinese Embassy after imprisoned Nobel Laureate Dr. 

Liu Xiaobo. 

Number 5. Use the UN human rights mechanism as leverage 

because both the Chinese Government and its people regard 

the United Nations as a legitimate world-governing authority, 

and the Chinese Government has taken the United Nations as 

the stage on which it seeks to compete with the United States 

to build a bi-polar world order in its own way. The Trump Administration must strengthen the U.S. leadership role in forming an alliance of democracies to collectively confront China on 

human rights issues. 

Thank you. 

12 

Chairman SMITH. Dr. Yang, thank you very much for your testimony and recommendations. As usual, you have been a great leader. 

I would now like to ask Mr. Chen Guangcheng to present his testimony. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Yang appears in the appendix.] 

STATEMENT OF CHEN GUANGCHENG, CHINESE LEGAL ADVOCATE; DISTINGUISHED VISITING FELLOW, INSTITUTE FOR 

POLICY RESEARCH AND CATHOLIC STUDIES, CATHOLIC UNIVERSITY OF AMERICA 

Mr. CHEN. Thank you. Greetings to the Chair people, to all the 

human rights Congressional representatives. Ladies and gentlemen, hello. 

In China, people know me as the ‘‘barefoot lawyer.’’ Despite having no formal training as a lawyer, I did the work of a lawyer, 

bringing officials to court and asking that the party respect China’s 

own Constitution and laws. As a result, I endured seven years of 

kidnappings, house arrest, secret detention, and imprisonment. 

After I was let out of prison, my family and I were put under illegal house arrest and conditions even worse than prison, including 

torture, until I finally escaped. 

My own experience tells me that one should not hold out any 

hope in the Communist Party. This is a fascist regime that destroys the essential goodness of humanity. 

The Communist Party has been persecuting its own people for 

years. 

Last year it began the infamous 709 Crackdown, persecuting 

human rights defenders and lawyers, torturing people and implicating family members by association. Some attorneys and activists 

in detention have been forced to make confessions of guilt in the 

state-controlled media, and have subsequently been sentenced to 

prison. 

But some, like Li Heping, Li Chunfu, Wang Quanzhang, and Xie 

Yang, and other attorneys refuse to admit guilt, and hence continue to be held illegally. Two weeks ago, Attorney Xie Yang was 

tortured by prison police, and Attorney Jiang Tianyong has been 

disappeared. Activists Huang Qi and Liu Feiyue have been taken 

by public security. Countless netizens have been blocked online, 

and their speech censored. 

Under Party control, the Chinese people have long lived in a 

state of suffering and fear. It should be clear that Communist authoritarian control is the enemy of humanity. We must put a stop 

to its destruction of humanity’s civilized values. 

On the other hand, America is a great nation that truly stands 

out in its commitment to universal values. There is simply no way 

to compare the United States and China on this front. Hence, 

America must be a model for human rights, and a leader in the 

global push to democracy. The American system has the strongest 

immunity against corruption, and the greatest capability for correcting its mistakes. 

Democracy, freedom, and human rights are America’s founding 

principles. After many injurious years of appeasement and self-beVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:27 Mar 16, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00016 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 U:\DOCS\23081 DIEDRE
13 

littling, the time has come for the United States to reinvigorate its 

core values and to protect universal human rights. 

I would like to make the following recommendations to the incoming Administration and Congress regarding human rights: 

Number 1. Correct the mistaken policy of separating trade 

from human rights. Human rights are like clean water, clean 

food, and clean air—they are an indispensable part of life, and 

cannot be separated from anything we do. 

The essence of the policy of separating trade and human rights 

is to focus solely on making money, without care to justice or ethics. In addition, the reality is that a country with strong human 

rights and rule of law is a better business partner for American 

companies. 

Number 2. In its position as a global leader, the United States 

should express a position of leader support for the universal 

values of freedom, democracy, and human rights. 

When a dictatorial regime uses force to suppress its people, the 

United States should act decisively to stop it. In addition, we 

should reconsider NATO’s function, to transform NATO from a 

hedgehog quill to a heroic sword. 

Number 3. Prevent human rights abusing officials from entering the United States. Investigate and where illegality is 

found, freeze the U.S. assets of Communist Party officials. 

Number 4. Prevent the Communist Party from infiltrating U.S. 

academia, media, and other institutions. 

Number 5. Demand that the Chinese Communist Party respect 

the UN International Treaty on Human Rights. Change the 

policy of speaking with the CCP [Chinese Communist Party] 

on issues of human rights behind closed doors, otherwise we 

will continue the useless conversations we have now. 

Number 6. Ensure reciprocity of visas for journalists, and prevent the CCP from using visas to punish journalists who expose the crimes of the party. 

Number 7. Invest in tools to get past Internet blocking mechanisms, to assist those who seek freedom in getting past the 

Great Firewall [Internet Berlin Wall]. Establish direct communication with the Chinese people, instead of just with the 

party. 

Number 8. Establish international, collaborative mechanisms 

to prevent the Chinese Communist Party from persecuting its 

own people internally, and from breaking down international 

procedures externally. 

Great nations have great responsibility. In Chinese there is an 

ancient saying: ‘‘Bring out the best and eliminate the worst under 

heaven.’’ This should be the principle to follow. 

As long as we join together, we can banish dictatorships, and 

make the world a better place. 

Thank you. 

Chairman SMITH. Mr. Chen, thank you very much for your eloquent statement. I would note that we have had—I have chaired 

61 Congressional hearings on human rights in China. One was 

about you, four were with you when you spoke Chinese, and this 

14 

is the first time you have presented your testimony in English. 

[Laughter.] 

So, I thank you for that. 

Mr. CHEN. Thank you. 

Chairman SMITH. Bob Fu, our next speaker, was the one who 

translated when you called in from your hospital bed in Beijing and 

got you on the phone through some mysterious way I will never understand, but I would like to now yield to Pastor Bob Fu for his 

testimony. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Chen appears in the appendix.] 

STATEMENT OF BOB FU, FOUNDER AND PRESIDENT, 

CHINAAID ASSOCIATION 

Mr. FU. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, thank you Congressman 

Hultgren for your leadership, too. Thank you Cochairman Rubio for 

the leadership. 

Mr. Chairman, your persistency, perseverance, and constant attention on the human rights, religious freedom, and rule of law 

globally, including my motherland, China, has, I think, already 

made a lot of differences. Sometimes, we have some setbacks, but 

I do think ultimately we will see a free and democratic, constitutional China. 

As my other distinguished friends and witnesses have already 

said, we can pretty clearly see that today’s China, the human 

rights situation, and the situation on religious freedom and rule of 

law should be recognized as the worst, perhaps, since the Cultural 

Revolution. 

Just to give you two latest illustrations, as my friend, Chen 

Guangcheng, just mentioned, just barely 16 days ago a friend, 

prominent human rights lawyer Jiang Tianyong, went missing and 

presumably was kidnapped based on his past experiences, for visiting a family member of another imprisoned human rights lawyer, 

Xie Yang. 

Mr. Jiang Tianyong—remember in 2009, when I organized a rule 

of law delegation with a group of human rights lawyers to the U.S. 

Congress, and it was you, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Wolf, who actually organized two congressional hearings. I still remember when 

we asked those fellow human rights lawyers and defenders who 

were willing to really testify for two hearings: one on the rule of 

law in China; one on the forced abortion and forced sterilization in 

China. 

Attorney Jiang Tianyong attended and testified twice. That really takes courage to do that. Today is the 16th day he is missing. 

So I hope you could really exercise your leadership and continue 

to push for his freedom. I want to recognize that Mr. Jiang 

Tianyong’s wife, Ms. Jin Bianling—I invited her to be here today, 

really to witness this, and she is here today behind me. Ms. Jin 

Bianling is here. 

So we just visited the State Department and also the Minority 

Leader, Nancy Pelosi. We hope that Mr. Jiang Tianyong’s whereabouts could be, at least, revealed, if not freed. But he has committed nothing wrong, just the visiting of fellow family members of 

human rights lawyers. 

15 

Another example—on November 29, just barely a week ago, another human rights and democracy leader, Mr. Peng Ming. He was 

suddenly declared dead by the prison authority after he was kidnapped from Burma as an American refugee and permanent resident and was sentenced to life in prison. So, for the last 12 years, 

he has been suffering imprisonment in China, and suddenly he was 

declared dead. 

The government even confiscated his death certificate. His three 

children, who are all American citizens; several of them actually 

testified and met with you, like Lisa Peng, and they live in Cleveland, Ohio. They want to visit Peng Ming’s funeral; and to bring 

his ashes back and his belongings. Yet, the day before yesterday, 

the Chinese Embassy and Consulate rejected their visa application 

even to visit their dead father. 

So these are just the latest examples to show that really the situation is becoming very worrisome. I think it is time to have a major 

paradigm shift in the whole approach to the China policy in the 

next administration. The so-called laid on the back, or behind, or 

acquired diplomacy is nothing but a real miserable failure. 

Here are just a few of my recommendations. Besides the recommendations, I really agree with the previous speakers on the— 

I think to help pass the global Magnitsky Act, to hold those human 

rights and religious freedom abusers and the corrupted officials accountable. 

Another one I agree with is to really develop and push down the 

21st century Berlin Wall, the Internet firewall. The other four, I 

would just very briefly mention that I want to encourage the 

Trump Administration officials and President-elect Trump to really—to not only raise these human rights abuse cases behind closed 

doors, but really, more importantly, to raise them publicly. 

Second, I think it is time to use a multifaceted approach on 

human rights and religious freedom. The so-called annual Human 

Rights Dialogue is just nothing but a waste of time and taxpayers’ 

money and should be abolished. I think human rights should be on 

the center and front. Overall, our strategy, no matter business, economic policy, strategic dialogue, this should be on the frontline. 

Third, I encourage the incoming Trump Administration to adopt 

a concerted, internationally coordinated effort by working jointly 

with our allies in Europe and other regions. I think the release of 

imprisoned lawyer Zhang Kai and Pastor Wen Xiaowu were good 

examples—showing a concerted, coordinated effort globally could 

produce real fruit. 

Fourth and finally, I think to really—this is important that the 

United States should unequivocally condemn the Chinese brutal 

violation of international laws by overstepping their own nation’s 

boundaries to kidnap and detain citizens, I think, as Chairman 

Smith just mentioned in his opening remarks. The dissidents, like 

Jiang Yefei and Dong Guangping—they were already under 

UNHCR [UN High Commissioner for Refugees] protection, and the 

Canadian Government already put them on the resettlement list. 

Yet, the Chinese Government—under pressure, the government expatriated them and paraded them on TV, so-called confessing their 

crimes. Now, we do not know where they are being held and they 

have not been tried for over a year. 

16 

Of course, we have all known about the treatment of the Hong 

Kong—the Causeway Bay bookstore owners. I am so glad that 

today one of the managers from that bookstore flew from Hong 

Kong yesterday to come over to tell the stories. He was the only 

witness, Mr. Hu Zhiwei. He is 75 years’ old and the author of 120 

books. He witnessed how the bookstore owner, Mr. Lee Bo, was 

kidnapped by nine mafia-like men, by the Chinese military. They 

also confiscated over 250,000 copies of the books and secretly transported them back to China and destroyed them into pieces. 

The value of monetary loss is over 30 million Hong Kong dollars. 

I hope our congressional leaders could shake hands with him, encourage him afterward and our media friends can continue to interview him. 

He is the only witness, and today is his first time he showed 

himself with courage. Even in Hong Kong, he was being photographed by the Chinese special agents. When he reported it to the 

Hong Kong police, that special agent was taken to the police station. An hour later, that agent was released and the Hong Kong 

police said, ‘‘No, we cannot deal with a higher authority from Beijing.’’ 

So that is the situation in China today. So thank you very much 

for your patience. 

Chairman SMITH. Pastor Fu, thank you very much. 

I just want to point out we have been joined by Ranking Member 

Walz. Would you like to—— 

Representative WALZ. No. I will wait. 

Chairman SMITH. Okay. Thank you, and thank you for your leadership. 

I do want to note that the selection as to the order of the panel 

is completely arbitrary. This is a panel of extraordinary men and 

women, heroes, one and all. Again, I want to thank you all for— 

seven members on a panel is quite large, but you have made the 

difference and will make a difference going forward. 

Our next witness will be Wei Jingsheng. Again, a man who spent 

18 years suffering cruelty that is just beyond the pale. And I would 

like to yield to him. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Fu appears in the appendix.] 

STATEMENT OF WEI JINGSHENG, CHAIRMAN, OVERSEAS 

CHINESE DEMOCRACY COALITION 

Mr. WEI. [With the aid of a translator.] I think during the Trump 

Administration the trade relationship with China will be a major 

policy he has to force China to improve its human rights conditions, and to increase its open market. I think it will be a very important policy. I think in this regard, CECC could be able to have 

a very important function. 

So to save time, I will let my English be read by my assistant. 

When Donald Trump becomes President of the United States, he 

is planning to abolish the TPP [Trans-Pacific Partnership] and to 

begin a trade war with China in order to save the U.S. economy. 

Some people say that this is a disaster. I would say this is the right 

way that should have started even earlier. 

The reality after 16 years well explains my position—granting 

China permanent most-favored-nation status, that is a permanent 

17 

normal trade relationship, was a huge mistake. It did not promote 

the development of the U.S. economy, but was a blood transfusion 

from the United States to the Chinese economy. It gave China the 

opportunity to engage in a trade war with the United States. 

The reason is as follows. The so-called free trade, refers to a unified law based on the domestic market, thus allowing the free 

trade. Such a free trade can be carried out normally between countries with a similar legal system. There cannot be normal free 

trade between countries with completely different legal systems. 

For example, after trade with China liberated, there were two 

main problems: one was cheap labor; one was its uncertain laws 

that always change. 

Since Chinese law does not guarantee human rights, it is able to 

keep labor prices at a very low level. This has led to the relocation 

of the U.S. companies to foreign countries, while it also allows Chinese goods to enter the U.S. market with low prices, resulting in 

unfair competition. It is an important cause of unemployment in 

the United States. 

China’s precarious legal system creates serious non-tariff barriers. Any local government can develop their own laws and regulations, without the need to implement the signed treaties and agreements between the Chinese central government and the foreign 

countries. So they can actually close their targeted import market. 

Coupled with the manipulation of the currency by the Chinese 

central government, those actions increased the exports and created a huge trade surplus for China. This is an important reason 

causing the economic recession in the United States. 

Some people say, for the United States, fighting a trade war with 

China will end in defeat, at least a lose-lose result. I think such 

statements are to confuse the U.S. policymakers. I think the 

United States will win this trade war, while China can only succumb to the rules developed by the United States, otherwise it will 

accelerate the collapse of the Chinese Communist regime. 

My reasons are as follows. First, for the majority of the goods are 

in the buyers’ market. The United States holds the markets, thus 

it has the power to develop rules, instead of forcing itself to comply 

with that so-called global free trade rule that cannot be enforced. 

The United States can formulate its own fair trade rules, to replace 

the invalid so-called free trade rules. 

Second, the Chinese domestic market is narrow and cannot afford the disaster of losing the U.S. market. So China can only compromise on the rules thus to protect part of the market share. 

Third, in the past, due to over-expansion of export production of 

shoddy goods, the quality of Chinese enterprises is very poor. In 

order to adapt to a fair market in the competition, Chinese companies must quickly upgrade. Therefore, there will be great demand 

for technology and services from the United States to open up the 

import market in the United States. This will help expand the U.S. 

exports and reduce its trade deficit with China. 

Fourth, after improving human rights in China, the income of 

the Chinese working class will increase, therefore the domestic consumer market will expand. This expansion would benefit the U.S. 

exporters after fair trade, therefore, reducing the U.S. trade deficit 

and even eliminating it. 

18 

So I think that the United States will win the trade war, and in 

the long run will also be beneficial to the economic normalization 

in China. China must accept and should accept it. 

Thank you. 

Chairman SMITH. Mr. Wei, thank you so very much for your 

leadership and for your testimony today, recommendations. 

I would like to now yield to Ms. Rebiya Kadeer. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Wei appears in the appendix.] 

STATEMENT OF REBIYA KADEER, PRESIDENT, WORLD 

UYGHUR CONGRESS 

Ms. KADEER. [With the aid of a translator.] Thank you. Chairman Smith and Cochairman Marco Rubio, and respected Members 

of the Commission, I would like to thank you for holding this timely and important hearing, and thank you for inviting me to testify. 

I also thank all the people who attended. 

So I am trying to learn English so I cannot read my statement. 

I have prepared a statement. So I would like to ask my assistant 

to read my written statement. 

Since my release from a Chinese prison in 2005, I have reported 

to the Commission the continuing human rights violations targeting the Uyghur people. As the Commission has noted in its annual reports, political freedoms in East Turkestan are among the 

most limited in China. The right to association and assembly is 

prohibited and freedom of speech is punished severely, as the case 

of imprisoned Uyghur academic Ilham Tohti illustrates. Economic 

discrimination, erosion of language rights and religious restrictions 

add to the already depressing condition of Uyghur human rights. 

President Xi Jinping has attempted to codify these violations in 

a series of repressive laws, such as the ones on counter-terror and 

cybersecurity. Implementation measures of the counter-terror law 

at the regional level in East Turkestan are a clear indicator of who 

China intends to target with these draconian measures. 

Nevertheless, China believes it should go further with its suppression. Arbitrary detentions, forced disappearances, and 

extrajudicial killings continue. 

Recent media reports indicate that the Chinese Government has 

implemented a policy to confiscate passports in East Turkestan to 

limit the international movement of Uyghurs. This is the formalization of a policy that Uyghur human rights groups have documented since 2006. 

Islam is a cornerstone of the Uyghur identity. China has adopted 

a series of religious laws at the national and regional level that 

curb Uyghur rights to freedom of worship. Private religious education has been targeted for several years under these measures. 

However, this year Chinese authorities adopted rules to report parents who encourage their children to undertake religious activities. 

During the George W. Bush and Barack Obama Administrations 

my colleagues and I have worked hard to bring Uyghur issues to 

the attention of the U.S. political community. Our organizations 

regularly brief State Department officials and legislators at the 

U.S. Congress. We have managed to mainstream the Uyghur issue 

into U.S. Government reporting on human rights. 

19 

China’s heavy-handed policies toward Uyghurs are creating instability and desperation among the Uyghur people. These policies 

have become self-fulfilling in some respects, as some Uyghurs have 

become radicalized in their effort to oppose China’s oppression. 

The United States should be concerned about these developments 

as it is in the Nation’s interest to support the democratic aspirations of the overwhelming majority of the Uyghurs. Stability in 

East Turkestan, China, and the Central and East Asian regions offers the opportunity to spread American values such as freedom 

and human rights. 

The Administration of President-elect Donald Trump should continue support for the Uyghur struggle for human rights and democracy and step up public concern over rights conditions in East 

Turkestan with Chinese officials. Any sign that the United States 

is ready to relinquish its commitment to raising human rights concerns in favor of achieving policy gains elsewhere will be a victory 

for the Chinese regime. 

Furthermore, the incoming administration should exercise extreme skepticism regarding China’s narrative that increased militarization and securitization in East Turkestan are justified in 

fighting radical Islam. The repression that accompanies security 

measures enables China to keep firm control of the region and suppress legitimate Uyghur claims for greater political, economic, social, and cultural freedoms. 

The Trump Administration should understand the situation in 

East Turkestan in similar terms to Tibet. It is a struggle for cultural survival in the face of formidable assimilative actions by the 

Chinese state. 

Let us be clear. Pressure works. My presence here today is testament to the success of pressuring Chinese officials. My colleagues 

and I will continue to put forward the Uyghur case to the international community. It is the responsibility of concerned governments to take this case directly to China and urge reform. 

The Uyghur people greatly appreciate the United States’ support 

of our plight. However, we ask the incoming administration to publicly raise the Uyghur issue with China. 

In conclusion, I offer these recommendations to the Trump Administration: 

First, prioritize Uyghur issues, especially during the human 

rights dialogue and the strategic and economic dialogue with 

China. 

Urge China to allow foreign diplomats and journalists unrestricted access to East Turkestan and Tibet to independently document the conditions in the regions. 

Call on China to free Ilham Tohti, Li Xiaobo, and all Uyghur, 

Chinese, and Tibetan political prisoners. 

Ask China to change its repressive policies, which are the root 

cause of all bloody incidents in the Uyghur region. 

Meet Uyghur, Chinese, and Tibetan leaders and human rights 

activists at the White House. 

Create a special coordinator office at the State Department for 

the Uyghurs. 

Finally, ask the Chinese Government to allow my children to 

leave China. 

20 

Thank you. 

Chairman SMITH. Thank you so very much, Ms. Kadeer. 

I would like to now go to our final witness and thank her for 

being here. Xiaodan Wang, thank you for speaking out so faithfully 

on behalf of your dad, especially. The floor is yours. Please? 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Kadeer appears in the appendix.] 

STATEMENT OF XIAODAN WANG (DANIELLE WANG), FALUN 

GONG PRACTITIONER AND DAUGHTER OF FORMER POLITICAL PRISONER WANG ZHIWEN 

Ms. WANG. Hello everyone. First, I would like to thank the Honorable Representative Smith and Senator Rubio and other honorable Members of the Commission for having me as part of this important hearing. 

I am the daughter of Zhiwen Wang, a loving father and kind 

spirit who has endured the persecution of Falun Dafa since it started on July 20, 1999. 

My husband and I returned from China this year empty-handed, 

shocked, and heartbroken after experiencing the persecution firsthand as U.S. citizens. My story is one of the millions, but I hope 

it will shed some light on why the U.S. Government’s continued 

role is so critical in ending this atrocity. 

In 17 years, there has never been a moment of relief from constant worry about my father’s safety. He was arrested and sentenced in December 1999 because he practiced Falun Dafa. 

Over the next 15 years, he suffered tremendously; lost his teeth, 

and had his collar bone broken, and even suffered a stroke in prison one month before his release. Then he was sent to a brainwashing camp in a final attempt to break his spirit in October 

2014. 

When he made it back home, he was subject to surveillance by 

police video cameras and neighborhood watch. Even today, he has 

four agents outside of his front door 24/7. 

After my father received his passport in January 2016, my husband and I prepared his immigration and traveled to China in 

July. This should have been a straightforward trip, but what we 

encountered was just a small taste of the persecution my father 

had endured for 17 years. 

We were followed by an undercover agent and harassed by police. 

They tried to intimidate us and get under our skin. They taunted 

us and abused their power, and ultimately, they slammed the door 

in our face as we attempted to take the last step to freedom. 

We experienced firsthand the discrimination and injustice Falun 

Dafa practitioners face every day. Regardless of what the Chinese 

law states, practitioners are treated as criminals, purely for their 

existence. 

The night before our flight home, a group of 30 police and agents 

showed up in our place in Guangzhou trying to force their way in. 

They shouted in my face and tried to scare us. 

Although they relented eventually, they stationed spies outside of 

our place to monitor us. We had no choice but to continue on with 

no one to turn to and no one to protect us. 

21 

We left the next morning and drove an hour and a half south of 

Guangzhou to the city of Dongguan only to be greeted by spies 

waiting for us at the ferry terminal. 

In the end, we could not even make it through Customs. They 

canceled his passport by cutting it. 

To think all of the years of struggle, sleepless nights, and thousands of miles traveled all ended with a pair of scissors is unbelievable. It is still hard for me to bear that I had to leave my father 

behind in China to face this cruel environment alone. If my father 

and I did not practice Falun Dafa, I may have broken down completely right there. 

I know that not all in China are in support of this persecution. 

It is the former Chinese Communist Party leader, Jiang Zemin, behind it. Zeng Qinghong, Jiang Zemin’s right hand, is also in power 

in south China and played an important role in denying my father’s departure to America. 

In addition, the Chinese regime continues its efforts to spread 

the persecution via propaganda, misinformation, and infiltration. 

I ask the new administration, and all officials interacting with 

their Chinese counterparts to let no opportunity pass by without 

pushing them on the persecution on Falun Dafa, and the monstrous practice of organ harvesting. 

It is crucial that the United States remain true to the role of 

human rights champion in the world and bring human rights to 

the center stage in dealing with China. 

And finally, I urgently request that the new administration, Department of State, Congress, and all relevant departments help me 

bring my father home for medical attention so we can finally have 

our happy ending and a new beginning. 

I want to conclude with my dad’s thanks. He said, he would like 

to tell the U.S. Government it actually put his heart at ease when 

he was in jail because he knew that I was studying in the United 

States. Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Ms. Wang appears in the appendix.] 

Chairman SMITH. Thank you so very much for your testimony. 

The love of a daughter for her father is just truly inspiring. 

Just a couple of things I will mention, ask you a few questions, 

and yield to my good friend, Mr. Walz. 

Pastor Fu, you mentioned the case of Jiang Tianyong who has 

gone missing. For the record, I would ask unanimous consent that 

we include this in the record. 

Marco Rubio and I sent a letter to the Ambassador of China to 

the United States on December 7, expressing our deepest concern 

regarding the recent disappearances of three Chinese citizens, 

Jiang Tianyong, Liu Feiyue, and Huang Qi and we are hoping for 

an answer, and we will follow it up with the Embassy to try to get 

to the bottom of it, and to advocate for them. But, thank you for 

bringing attention to this. 

You did make the point, Pastor Fu, that the human rights situation is the worst in China since the Cultural Revolution. That is 

the best-kept secret in Washington and in capitals all around the 

world, as we continue what Chen Guangcheng said in his testimony is an attitude of appeasement toward China that manifests 

22 

itself all over the United Nations, among nations, and certainly in 

capitals around the world, including Washington. 

So I want to thank you for being bold enough to say exactly— 

we perhaps, have naive misconceptions about the Chinese dictatorship under Xi Jinping, but as our report this year clearly chronicles, when you look at all of the changes, the new laws, draft laws, 

and the like that have gone into effect, whether it be on cybersecurity, whether it be on NGOs, and the tightening of the noose 

around NGOs, which is really a—harbinger of a crackdown, what 

is happening with regard to religion of all kinds, including the officially recognized churches like the Patriotic or Three Self movement which are being increasingly crushed. The underground is already crushed. 

It is time for a significant reappraisal, which you all have helped 

provide to the Commission, which we will convey to policymakers 

and also enlighten ourselves. 

There are things that could be done immediately by the President-elect when he becomes president. It was not done during 

President Obama. 

On visas, I wrote the law in 2000, The Admiral Nance, Meg 

Donovan International Foreign Relations Authorization Act of 

2000, which is a permanent law that says anybody who was 

complicit with the barbaric one-child—now, maybe, two-child—per 

couple policy, but the enforcement mechanisms of coercion remain 

unabated, can be precluded from issuance of a visa by the United 

States. It is reason for denial. It has not been implemented in the 

16 years that it has been in effect since 2000. 

The Global Magnitsky Act is in route to becoming law. It has 

passed as part of the NDAA [National Defense Authorization Act]. 

It is in a very good form, I believe. And it can be immediately applicable to Chinese torturers and violators of human rights in our 

admonition to the administration. When that is signed the next 

steps would be to start chronicling the names, produce lists of 

human rights abusers, and then hold them to account. A visa denial is one modest, but meaningful way of doing that. So we will 

be pushing that, so thank you for raising those issues as well. 

Mr. Speaker, you mentioned the worsening of the mistreatment 

of a Tibetan Buddhist. The New York Times, ‘‘China Takes a 

Chainsaw to a Center of Tibetan Buddhism’’ by Edward Wong. You 

are talking about what has gone on in Larung Gar. 

You might want to speak to that, because I think that is a highly 

visible manifestation of the hatred with which the dictatorship 

holds for faith-filled believers, including Tibetan Buddhists, 

Uyghurs, Falun Gong, Christians—I mean, it is one thing to profess to be an atheist. You have every right to be an atheist, but you 

have absolutely no right—and certainly international law is clear 

on this—to so aggressively suppress, torture, and hurt those who 

believe in God or in a spiritual practice like Falun Gong. 

So you might want to speak to that, if you would. Any of you who 

would like to speak to the visa ban, and the fact that it should be 

teed up right now for President Trump to say, we are going to be 

serious about denying visas to those individuals who commit these 

atrocities. And also, CPC [Country of Particular Concern]—on religious issues, China has been on the CPC list on a law that was 

23 

written by former Congressman Frank Wolf, the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998. And Bush did not do much. Obama has 

done nothing with regard to sanctioning. 

As you know, there are prescribed in the International Religious 

Freedom Act some 18 specific actionable items, the least of which 

is a demarche, but then there are some very serious ones dealing 

with trade, security matters, sharing, like cultural exchanges and 

scientific exchanges that a serious administration could apply to 

say, ‘‘We are not kidding. You have got to let the dissidents go. You 

have got to end the torture.’’ 

We had a hearing in this room recently in which we talked a lot 

about the torture chair—again, another one of the best-kept secrets 

in Washington—that is routinely deployed against dissidents to try 

to break them. So, Mr. Speaker and others, if you want to speak, 

and then I will yield to Mr. Walz, and then go to Randy Hultgren. 

Mr. TSERING. Thank you, Chairman. The ongoing destruction of 

residences of monks and nuns in Larung Gar is a very serious 

problem that is facing Tibetan Buddhism today. Larung Gar—some 

estimate that there are about 20,000 monks and nuns, but nobody 

has the exact number, but I think it is beyond 10,000 which makes 

it the largest center of Buddhist learning in the world. 

Larung Gar also faced the same fate in the early 2000s, when 

some part of it was destroyed by the Chinese Government and people started coming back. In fact, if the Chinese Government wanted 

to destroy it, then why did they allow settlement of monks and 

nuns in the first place? 

So this has resulted in the present problem. Now, the destruction 

in the case of Larung Gar could be a precursor to many of things 

that could come, if it is not condemned and stopped, then I am sure 

the Chinese Government will take this matter to other monasteries. There are already indications that Yargar which is also a 

monastery linked to Larung Gar may also face the same fate. 

In the rest of Tibet, particularly, in the Tibet Autonomous Region, the restrictions of monks and nuns have come down. Those 

days when Tibet was free and independent, we used to have 7,700 

and 5,500, and 3,300 in three big monasteries in Lhasa. Monks and 

nuns could come from different parts of Tibet to learn in the capital 

Lhasa, and then go back to their respective regions to teach, 

preach. They have now brought the numbers down to 500, and still 

less in those big monasteries. 

So Larung Gar is outside of the Autonomous Region, and the 

learning of Buddhism has increased over the years, not just for Tibetans coming from different parts of Tibet, but also a lot of Han 

Chinese who have interest in studying Buddhism. In fact, Larung 

Gar is supposed to have a large number of Han Chinese, and they 

are also becoming victims of the destruction that is taking place inside Tibet. 

This one example can exemplify how the Chinese Government 

abuses religious freedom inside Tibet. We have been appealing; the 

Central Tibetan Administration in Dharamsala has released and 

you must have seen videos of monks and nuns being forced to go 

back and asked to sing and forced to dance. They were forced to 

dance and sing praises of the Communist Party after they were 

sent back to their respective region. 

24 

So certain things which are unimaginable are happening, and we 

hope the U.S. administration will express their concern on the ongoing situation. So we hope the new administration will definitely 

pay attention to this and bring it to the attention of the Chinese 

authorities that this is not acceptable to the U.S. Government. 

I think the Congress should also adopt resolutions to condemn 

these kinds of actions by the Chinese Government. 

Mr. YANG. I am thrilled. I think that every member of the 

human rights community is thrilled that the Global Magnitsky Bill 

actually was passed in the House as part of a National Defense Authorization Act. 

We cannot wait to see it signed by the President into law. After 

that becomes law, we will work closely with CECC and other Congressional organization committees, and the State Department, and 

the White House. 

With the least of these, we think we should ban their travel to 

the United States. I think this is just the beginning of the paradigm shift as my friend and colleague, Bob Fu, just said—paradigm 

shift. So I think I have been advocating—this is the second time 

for me to speak about it at a Congressional hearing—China Democracy Act. 

That is the Act that we all stated expressly that advancing 

human rights in China is in the national interest of this country, 

and to regulate every Federal agency to promote human rights in 

China while engaging with China. And also require a presidential 

report to the Congress about the progress. 

The parallel example would be recent because of Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen’s call with President-elect Donald Trump. So 

Taiwan has been in the headlines, but 37 years back, in Washington, everybody saw the Taiwan situation as inconvenient, just 

as nowadays. A lot of people present—prime ministers everywhere, 

see funding human rights issues as inconvenient. So they do not 

want to do it. 

As a policy, we can change—it is very situational. When the situation is not good, they want to change. The major mentality among 

the policymakers here 37 years ago was to abandon Taiwan altogether because the Taiwan issue had become very inconvenient. 

But a few Congressional Members insist that we have to defend 

Taiwan. We have to pass a law to regulate the President of the 

United States, every one of them have to take the responsibility as 

a duty of law to defend Taiwan. 

So 30-some years passed—then we looked back. This Act actually 

worked very well for the long-term interest of this country. But at 

that time, everybody found this inconvenient. This is just as a parallel to the human rights situation here. 

The president may find it very inconvenient, but we need the 

law. We need a China Democracy Act to be passed so that—advancing human rights in China would become a duty of law for 

every president, and for every Federal agency in this country. 

Thank you. 

Chairman SMITH. Dr. Yang, I would look forward to working 

with you on that—— 

Mr. YANG. Yes. 

25 

Chairman SMITH (continuing).—legislation. We have talked before. I think your point about U.S. policy failures, we need a different approach. U.S. policy failures need not be forever. It is time 

to change. 

Yes, Mr. Wei? 

Mr. WEI. I want to say that the CECC should play an important 

role in the future trade war with China. During this trade war, 

human rights and religious rights are a very good reason. 

The CECC should really put human rights as a very important 

target during the future trade war. One side is, it is important to 

improve human rights. The other side is, to improve human rights 

would be beneficial to open the Chinese market to U.S. companies. 

As a matter of fact, I want to remind you that back 16 years ago 

when there was a passing of this act about the normal trade relationship, it really has the condition as stipulated, CECC was really 

in the prospect to determine if this favorable trade relationship is 

suitable or not when Chinese human rights conditions are really 

bad. 

So we really should remind Donald Trump’s team that, yes, the 

CECC could have used it—to use it for this trade war, but in the 

meantime, to improve human rights conditions in China. So I think 

CECC should become a very important tool for this. 

Thank you. 

Chairman SMITH. Thank you Mr. Wei. Pastor Fu, and then 

Rebiya Kadeer. 

Mr. FU. I want to go further a little bit from what Dr. Yang 

Jianli just said. We are so happy to see the passage of the Global 

Magnitsky Act as you have been leading with your colleagues. 

I think after this passage we also need to encourage our allies 

and regional partners to use their influence through the inter-parliamental mechanism to encourage other like-minded parliaments 

or like a European Parliament to pass a similar measure so that 

those human rights, religious freedom, rule of law corrupted abusers cannot find any safe sanctuary or haven in any part of the free 

world. 

So we have been working with our partners in Taiwan. I think 

even the Taiwan Parliament had great momentum with bipartisan, 

actually tripartisan now, support to make this happen. 

Also, I want to illustrate another barring sign about religious 

freedom. As you know, earlier this year, the Chinese Communist 

regime made a proposed new regulation on religious affairs. According to this new regulation, those who were fond of so-called illegally organized religious meetings or underground training, like 

my wife and I did 20 years ago—at that time we received two 

months’ imprisonment, but, according to the newly proposed regulation, if it is passed, those leaders could be subject to up to the 

equivalent of US$33,000 fine. And of course, point for criminal 

prosecution, including those who attend overseas religious training 

or a kind of conference overseas are liable to be punished this way. 

We just finished a training conference on kind of a biblical—on 

law and the government on Hong Kong with 400 Christian leaders 

from mainland China there. This is the first time I found out the 

Chinese security agents even went to our conference and warned 

26 

the conference—some of our Hong Kong partners which speakers 

should be allowed to speak. 

The two organizers in Hong Kong were violently beaten up when 

they returned to China a couple of weeks ago. So you can see the 

aggressiveness. I think it is a time to have a new paradigm to handle and deal with this kind of worsening situation. 

Chairman SMITH. Thank you. 

Ms. Kadeer? 

Ms. KADEER. So I would like to make a comment about a section 

in the Uyghur region. It is really very similar to what is happening 

in Tibet. 

There is now new regulations introduced by the Chinese authorities. According to these new regulations, the religious worship outside of the government-designated areas would be considered an illegal religious activity. 

So according to Uyghur tradition, according to our religion, we 

can worship at home. So we can pray at home. According to this 

new regulation, worshiping at home in private will be considered 

an illegal religious activity and be punishable by the government. 

And also now, Chinese authorities encourage the children to report about their parents’ activities at home. Every week, even elementary school children are being questioned by authorities on 

what their parents have been doing at home, whether they are 

worshiping at home. 

So there are many families who are destroyed by this, you know, 

reporting because the children told the school authorities that their 

parents worshiped at home, so then their parents have been arrested by the Chinese authorities. 

And the same thing that happened in Tibet also happened in 

East Turkestan. The imams of the mosques have been forced to 

take to the streets and dance and sing praising the Communist 

Party. Cultural Revolution came back to East Turkestan, so women 

and men all get forced to take to the streets and sing songs praising their Communist Party and the Chinese Government. 

If anybody refuses to take part in these actions, they will be punished or fired from their workplaces. So there are thousands of people who are in Chinese prisons now, suffering in Chinese prisons. 

All of them have been arrested, detained because of these so-called 

illegal religious activities. 

Thank you. 

Chairman SMITH. Chen Guangcheng? 

Mr. CHEN. Mr. Chairman, I have two questions. One is before 

President Obama leaves office, we should press him to call Mr. Xi 

Jinping about the whereabouts of the attorney, lawyers that disappeared. 

And from the performance of the president during his eight years 

in office, we see that he never met any democracy activists, and 

dissidents from China. But actually, he spared his very valuable 

time to meet with Jack Ma, the billionaire of the Chinese. 

I wonder why the president has forgotten his duty to preserve 

the founding principle of the United States as a human rights protector and defender? And I hope that the new Trump Administration will adopt an agenda to end authoritarian regime with the 

help of the Chinese people there. 

27 

I think that before Chinese human rights improve, I do not think 

America has any other choices. 

Thank you. 

Chairman SMITH. Mr. Chen, on that question—it was part rhetorical, but I think it deserves at least some focus. 

In not meeting with the dissidents, and we have asked the President to meet both in Beijing when he travels there, and in the 

White House with dissidents—when Bush went to the Olympics, 

we asked him to meet with dissidents like Rebiya Kadeer and others, and he did. Wei, you will remember that. And he spent a considerable amount of time before setting foot into Beijing getting insights from the people who had suffered. 

The one that has troubled me the most is that after we had our 

Five Daughters hearing—we had five precious daughters of dissidents who are, today, still languishing in prison, including the 

daughter of Gao Zhisheng, who appealed to the President. Each of 

the five said, ‘‘Mr. President, you have two daughters. You will understand. We want to meet with you and ask that you raise our 

father’s cases by name with the President of China.’’ 

We sent over that request. They made it themselves. The Washington Post did an outstanding article on it, by the editorial page 

editor. It was December 2013, on the House Foreign Affairs subcommittee hearing, the Five Daughters hearing. We called repeatedly down to the White House. Will you meet, please, Mr. President with the five daughters who are young ladies? 

One wrote a beautiful piano song. She is a great pianist, but she 

wrote a song to her dad, and she just wanted to look the President 

in the eye and say, ‘‘Please advocate for our dads’ release, to the 

end of the torture.’’ 

After six months, we got back from the White House, he does not 

have the time. 

Mr. CHEN. I would like to add one more thing. 

As we mentioned Mr. Jiang Tianyong, disappearing attorney, it 

was him who showed up at 2 a.m., at the wee hours in Beijing, 

during the President’s visit because they learned that the President’s office released a statement and said, ‘‘Oh, no human rights 

advocates showed up during his visit.’’ But that was not the case. 

So I want to emphasize that too. 

Chairman SMITH. I would just add, Danielle was one of those five 

daughters. And, again, all we wanted was a face-to-face meeting so 

that the President could hear their appeals. 

I yield to my good friend. 

Representative WALZ. Yes. Thank you to the Chairman. 

I would suggest, then, we put in a formal request to Presidentelect Trump to make that meeting from us as Commissioners. I 

would certainly be glad to sign that because I think it is what we 

ask for. 

I think maybe Yang Jianli brought up the idea of inconvenience. 

I think sometimes the Chinese Government feels like we will—we 

are not persistent, or we will lose our focus, or things that are inconvenient we will put aside. 

I would suggest to them that they have not met Chairman 

Smith, because he will not give up. He will be persistent, and I 

28 

think that is what we need. So I think that is exactly what we 

should do. 

To each of you, it is a privilege to be here with you, and every 

time I come, I am inspired, I am encouraged, and I realize that the 

fight goes on. At times thinking, as a Member of Congress, what 

can I do? Then I watch extraordinary people in circumstances 

sometimes beyond imagination rise up on those very issues that 

are our core foundation issues of human rights, and that is truly 

inspiring. 

It is from these hearings, and it is from each of you who have 

testified before—some of us have become friends over the years— 

that told us you need to continue to talk. I think we have spoken 

on this, and to let some of you know last year we traveled to Hong 

Kong, to Tibet, and then met with Premier Li in the Forbidden 

City. 

I can assure each of you it was something I thought I would 

never witness. Sitting in the Forbidden City with the Premier of 

China and him answering questions about His Holiness the Dalai 

Lama, him asking questions and answering questions about Falun 

Gong, about the Uyghurs, about freedom of religion, in Hong Kong. 

And I can tell you this, that Ambassador Baucus along with Leader 

Pelosi, myself, and other Members of Congress did meet with those 

dissidents in Beijing in the U.S. Embassy, and it is a good thing 

we have divided government because we have a voice. We continue 

to speak out on these issues, we continue to find common ground. 

So I cannot tell you the courage you give me, the instruction that 

you give me to continue talking because many of us up here worry 

the inconvenience, or more importantly, it is one thing for us to say 

what we are going say, and then go to our homes while your families are still in Chinese prisons, while your families are still under 

threat, the feedback we have gotten from you is, continue to make 

this issue. 

I will just ask, or maybe make a statement, maybe rhetorical a 

little bit. Wei Jingsheng brought up this point about tying trade to 

human rights. Those of us in here know going back to President 

Clinton, most-favored-nation status and some of the changes—I 

certainly was under the illusion that liberalizing trade and openness would have a significant impact on liberalization of personal 

freedoms. 

I have now seen that is not the case. As I told someone—again, 

it is anecdotal, but I can tell you this. I have been to Hong Kong 

dozens, and dozens, and dozens of times, both going from Fosan as 

a young teacher to Hong Kong, and coming here. 

The last time I went—and certainly it was the first time as a 

U.S. Congressman, Hong Kong is significantly different. Hong 

Kong feels different, and it feels different in one of those most basic 

ways of personal freedoms, religious freedoms, freedom of expression. And those should be concerns of ours. 

I think going—I would say this, just as a suggestion, I am not 

sure President-elect Trump would characterize it as a trade war, 

but I do think he should probably characterize it as a recalibration 

of fair trade. I think as a Nation, this is an important discussion 

we should have. 

29 

We may get cheaper products at our local big box store, but it 

comes at a price. It comes at a price as workers as Wei Jingsheng 

said. It comes at a price in wages. It comes at a price in our economy, but it also comes at a price to human rights for those workers. It comes at a price that we have lost our leverage. 

I would say this. I am very encouraged that it appears that incoming Defense Secretary, General Mattis has impressed upon 

President-elect Trump that torture is not something that we do, 

and it is not something that we accept from others. 

I think this does give us a chance to reset. This does give us an 

opportunity because of a peaceful transitioning government here to 

highlight those things, and I would say that each of you said this, 

I think this Commission can be a place for that to start again. 

I think you have got a Chairman that has been dogged about it. 

You have got a Chairman that has been consistent across administrations. When they fail or fall short, he has called them out. When 

they have done something right or leading in that right direction, 

he has praised them for that. 

I think I do not speak for all of the Commissioners, but I agree 

with that. I, for one, am serious. I think we send a letter and ask 

the President-elect to meet with the five daughters if that is what 

we are going to ask. 

We should be prepared that that may not happen, too. I think 

as a Commission, it may or it may not, but our responsibility is 

clear and it comes from each of you saying this. We need to continue to press these issues. We need to continue to recalibrate how 

we do this. 

I think we underestimate the leverage of both—by our actions— 

this was a fascinating thing, and I never thought this would happen. Premier Li was really fascinating because I told them I had 

been to Tibet before. And I said I had been to Tibet in 1989. And 

they said, ‘‘No, it was February of 1990.’’ They are very good at remembering when I was there, better than I. [Laughter.] 

They said, ‘‘Has it not improved? ’’ And I said, ‘‘Well, it was easier than going by bus for seven days from Chengdu, because now 

we could fly in or take the train. There were more hospitals. There 

were more shops.’’ But I told them candidly, speaking face-to-face, 

I said it is very different. The culture is very different. 

And he said, well, you saw a village or whatever. Yes, a 

Potemkin village that they showed us that was not there. 

But he brought up something very interesting that showed me 

that this relationship is changing a little bit. He said, ‘‘Congressman, I know when you were a young man, you taught on the Pine 

Ridge Native American Reservation in South Dakota. How did 

America treat the Native Americans? ’’ 

And I answered to him, ‘‘I would not use us as an example of the 

right way to do it because many of us know there are things we 

could do differently. We are asking you in the spirit of friendship, 

cooperation, human rights to work with these issues and to understand all of us have to go through that.’’ 

And it was fascinating to me that the Premier was gracious, he 

engaged in this conversation. I did not have any expectations there 

would be a change, but I think it did show if we continue to bring 

these issues up, if we continue to lead with our values, and tie 

30 

those to our economic policies, not separate them from that, that 

there is potential here for us to get to a common ground. 

I think for all of us, we have to continue to believe that because 

whether it is our father, whether it is our relatives, whether it is 

our own family being asked to make gripping choices, we have to 

see a better day. 

So again, I thank each of you. I do not have a question of you, 

but I think it is important to stress the inspiration you bring to 

others, the courage that you bring to others, and to speak about an 

issue from the United States, I know does not take courage. To 

stand up and say it in Beijing or in Foshan, or in Guangdong, those 

take courage understanding there will be repercussions. This issue 

of basic human rights, it unites all of us. 

So I thank the Chairman once again for putting together a remarkable panel. I do think it needs to be said, your persistence on 

the issue of human rights is something incredibly admirable. It is 

something that every day I am glad you are still here, because I 

do think—and the Chinese know this—they just want to wear you 

down over time. They want to wear you down. I have seen it. They 

found the one person they are not going to wear down. So I am 

glad to be with him. 

I yield back. 

Chairman SMITH. Thank you very much. I thank you for your 

leadership for decades on behalf of human rights in China, and I 

think the idea that you suggested is a great one. We will follow it 

up, and it will be a letter from you and I, and, of course, the 

other—the Cochair and I am sure Marco will readily agree with 

that. 

Is there anything else anybody would like to say before we conclude? [No response.] 

For the record, I would ask unanimous consent that statements 

from the 709 Lawyers’ Wives and the Southern Mongolian Human 

Rights Information Center be made a part of the record. Without 

objection, so ordered. 

Again, thank you all for your insights. This is a new beginning. 

The failed policies by any previous administration need to be matriculated to something that works. You have given us the blueprint. 

Thank you so very much. The hearing is adjourned. 

[The statements appear in the appendix.] 

[Whereupon the hearing was concluded at 4:08 p.m.] 

(31) 

A P P E N D I X 

32 

PREPARED STATEMENTS

PREPARED STATEMENT OF PENPA TSERING

DECEMBER 7, 2016

Thank you for this opportunity to testify before the Congressional-Executive Commission on China regarding on our recommendations to the next United States Congress and Administration on human rights in Tibet. This is my first testimony before the United States Congress following my appointment as Representative of 

H.H. the Dalai Lama to the Americas. Therefore, I would like to begin with offering 

the gratitude of the Tibetan people to the United States Congress for your consistent and strong support to His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan issue. 

Through its elections the United States and the American people have shown democracy in practice. Following the results, His Holiness the Dalai Lama has written 

to both President-Elect Donald Trump and Secretary Hillary Clinton. His Holiness 

further looks forward to meeting with the new President, just as he has done with 

the previous several presidents. 

At the outset, for those who don’t much about Tibet, I wish to present few basic 

facts. Some people feel that Tibet is a very small country nestled in the Himalayas. 

Factually, Tibet with close to 6 million Tibetans live on 2.14 Million Sq. Kms, roughly 23 percent of China’s total landmass. Tibet has an average altitude of 4641 meters or 15226 feet above sea level. Tibetans call Tibet as the Land surrounded by 

snow mountains; westerners called Tibet as the roof of the world; Asians call Tibet 

as the water tower of Asia and today Chinese environmental scientists call Tibet 

as the third pole because of the amount of glaciers and permafrost that feeds all 

the major rivers of Asia. 

ISSUES

On the matter of our recommendations, while there has been a clear deterioration 

in the overall human rights situation in Tibet, I would like to raise the following 

four points that can have grave impact during the term of the next Congress and 

Administration. 

1. Religious freedom of the Tibetan people 

Several developments in recent times, which follow decades of oppressive policies, 

indicate that in order to fulfil their political agenda, the Chinese authorities are undermining the very existence of a genuine Tibetan Buddhist tradition in Tibet. 

These include adopting regulations that give the Chinese Communist Party the 

absolute decision making authority on matters concerning Tibetan Buddhism, including promulgating legislation requiring all reincarnated Tibetan Buddhist leaders to obtain government approval. These measures are aimed at controlling and 

managing the process of the Dalai Lama’s next reincarnation, in order to ensure the 

dominance of the Party state in Tibet. Chinese official media reports have confirmed 

that the CCP authorities view the matter of the Dalai Lama’s reincarnation as ‘‘an 

important issue concerning sovereignty and national security.’’ What the Chinese 

government has done to the Panchen Lama, who was kidnapped when he was 5 

years old and has no longer been seen since then and replaced him with someone 

appointed by the Chinese Communist Party, is a stark reminder of what China intends to do. 

Secondly, there has been increased and intrusive interference in the affairs of the 

Tibetan Buddhist monasteries and institutes. The most recent case is the demolition 

process taking place at the Tibetan Buddhist Academy of Larung Gar in Tibet—one 

of the world’s largest monastic institutions with a population of thousands of Chinese and Tibetan practitioners - and the forced expulsion of several hundreds of 

monks and nuns from there. Larung Gar has in recent years become a vital center 

for the study, practice, and promotion of Buddhist teachings. 

The most recent demolitions of monks’ and nuns’ dwellings began in July due to 

restrictions put in place by the Chinese government. According to information received from Tibet, hundreds of monks and nuns from Golog (Chinese: Guoluo) and 

Jyegudo (Chinese: Yushu) in Qinghai, Ngaba (Chinese: Aba) in Sichuan, and the 

Tibet Autonomous Region were among those forced to leave Larung Gar in late October this year. Officials and police arrived from their home areas to escort them. 

Many monks and nuns were compelled to put their thumbprints or sign a document 

which stated the following in Chinese: In accordance with the requirements of promoting regulation work in the Serthar County Larung Five Sciences Buddhist AcadVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:27 Mar 16, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00036 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6621 U:\DOCS\23081 DIEDRE
33 

emy, I left the Larung Five Sciences Buddhist Academy and will, after returning 

home, as always continue to love the country and love religion, and abide by the 

law. I solemnly promise not to return to the Serthar County Larung Five Sciences 

Buddhist Academy, except to carry out relevant formalities during large-scale Buddhist activities.’’ 

If we do not send a strong message to the Chinese authorities on this, it could 

be a precursor to many such demolitions of other Tibetan religious institutes. 

2. Restrictions of Freedom of Movement 

From 2012, following the imposition of tough new measures restricting travel in 

Tibetan areas since the 2008 protests, Tibetans began to face tightening restrictions 

on their travel abroad, through restrictions on the issuance of passports, including 

to receive Buddhist teachings from the Dalai Lama, or to study abroad. This is in 

contrast to the increasing number of Chinese citizens being granted passports and 

being able to travel abroad with ease. 

Since the Dalai Lama is giving an important Tibetan Buddhist teaching in India 

in January 2017, many Tibetans in Tibet wanted to travel there. In addition to the 

already existing restrictions for Tibetans in getting a passport, in the last few 

weeks, Chinese officials have confiscated passports from those Tibetans who have 

managed to secure one. 

Some Tibetans who have already arrived in Nepal and India for pilgrimage and 

for attending the Buddhist teachings in January have already been ordered to return, and the authorities are as well pressuring their families in Tibet. 

China’s discriminatory policy on Tibetan freedom of movement also includes Tibetan Americans who wish to travel to Tibet for pilgrimage or to meet their relatives. The Chinese Embassy and consulates in the United States adopt a different 

processing system for Tibetan Americans that includes intensive investigation and 

often end up with denial of visas. 

3. Use of Counter-terrorism measures to control Tibetans 

In Tibet, despite the absence of any violent insurgency, an aggressive ‘‘counterterrorism’’ drive has been underway resulting in the militarization across the Tibetan plateau. By conflating the expression of distinct religious and ethnic identities 

with ‘‘separatism’’, and blurring distinctions between violent acts and peaceful dissent, the Chinese government is using counter-terrorism as a justification to crackdown on even mild expressions of religious identity and culture in Tibet. 

In line with a ‘‘counter-terror’’ campaign, the Chinese authorities have rolled out 

new systematic and long-term security measures in Tibet as part of an intensified 

control agenda. 

While rigorous and oppressive measures, including an increase in Communist 

Party personnel at ‘‘grass roots’’ levels, have been in place since the 2008 protests 

in the Tibet Autonomous Region (TAR), these measures to eliminate dissent and enforce compliance to Chinese Communist Party policies are now being increasingly 

observed in the eastern Tibetan areas of Kham and Amdo. 

Since October 2011, Chinese authorities have sent tens of thousands of government and party cadres to thousands of villages, religious institutions and neighborhood to monitor and surveil local Tibetans, organize anti-Dalai Lama themed political indoctrination campaigns, and entrench and expand the influence of the CCP 

in Tibet. 

4. H.H. the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan issue 

On the overall issue of Tibet, the position of His Holiness the Dalai Lama remains 

unchanged in key areas. His is commitment to the Middle Way is unwavering. He 

is not seeking independence for Tibet but, rather, genuine, meaningful autonomy for 

the Tibetan people within the People’s Republic of China reached through a negotiated settlement with the Chinese leadership. He has strengthened democratic values within the Tibetan community in exile, including in handing over all his political authority to the elected Tibetan leadership. 

Diplomatic and Political Actions that have worked: 

1. Presidential meeting with His Holiness the Dalai Lama 

Successive Presidents of United States have met with His Holiness the Dalai 

Lama and expressed their support for the Middle Way Approach. This sends a very 

strong signal to the Chinese authorities that the Issue of Tibet is on the highest 

of agenda in US-China relations. 

2. Appointment and the role of Special Coordinator on Tibet 

Having a special coordinator on Tibetan Issues in the State Department as mandated by the US Tibet Policy Act of 2002 and its annual report on the status of 

Sino-Tibet negotiations indicates the importance that US Administration attaches in 

34 

resolving the Tibetan issue in a non-violent, mutually beneficial negotiated solution 

without pre-conditions. 

3. Hearings and reports of the commissions 

Meetings of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Sikyong, and the Speaker of the Tibetan Parliament in Exile with bipartisan, bicameral congressional Foreign Relations Committee; hearings and reports by CECC and Tom Lantos Human Rights 

Commission helps in informing the congress of the Tibetan perspective of the situation inside Tibet and possible solutions. 

4. Financial Aids 

Financial Aids from State Departments to the Tibetans through USAID, PRM and 

Scholarship Programs for education, health, social and economic development of Tibetans helps in the preservation and promotion of Tibetan identity. 

5. Bills and Resolutions 

We believe that the introduction of the Reciprocal Access to Tibet bill has built 

some traction in allowing congressional delegation and journalists visits to Tibet. 

6. Congressional and State Department visits to Tibet and Dharamsala 

The congressional delegation’s visit to China and Tibet provided first hand understanding of the situation inside Tibet and more intimate dialogue with the local 

leaders. Similarly, visits to Dharamsala also sends a strong signal to China. 

Suggestions to the new Administration and the Congress: 

1. The United States has played a pivotal role in highlighting the human rights 

situation in Tibet and in encouraging the Chinese Government to improve them. 

Human rights will be respected if China implements internal reform. US Government need to publicly express concern for the human rights situation in Tibet to 

send a clear signal to China that this is an integral part of US policy on China 

2. Advocate for the release of Tibetan political prisoners. The US should advocate 

for the release of specific Tibetan political prisoners languishing in Chinese prisons. 

In the past, efforts by the United States and other governments have led to the Chinese authorities releasing some Tibetan political prisoners who were able to come 

to the United States for medical treatment and rehabilitation. My office will be 

pleased to provide some names of Tibetan political prisoners. 

3. An early implementation of the Tibetan Policy Act, including the designation 

of the US Special Coordinator for Tibetan Issues at a senior level within the State 

Department so that the new Administration has its contact person on Tibet in place 

for effective coordination of work. 

4. The Reciprocal Access to Tibet Act before the House could also help to promote 

access to Tibetan areas for U.S. officials, journalists, and citizens. Currently, travel 

restrictions imposed by the Chinese government on Tibet are more severe than for 

any other provincial-level entity in China. The approval of the Global Magnitsky Act 

by the US Congress will send the right message to Chinese officials responsible for 

human rights violations in Tibet. 

5. The Administration should impress on China the need to establish US Consulate in Lhasa. 

6. The incoming President should meet with His Holiness the Dalai Lama at the 

earliest opportunity in keeping with precedents. 

7. The congress and the Administration could raise with the Chinese leadership 

their discriminatory policies towards the Tibetan people, particularly in the matters 

of religious freedom and freedom of movement. 

8. The Administration should monitor China’s misuse of counter terrorism policies 

in Tibet leading to the denial of fundamental rights of the Tibetan people. As and 

when necessary this needs to be raised publicly. 

9. Preserve funding for Tibet-related programs in the Department of State & Foreign Operations Appropriations bill, including economic development; humanitarian 

assistance; Tibetan language broadcasts through Voice of America and Radio Free 

Asia; and scholarship and exchange programs. These small but indispensable investments in Tibetan communities support the Dalai Lama’s vision of preserving Tibetan identity during these difficult times until a negotiated agreement is reached. 

10. The congress should organize more bipartisan, bicameral visits to Tibet and 

Dharamsala. 

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11. Above all, proactive support at the highest level of Government to encourage 

the Chinese authorities to resume dialogue to resolve the Tibetan issue, as mandated by the Tibetan Policy Act, will eventually improve the human rights situation 

of the Tibetan people. 

I thank you for the opportunity to testify before your Commission and look forward to answering any questions you have. 

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PREPARED STATEMENT OF CHEN GUANGCHENG

DECEMBER 7, 2016

Greetings to the Chair people, to all the human rights Congressional representatives, ladies and gentlemen: Hello! 

In China, people know me as, ‘‘the barefoot lawyer:’’ despite having no formal 

training as a lawyer, I did the work of a lawyer, bringing officials to court and asking that the party respect China’s own Constitution and laws. As a result, I endured 

7 years of kidnappings, house arrest, secret detention sites, and imprisonment. After 

I was let out of prison, my family and I were put under illegal house arrest under 

conditions even worse than prison, including torture, until I finally escaped. 

My own experience tells me that one should not hold out any hope or possibility 

in the Communist Party. This is a fascist regime that destroys the essential goodness of humanity. 

The Communist Party has been persecuting its own people for years. Last year 

it began the infamous 709 crackdown, persecuting human rights defenders and lawyers, torturing people and implicating family members by association. Some attorneys and activists in detention have been forced to make confess guilt in the statecontrolled media, and have subsequently been sentenced to prison. But some, like 

Li Heping, Li Chunfu, Wang Quanzhang and other attorneys refuse to admit guilt, 

and hence continue to be held illegally. Two weeks ago, Attorney Xie Yang was tortured by prison police, and Attorney Jiang Tianyong has been disappeared. Activists 

Huang Qi and Liu Feiyue have been taken by public security. Countless netizens 

have been blocked online, and their speech censored. 

Under Party control, the Chinese people have long lived in a state of suffering 

and fear. It should be clear that Communist authoritarian control is the enemy of 

humanity: we must put a stop to its destruction of humanity’s civilized values. 

On the other hand, America is a great nation that truly stands out in its commitment to universal values. There is simply no way to compare the US and China on 

this front. Hence, America must be a model for human rights, and a leader in the 

global push to democracy. The American system has the strongest immunity 

(against corruption), and the greatest capability for correcting its mistakes. Democracy, freedom, and human rights are America’s founding principles. After many injurious years of appeasement and self-belittling, the time has come for the US to 

reinvigorate its core values and to protect universal human rights. 

I would like to make the following recommendations to the incoming administration and Congress regarding human rights: 

1. Correct the mistaken policy of separating trade from human rights. Human 

rights are like clean water, clean food, and clean air: they are an indispensable 

part of life, and cannot be separated from anything we do. The essence of the 

policy of separating trade and human rights is to focus solely on making money, 

without care to justice or ethics. In addition, the reality is that a country with 

strong human rights and rule of law is a better business partner for American 

companies. 

2. In its position as a global leader, should express a position of clear support 

for the universal values of freedom, democracy, and human rights.When a dictatorial regime uses force to suppress its people, should act decisively to stop 

it. In addition, we should reconsider NATO’s function, to transform NATO from 

hedgehog quill to heroic sword. 

[NATO is now an organization primarily concerned with its own member nations 

and their security. The US should recognize that authoritarian regimes pose an existential threat to democracies everywhere. The US, for example, is already experiencing infiltration into many areas of civic and government life, including its media, 

academia, government offices, and electoral process by the largest dictatorships in 

the world. If this continues unabated, the US will find its democratic institutions 

substantially weakened. By supporting democratic movements through clear statements, the US and NATO will put a check to violent repression of innocent people 

and reclaim the importance of universal rights for all.] 

3. Prevent human rights abusing officials from entering the United States. Investigate and where illegality is found, freeze the US assets of Communist 

Party officials. 

4. Prevent the Communist Party from infiltrating US academia, media, and 

other institutions. 

5. Demand that the Chinese Communist Party respect the UN International 

Treaty on Human Rights. Change the policy of speaking with the CCP on issues 

of human rights behind closed doors .otherwise we will continue the useless conversations we have now. 

52 

6. Ensure reciprocity of visas for journalists, and prevent the CCP from using 

visas to punish journalists who expose the crimes of the party. 

[At the moment, the US allows roughly 800 journalists from China into the US, 

the majority of whom are from party media outlets, but China only allows 100 US 

journalists into China.] 

7. Invest in tools to get past internet blocking mechanisms, to assist those 

who seek freedom in getting past the Great Firewall [Internet Berlin Wall]. Establish direct communication with the Chinese people, instead of just with the 

party. 

8. Establish international, collaborative mechanisms to prevent the Chinese 

Communist Party from persecuting its own people internally, and from breaking 

down international procedures externally. 

Great nations have great responsibility. In Chinese there is an ancient saying: 

‘‘Bring out the best and eliminate the worst under heaven.’’ This should be the principle to follow. As long as we join together, we can banish dictatorships, and make 

the world a better place. 

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PREPARED STATEMENT OF BOB FU

RELIGIOUS FREEDOM AND RULE OF LAW UNDER XI JINPING 2016 

DECEMBER 7, 2016

Dear Chairman Congressman Smith and Co-Chair Senator Marco Rubio, 

As China regresses into a more Maoist regime, the Communist Party continues 

to place restrictive measures on human rights and religious freedom and executes 

its control over all forms of dissent by arresting or otherwise harassing those who 

oppose the strictures. 

According to current president Xi Jinping, religion must conform to and benefit 

a socialist society. At a national conference on religion held in April of this year, 

he urged his administration to ensure that religions ‘‘merge religious doctrines with 

Chinese culture, abide by Chinese laws and regulations, and devote themselves to 

China’s reform and opening up drive and socialist modernization in order to contribute to the realization of the Chinese dream of national rejuvenation,’’ and argued 

that the role of the Party was to ‘‘guide and educate the religious circle and their 

followers with the socialist core values . . ..’’ 

His words reinforced a pre-existing nationwide crackdown on religious institutions, including an ongoing cross demolition campaign, arbitrary arrests of pastors 

and lawyers, and the suppression of Tibetan Buddhists and Uyghur Muslims. Because China Aid receives reports on Christian persecution, this summary will spotlight their cases as examples indicative of a much wider repression of belief. 

In its 2015 Annual Report, Chinese Government Persecution of Christians and 

Churches in China, China Aid noted a 4.74 percent overall increase in persecution, 

based on how statistics gathered in 2015 compared to those collected the previous 

year. The various categories accounted for include: number of religious persecution 

cases (up 10.84 percent), number of persecuted individuals (up 8.62 percent), number of unjustly detained persons (up 6.14 percent), number of abuse cases (up 174.65 

percent) and number of abused people (up 91.32 percent). 

Persecution campaigns made 2016 one of the most tyrannical years since the Cultural Revolution. As imprisoned human rights lawyers still fight for the right to defend their clients without legal repercussions, officials in Zhejiang province carry out 

the third consecutive year of a beautification movement that targets church crosses 

for demolition, Henan province launched a movement focusing on forcing ‘‘illegal’’ 

Catholic and Protestant churches to conform to socialist ideals, and authorities arrested and detained church members. 

Trials for lawyers rounded up in the 709 incident, the nationwide crackdown on 

human rights defenders named for the day it started, July 9, 2015, commenced on 

August 2 with the sentencing of Zhai Yanmin, a rights activist who received a threeyear suspended prison term for coordinating protests against government rule. A 

day later, a Tianjin court condemned Beijing church elder Hu Shigen to seven-anda-half-years’ incarceration and five years’ deprivation of political rights for allegedly 

‘‘subverting state power’’ by using Christianity to ‘‘spread subversive thoughts and 

ideas.’’ The tribunal presented photos of his baptism as evidence of his guilt, and 

Hu was forced to confess to his crimes, after which he accepted his sentence and 

did not appeal. 

Hu, a Beijing University alumnus and former instructor at the Beijing Language 

Institute, formerly served 16 years of a 20 year prison sentence for founding an organization that opposed the Communist Party. 

On August 4, Zhou Shifeng was coerced into confessing to his crimes. Zhou, a 

Christian attorney, was arrested on suspicion of ‘‘subverting state power’’ on January 8, 2016. In an attempt to publicly authenticate their charges against him, authorities pressured Zhang Kai, a human rights lawyer known for his defense of 

more than 100 churches affected by the cross demolition campaign, to travel from 

his home in Inner Mongolia, attend the trial, and conduct an interview in which he 

denounced Zhou and the other imprisoned human rights lawyers. Zhang later recanted his statements, saying he had been too frightened to stand up to the authorities. Consequentially, officials barred him from social media and attempted to arrest 

him again. 

On the night of August 25, 2015, government personnel broke into a church in 

Wenzhou, Zhejiang and took Zhang and his two legal assistants into police custody. 

After holding him incommunicado for six months in an unofficial prison known as 

a ‘‘black jail,’’ China forced Zhang to confess on television on February 25, 2016. A 

few days later, he was taken into criminal detention and released on bail on March 

23. Since then, he has lived with his parents in Inner Mongolia. 

56 

Another Christian lawyer, Li Heping, vanished into police custody on July 10, 

2015, followed by his brother, attorney Li Chunfu, on August 1 of that year. Li 

Heping was formally arrested on January 8, 2016, on suspicion of ‘‘subverting state 

power.’’ Since their disappearance, family members have not been able to contact 

either of the men. 

The cross demolition movement, which began in 2014 as part of a beautification 

campaign known as ‘‘Three Rectifications and One Demolition,’’ continued in 

Zhejiang province during 2016. Although official rhetoric claims the operation intends to address ‘‘illegal structures,’’ it specifically discriminates against Christian 

churches and imposes strictures on the crosses that adorn the exterior of their 

buildings. In 2016, the number of crosses demolished surpassed 1,800. 

Zhang Chongzhu, a pastor who was placed under ‘‘residential surveillance in a 

designated location,’’ otherwise known as a ‘‘black jail,’’ in September 2015, was 

originally held in police custody for his opposition to the cross demolitions,. On February 5, he was criminally detained for ‘‘stealing, spying, buying, or illegally providing state secrets or intelligence to entities outside China.’’ He was formally arrested on March 9 for the same crime. On May 9, he was released. 

Now, Zhang faces a new challenge; on October 29, the Zhejiang Provincial China 

Christian Council and the Zhejiang Provincial Three-Self Patriotic Movement, China’s two state-run Christian organizations, expelled him from the clergy and revoked a certificate proving that he was licensed to preach. This triggered outrage 

among local Christians, one of whom speculated that the government terminated 

Zhang Chongzhu in order to keep citizens from attending house churches. 

In addition to previous restrictions on religious activity, Henan province published 

a work plan devising to bring ‘‘illegal’’ Catholic and Protestant churches in line with 

the Party’s ideologies. According to the official document, the authorities plan to 

manage church meetings and force the congregations to eradicate all religious symbols and become more socialist. The timeline outlined by the official document stated the plan was to be implemented on September 4 and run until October 15. The 

government mandated that the village and sub-district government branches investigate churches, submit reports to their superiors, assist the religious affairs bureau 

in distributing a notice about the expected changes to the churches, shut down noncompliant congregations, and record how satisfactorily they were able to complete 

the job as part of their year-end assessment. 

Prompted by this decision, the Bo’Ai County Religious Affairs Bureau issued a notice to a house church. Claiming that the church was unauthorized, the bureau ordered it to immediately disband and remove any religious materials within three 

days. They urged the attendees to conduct religious activities at the local official 

churches, with which many of them have deep, theological disagreements. Failure 

to comply with these measures will result in further government interference. 

This campaign echoes the new political trend set out in a proposed revision of the 

Regulations on Religious Affairs, which was introduced by the State Council earlier 

this month. The revision introduces tighter control on peaceful religious activities, 

such as punishing house church meetings by imprisoning Christians or heavily 

fining the church leaders, forbidding religious adherents from attending conferences 

or trainings abroad, and barring minors from receiving religious education. By passing these regulations, China violates its own Constitution, which guarantees religious liberty and condemns discriminating against religious and non-religious citizens, and breaches the country’s pledges to adhere to the Universal Declaration of 

Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the 

United Nations’ Convention on the Rights of the Child. 

Paraphrasing and quoting an unnamed expert on the Regulations on Religious Affairs, Christianity Today published the following statements on October 3 in an article entitled ‘‘Red Tape: China Wants to Constrict Christian Activities with 26 New 

Rules,’’ referring to China’s State Administration on Religious Affairs as SARA: 

The draft law opens with the assurance that all Chinese citizens are free 

to believe whatever they want and to engage in religious activity—as long 

as it’s within the tighter limits. One Chinese religious policy expert, who 

asked to remain anonymous, summed up some of what the regulations include: 

• No religious activities that are not approved by SARA. 

• No one may provide a venue for religious services that are not approved 

by SARA. 

• No one may use their home for religious practices that are not approved 

by SARA (including home or family Bible studies). 

• No publishing religious materials without approval from SARA. 

57 

• No foreign or domestic donations may be made to any religious organization that hasn’t been approved by SARA. 

• No one may call themselves a pastor without the approval of SARA. 

• No international religious exchanges may happen without the approval of 

SARA. 

• No one may study theology at school without the approval of SARA. 

‘‘As you can imagine, these amendments to the administration of religion 

in China by SARA would in effect leave no space for the house or unregistered church in China, and will significantly curtail many of the activities 

of the TSPM [Three-Self Patriotic Movement] as well,’’ the expert told 

ChinaSource. 

In 2015, a major developing case emerged as authorities increased pressure on 

Huoshi Church, the largest house church in Guiyang, Guizhou province. Though 

preluded by a police presence when the church moved into a new building in 2014 

and the 2015 arrest of Zhang Xiuhong, an accountant and chairwoman at the 

church who was apprehended when she withdrew church funds at her beauty shop, 

the situation escalated when Pastor Su Tianfu received an administrative penalty 

notice on October 21, 2015. It indicted himself, Zhang and a church member named 

Liang Xuewu for ‘‘changing usage plans’’ of the office space the church rents for its 

services and ordered them to stop holding religious activities there, despite the 

church continually reporting its services to the government. Originally, the building 

was approved for business operations. When they neglected to heed the orders, officials imposed a fine that accumulated 12,960 Yuan (U.S. $2,030) daily. 

Su, who is currently released on bail, has been under constant surveillance since 

December 19 and must use government-arranged transportation for all outings. He 

is expected to stand trial soon. 

Additionally, administrative offices dispatched uniformed and plainclothes personnel to raid the church on several occasions. On December 9, 2015, Pastor Li 

Guozhi, better known by his alias, Yang Hua, was taken into police custody and 

sentenced to two consecutive, five-day administrative detention terms a day later for 

the ‘‘crime of obstructing justice’’ and ‘‘gathering a crowd to disturb public order’’ 

after he attempted to prevent officials from confiscating a church hard drive. When 

his wife came to collect him on December 20, she witnessed him donning a black 

hood and being herded into an unlicensed vehicle. Upon further inquiry, she learned 

that her husband had been charged with ‘‘illegally possessing state secrets’’ and was 

being transferred to another facility for criminal detention. She was not allowed to 

contact him. On January 22, she received a notice announcing his formal arrest and 

changing his charge to ‘‘divulging state secrets.’’ 

Even with his impending trial, which is expected to take place this month, authorities only permitted Yang to convene with his lawyers beginning in March. During one meeting, lawyer Chen Jiangang and his co-counsel, Zhao Yonglin, noted that 

he appeared fearful and began to suspect that he had been tortured. On their next 

visit, Zhao transcribed an interview with Yang in which he described how the prosecutors assigned to his case had stepped on his toes and threatened to kill him and 

harm his family in order to extract a confession from him. After hearing this, Chen 

and Zhao filed a lawsuit against the prosecution team and asked that they be criminally punished for ‘‘using torture to extort a confession.’’ 

During one of his pre-trial meetings, Yang requested that Zhang Wei, one of the 

prosecutors in his case, be disqualified from hearing the trial on account of his torture allegations. Chen and Zhao have furthered this request by submitting a document requesting both the disqualification of Zhang and a transferal to a new court. 

In the highest profile case of Christian persecution since the Cultural Revolution, 

China ousted Gu Yuese, chairman of the Hangzhou branch of the China Christian 

Council, from his position as the head pastor of China’s largest Three-Self Church 

on January 18. Later that month, Gu was arrested on a falsified charge of ‘‘embezzling 10 million Yuan (US$1.6 million) in funds,’’ although many Christians believe 

authorities incarcerated him for his opposition to the cross demolition campaign. On 

April 1, he was released and placed under ‘‘residential surveillance.’’ His case demonstrates the rampant spread of religious persecution as China clamps down on 

both house and state-run churches. 

As 2016 progressed, religious persecution continued to intensify. In Xinjiang, a politically and ethnically restive region wrought with religious tension, authorities apprehended dozens of Christians in the last two months. One of them, Ma Huichao, 

was taken from her home in September, where she and four other Christians were 

gathering for a church service. As a result of the service, she was charged with 

‘‘gathering a crowd to disturb public order,’’ and her trial of the first instance comVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:27 Mar 16, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00061 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6621 U:\DOCS\23081 DIEDRE
58 

menced in mid-November. According to Li Dunyong, her defense attorney, he was 

barred from pleading innocent on her behalf. Currently, the court is adjourned. 

Recently, two Hong Kong residents, Lin Haixin and his wife, vanished into police 

custody for running a church that specialized in offering assistance to individuals 

suffering from addictions and mental health problems. The church was raided, and 

officials confiscated its computer and religious materials, banned it from holding religious services and dispersed Christians gathered there. 

For two days, local Christians tried unsuccessfully to contact them. Some speculate that they were taken away for holding so-called ‘‘illegal religious activities’’ 

without registering. 

Concerns over the safety of human rights lawyers spiked in the past weeks as 

Jiang Tianyong, a prominent human rights lawyer turned activist following his disbarment in 2007, disappeared, believed detained. He contacted his wife shortly before boarding a train from Changsha to Beijing, after which no one has been able 

to successfully reach him. He had been returning from a trip to visit the wife of 

Xie Yang, another human rights lawyer who was imprisoned during the lawyer 

crackdown last year, and helped her petition for his release. In the past, Jiang has 

been incarcerated for his work and suffered torture at the hands of the authorities. 

On the morning of November 29, the brother of veteran human rights activist 

Peng Ming received a call from prison authorities saying that Peng had suddenly 

collapsed while watching television and was found dead. However, three days earlier, Peng had received a visit from his brother, who reported that the prisoner was 

in satisfactory health. When he arrived at the hospital and tried to place a call to 

his sister, who lives in California, officials took the phone from him and related 

their version of the story. Peng’s family has since demanded an autopsy to confirm 

the cause of his death, and the Chinese government has warned them not to travel 

to China for the funeral. 

At the time of his death, Peng was serving a lifelong prison sentence that began 

on May 28, 2004, when Chinese agents lured him into Burma while he was visiting 

his parents in Thailand and abducted him. After arriving in China, he was charged 

with leading a terrorist organization and kidnapping and possessing counterfeit 

money and given a life sentence. Upon investigation, the U.N. Working Group on 

Arbitrary Detention concluded in 2005 that authorities arbitrarily detained Peng, 

violating his right to freedom of expression and association. 

China is unwilling to commit to furthering religious freedom and human rights, 

which caused both a significant demise of human rights under the Xi Administration. Western policies can hold the country accountable for abuses of basic freedoms. 

It is time for the West to shift their paradigm from appeasing China to truly principled engagement. Like what happened before in the West during Hitler’s rule of 

Germany in the 1930s, the current policy of ignoring China’s anti-democratic system 

of governance in pursuit of economic opportunity will likely produce irreparable 

damage for the fundamental interests of the free world. 

Recommendations: 

I urge the Trump Administration and members of Congress, including President 

Trump himself, to meet with religious leaders and family members of prisoners of 

conscience and visit religious sites- especially churches, mosques and Tibetan Buddhism temples when visiting China in order to: 

1. Raise cases not only behind doors, which has proved non-effective so far, 

but in public as well. Look at what happened to the prompt release of the 

‘‘China feminist 5’’ after interventional outcry, including public demands by 

Secretary John Kerry and United States Ambassador to the United Nations 

Samantha Power. 

2. Use multi-faceted approaches to religious freedom and human rights. The 

‘‘human rights dialogue’’ mechanism has failed, be it bilateral or multilateral. After all, FoRB is a universal value. If the Chinese regime only sees 

the West as interested in talking about this issue behind closed doors in 

a compartmentalized way, it’s nothing but a green light for the abuses to 

continue. 

3. Adopt a concerted, internationally coordinated effort by working jointly 

with our allies in Europe and other regions. The release of imprisoned 

human rights lawyer Zhang Kai and Pastor Wen Xiaowu, who were freed 

after the Communist Party received enormous international pressure, are 

good examples of how well this method works. 

4. Pressure China to stop committing violations of international law by 

overstepping their own nation’s boundaries to detain dissidents such as 

Jiang Yefei and Dong Guangping, who were taken back to China from a 

detention center in Thailand; Peng Ming, who was kidnapped after being 

59 

lured into Burma by Chinese special agents and died on November 29 while 

serving a life sentence; and five Hong Kong booksellers, who disappeared 

into police custody for selling gossip books about the private lives of Chinese officials. 

In conclusion, China continuously violates its own laws and international statutes 

safeguarding religious freedom and human rights in favor of promoting a socialist 

agenda, forcing dissidents and religious devotees to choose between certain persecution and disregarding their deeply-held beliefs. Additionally, it prosecutes lawyers 

who attempt to defend the rights of religious practitioners and activists, completely 

disregarding the rule of law. International governments must publicly and 

proactively organize efforts to persuade China to free those it unjustly holds behind 

bars and refrain from unproductive, behind-closed-doors conversations on these matters. Should the international community fail to do this, they will be communicating 

to China that they care more about trade than human rights, permitting these 

abuses to continue. 

SUGGESTIONS ON THE FUTURE SINO-US ECONOMIC AND

TRADE RELATIONS AND THE REASONS

PREPARED STATEMENT OF WEI JINGSHENG

DECEMBER 7, 2016

When Donald Trump becomes president of the USA, he is planning to abolish the 

TPP and began a trade war with China in order to save the US economy. Some people say that this is a disaster, I would say that this is the right way that should 

have started even earlier. The reality after sixteen years well explain my position: 

granting China permanent MFN status, that is PNTR, was a huge mistake. It did 

not promote the development of the US economy, but was a blood transfusion from 

the USA to the Chinese economy. It gave China the opportunity to engage in trade 

war with the United States. 

The reason is as follows. The so-called free trade, refers to a unified law based 

on the domestic market, thus allowing free trade. Such free trade can be carried 

out normally between countries with similar legal systems. There cannot be normal 

free trade between countries with completely different legal systems. 

For example, after trade with China liberated, there were two main problems: one 

was cheap labor, one was its uncertain laws that always change. 

Since Chinese law does not guarantee human rights, it is able to keep labor prices 

at a very low level. This has led to the relocation of US companies to foreign countries, while also allows Chinese goods entering the US market with low prices, resulting in unfair competition. It is an important cause of unemployment in the 

United States. 

China’s precarious legal system creates serious non-tariff barriers. Any local government can develop their own laws and regulations, without the need to implement 

the signed treaties and agreements between the Chinese central government and 

foreign countries. So they can actually close their targeted import market. Coupled 

with the manipulation of the currency by the Chinese central government, these actions increased exports and created a huge trade surplus for China. This is an important reason causing the economic recession in the USA. 

Some people say: for the USA, fighting a trade war with China will end in defeat, 

at best a lose-lose result. I think such statements are to confuse the US policy makers. I think the USA will win this trade war, while China can only succumb to the 

rules developed by the United States, otherwise it will accelerate the collapse of the 

Chinese Communist regime. My reasons are as follows. 

First: Now the vast majority of goods are in the buyers’ markets. The United 

States holds the markets, thus it has the power to develop rules, instead of forcing 

itself to comply with that so-called global free trade rule that cannot be enforced. 

The United States can formulate its own fair trade rules, to replace the invalid socalled free trade rules. 

Second: The Chinese domestic market is narrow and cannot afford the disaster 

of losing the US market. So China can only compromise on the rules thus to protect 

part of the market share. 

Third: In the past, due to over-expansion of export production of shoddy goods, 

the quality of Chinese enterprises is very poor. In order to adapt to a fair market 

in the competition, Chinese companies must quickly upgrade. Thus there will be a 

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port market in the USA. This will help expand US exports and reduce its trade deficit with China. 

Fourth: After improving human rights in China, the income of the Chinese working class will increase, therefore the domestic consumer market will expand. This 

expansion would benefit US exporters after fair trade, thereby reducing the US 

trade deficit and even eliminating it. 

So I think that the USA will win this trade war, and in the long run will also 

be beneficial to the economic normalization in China. China must accept and should 

accept it. 

Thank you! 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF REBIYA KADEER

DECEMBER 7, 2016

Since my release from a Chinese prison in 2005, I have reported to the Commission the continuing human rights violations targeting the Uyghur people. As the 

Commission has noted in its annual reports, political freedoms in East Turkestan 

are among the most limited in China. The right to association and assembly is prohibited and freedom of speech is punished severely, as the case of imprisoned 

Uyghur academic Ilham Tohti illustrates. Economic discrimination, erosion of language rights and religious restrictions add to the already depressing condition of 

Uyghur human rights. 

President Xi Jinping has attempted to codify these violations in a series of repressive laws, such as the ones on counter-terror and cybersecurity. Implementation 

measures of the counter-terror law at the regional level in East Turkestan are a 

clear indicator of who China intends to target with these draconian measures. 

Nevertheless, China believes it should go further with its repression. Arbitrary detentions, forced disappearance and extra-judicial killings continue. Recent media reports indicate the Chinese government has implemented a policy to confiscate passports in East Turkestan to limit the international movement of Uyghurs. This is the 

formalization of a policy that Uyghur human rights groups have documented since 

2006. 

Islam is a cornerstone of the Uyghur identity. China has adopted a series of religious laws at the national and regional level (2015) that curb Uyghur rights to freedom of worship. Private communal religious education has been targeted for several 

years under these measures; however, this year Chinese authorities adopted rules 

to report parents who encourage their children to undertake religious activities 

During the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations my colleagues 

and I have worked hard to bring Uyghur issues to the attention of the U.S. political 

community. Our organizations regularly brief State Department officials and legislators at the U.S. Congress. We have managed to mainstream the Uyghur issue into 

U.S. government reporting on human rights. 

Most notably, I was privileged to meet President George Bush on two occasions; 

the first time in June 2007 and the second in July 2008. These meetings placed 

Uyghurs at the center of U.S. policy concerns over human rights in China. 

China’s heavy handed policies towards Uyghurs are creating instability and desperation among the Uyghur people. These policies have become self-fulfilling in 

some respects, as some Uyghurs have become radicalized in their effort to oppose 

China’s repression. The United States should be concerned about these developments as it is in the nation’s interest to support the democratic aspirations of the 

overwhelming majority of Uyghurs. Stability in East Turkestan, China and the Central and East Asian regions offers the opportunity to spread American values such 

as freedom and rights. 

The administration of President-elect Donald Trump should continue support for 

Uyghur democrats and step up public concern over rights conditions in East 

Turkestan with Chinese officials. Any sign that the United States is ready to relinquish its commitment to raising human rights concerns in favor of achieving policy 

gains elsewhere will be a victory for China. 

Furthermore, the incoming administration should exercise extreme skepticism regarding China’s narrative that increased militarization and securitization in East 

Turkestan are justified in fighting radical Islam. The repression that accompanies 

security measures enables China to keep firm control of the region and suppress legitimate Uyghur claims for greater political, economic, social and cultural freedoms. 

The Trump administration should understand the situation in East Turkestan in 

similar terms to the Tibet. It is a struggle for cultural survival in the face of formidable assimilative actions by the state. 

61 

Let us be clear. Pressure works. My presence here today is testament to the success of pressurizing Chinese officials. My colleagues and I will continue to put forward the Uyghur case to the international community. It is the responsibility of concerned governments to take this case directly to China and urge reform. The 

Uyghur people greatly appreciate the United States’ support of our plight.; however, 

we ask the incoming administration to publicly raise the Uyghur issue with China. 

In conclusion, I offer these recommendations to the Trump administration: 

1. Prioritize Uyghur issues, especially during the Human Rights Dialogue and 

the Strategic and Economic Dialogue. 

2. Urge China to allow foreign diplomats and journalists unrestricted access 

to East Turkestan to independently document the conditions in the region. 

3. Call on China to free Ilham Tohti and his students and all writers and reporters. 

4. Ask China to change its repressive policy, which is root cause of all bloody 

incidents in Uyghur region. 

5. Meet Uyghur leaders and activists at the White House. 

6. Create a special coordinator office at the State Department for the 

Uyghurs. 

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PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, A U.S. REPRESENTATIVE

FROM NEW JERSEY; CHAIRMAN, CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE COMMISSION ON CHINA

This has been another dark and difficult year for Chinese rights defenders and 

democracy activists. Under President Xi Jinping’s version of the rule by law, the law 

is being used to more severely curb the freedom of expression, civil society, religious 

freedom, and other fundamental rights. 

Chinese courts have convicted rights activists and lawyers of ‘‘subversion of state 

power’’ for simply seeking to represent religious groups, petitioners, and democracy 

advocates. 

China’s diverse religious communities faced even more restrictions, as new regulations, and a ‘‘sinicization’’ campaign, will further politicize religious life and lead to 

more repression. 

In Hong Kong, mainland China’s political interference and its abduction of booksellers threatens the rule of law and Hong Kong’s promised autonomy, contributing 

to a growing climate of insecurity. 

Internationally, China continues to push a relativistic version of human rights, 

characterizing universal values as ‘‘Western’’ values that do not apply to China’s national situation. 

The next Administration faces major challenges in dealing with China. A new approach is needed that learns the lessons of the past and listens to those who have 

suffered prison and persecution to advance fundamental freedoms in China. 

The problem is that U.S. diplomacy is stuck with policies that no longer match 

Chinese realities. For the past two decades, U.S. policy was based on the belief that 

China’s growing prosperity would bring political reforms and the rule of law. We 

focused on integrating China into the international system, ignoring clear evidence 

that China, under the Communist Party’s leadership, would play by its own rules. 

China has not become a ‘‘responsible stakeholder’’ in the international system as 

predicted. Quite the contrary, despite decades of remarkable economic growth, Beijing’s leaders are increasingly dismissive of ‘‘Western influence’’ and hostile to both 

free societies and democratic capitalism. 

A strategy of engagement through trade, investment, and people-to-people exchanges has not lead to a freer China and remains cold comfort to China’s repressed 

human rights lawyers, religious and ethnic minority groups, journalists, and civil 

society leaders. 

The U.S. must recognize that China’s internal repression drives its external aggression and develop new policy approaches that intertwine our principles and interests in the pivotal Asia-Pacific region. 

Working with the Congress, the next Administration should be prepared to bolster 

U.S. strategic advantages in the Asia-Pacific. This will mean improving military 

readiness, insisting on freer and fairer trade, strengthening relations with regional 

partners, and making more robust commitments to advancing democratic institutions, human rights, and the rule of law. 

This last point will require the U.S. to push China to embrace greater transparency and better adherence to universal standards. It will require the next Administration to shine a bright light on human rights abuses and level meaningful 

sanctions in response to these abuses. The U.S. must also find ways to support China’s reformers, dissidents, and its champions of liberty and the rule of law. 

The bipartisan Congressional-Executive Commission on China (CECC), which we 

cochair, recently issued its 2016 Annual Report with specific recommendations for 

ways to pursue human rights and the rule of law within U.S.-China relations. 

This report is the ‘‘gold standard’’ of human rights reports on China. I want to 

publicly commend the CECC staff for their efforts producing the report. It is a big 

task and I appreciate their hard work. The report should be required reading for 

Members of Congress interested in China, journalists writing on China, and for Administration officials looking to develop strategies to engage with China. 

The need for principled and consistent American leadership is more important 

than ever, as China’s growing economic clout, and persistent diplomatic efforts, have 

succeeded in dampening global criticism of its escalating repression and failures to 

adhere to universal standards. 

We owe a new approach to Liu Xiaobo, Li Heping, and the thousands of other suffering prisoners of conscience. And, we owe it to future generations of Americans, 

whose security and prosperity will depend on a U.S.-China relationship that is open 

and transparent, free of censorship and persecution, based in adherence to universal 

standards and, hopefully; increasingly democratic. 

68 

PREPARED STATEMENT OF HON. MARCO RUBIO, A U.S. SENATOR FROM FLORIDA; 

COCHAIRMAN, CONGRESSIONAL-EXECUTIVE COMMISSION ON CHINA

DECEMBER 7, 2016

Thank you Chairman Smith and thank you to all of the witnesses gathered here 

today—this is an impressive group of men and women who have important stories 

to share about their own personal suffering and that of their family members and 

associates at the hands of the Chinese government and Communist Party. Their experiences must not be viewed in isolation, rather they are representative of untold 

numbers of other Chinese, Tibetans and Uyghurs who daily face repression. Today 

I joined Rep. Smith in sending a letter to the Chinese Ambassador to raise our concern and seek additional information about a spate of detentions involving prominent Chinese human rights advocates, as well American citizen Sandy Phan-Gillis 

who has been arbitrarily detained for twenty-one months now—I submit a copy of 

that correspondence for the Record. 

Before going any further, I’d like to take a moment at this hearing, the last CECC 

hearing of the 114th Congress, to recognize Chairman Smith for his capable and 

principled leadership of the Commission. He is an unrelenting advocate for human 

rights and rule of law in China and around the globe and I look forward to continuing to partner with him in the new Congress—because as today’s testimony will 

no doubt make clear, the mandate and mission of this Commission is as vital as 

ever. 

The Commission’s recently released Annual Report painted an undeniably bleak 

picture regarding the deterioration of human rights and the rule of law in China, 

with especially grave consequences for civil society, religious believers, human 

rights lawyers, and labor activists. Since the Report’s release in October 2016, those 

abuses have continued apace in the last two months. 

As the Report documents and as new stories from the last several weeks underscore, Beijing has become increasingly brazen in exerting its extraterritorial reach. 

This was especially true in the outrageous abductions of the Hong Kong booksellers 

last year—including Swedish national Gui Minhai who is still being held by Chinese 

authorities at an undisclosed location—and now more recently in China’s unprecedented intervention in Hong Kong’s legal system in the cases surrounding two 

democratically elected politicians who won seats in the Legislative Council on platforms calling for democratic self-determination for Hong Kong. The ripple effects of 

this ruling are not fully known yet as the Hong Kong government has now taken 

additional steps targeting opposition lawmakers. This is gravely concerning and 

something which the Commission, and the Congress, will be watching closely in the 

coming year especially as it relates to the Hong Kong Policy Act. 

Returning to the focus of today’s hearing, we are at a critical juncture in U.S.- 

China relations, and there is much wisdom to be gleaned, for the incoming administration, from dissident voices. 

December will mark fifteen years since China gained entry to the World Trade 

Organization. It is past time to take stock of our approach and recognize that despite what proponents at the time believed would happen, China has in fact used 

the international rules-based system to fuel vast economic growth, while further restricting freedom and increasing repression. Quite simply, many of the principles 

which have undergirded U.S.-China relations during Democrat and Republican administrations alike in recent decades have not yielded the desired outcomes. 

A perennial critique from those who care about human rights issues has been that 

the U.S. foreign policy apparatus risks ghettoizing human rights concerns, only giving them the prominence they merit during infrequent, and often ineffective, human 

rights dialogues and then relegating these issues to the sidelines in high-level bilateral engagement. 

The Obama administration struggled to integrate human rights issues at the 

highest levels sending unmistakable signals early on, as was famously reported during then Secretary Clinton’s inaugural trip to China in 2009 that human rights 

issues, quote, ‘‘can’t interfere with the global economic crisis, the global climate 

change crisis and the security crisis.’’ Words have consequences, midlevel appointees 

at the State Department and elsewhere take them to heart. As such, it will be critical, during the early days of the new administration, for the Secretary and other 

senior diplomats to put down markers on these issues which are of central import 

not only to the Chinese people, but to U.S. national interests. For as history has 

shown us, where rule of law fails to take root, where human rights abuses are committed with impunity, where international obligations are violated, the U.S. should 

not expect to find a responsible global stakeholder. 

69 

I look forward to hearing from our witnesses on this important topic. Today’s 

hearing was scheduled to coincide with the commemoration of Human Rights Day 

this weekend, and also with the sixth anniversary of the awarding of the Nobel 

Peace Prize to Chinese dissident and writer Liu Xiaobo—an honor he has not been 

able to rightfully claim given that still today he languishes unjustly in prison, serving an eleven-year sentence handed down for his essays criticizing the Chinese government. 

The U.S. must commit anew to standing with China’s reformers and dissidents, 

embracing their aspirations and consistently pressing the Chinese Government and 

Communist Party to respect basic human rights and uphold the rule of law. I look 

forward to today’s testimony and policy recommendations. 

70 

SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD

STATEMENT SUBMITTED FOR THE RECORD BY ENGHEBATU TOGOCHOG, OF THE

SOUTHERN MONGOLIAN HUMAN RIGHTS INFORMATION CENTER (SMHRIC) 

DECEMBER 7, 2016

Dear Chairperson Christopher Smith, Co-Chair Marco Rubio and distinguished 

members of the Commission, 

It is my great honor to have this opportunity to bring to your attention the deteriorating human rights conditions and worsening humanitarian crisis in the Mongolian areas in China. 

14 years ago, on August 5, 2002, on behalf of the Southern Mongolian Human 

Rights Information Center (SMHRIC), I testified before the Commission and 

brought to the attention of the Commission the specific human rights violation cases 

including the cases of political prisoners Mr. Hada, Mr.Tegexi and the Chinese authorities’ state-sponsored forced displacement of Mongolian herders from their ancestral lands. 

We are truly grateful to the Commission for its great effort in the past 14 years 

to raise public awareness of human rights issues of the Mongolian people by including a great deal of information we provided into the Commission’s annual reports 

as well as updating its political prisoner database with the cases of Mongolian dissidents and activists who have been arrested, detained and imprisoned by the Chinese authorities for promoting and defending their basic human rights and fundamental freedoms. 

Yet, 14 years later today, human rights situations of the Mongolian people in 

China have gone from bad to worse. Mr. Hada, President of the Southern Mongolian 

Democratic Alliance, is still under house arrest in an apartment owned and guarded 

by the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region Public Security authorities, after serving 

the full term of 15 years imprisonment and an additional 4-year extrajudicial detention. 

Despite the Chinese authorities’ cruel torture and inhumane treatment in the 

past 21 years, Hada has consistently refused to admit that he committed any crime. 

Recently Hada completed his written appeal to the Chinese Supreme People’s Court, 

demanding the Chinese authorities retry his case for the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region Public Security authorities illegally sentencing him to 15 years in prison, holding him for another 4 years of extrajudicial detention, and maltreating and 

persecuting him and his family members. 

Hada’s family members including Ms. Xinna and son Mr.Uiles are still under 

tight surveillance and subjected to constant harassment by the Chinese Public Security and State Security authorities after spending multiple and extended period of 

extrajudicial detentions for defending their rights and refusing to cooperate with the 

authorities. 

Xinna, was arrested on December 4, 2010, on a trumped-up charge of ‘‘involvement in illegal business,’’ referring to her Mongolian Studies Bookstore. In April 

2012, she was sentenced to three years in prison with five years reprieve on the 

same charge. 

In 2002, the then 17-year-old Uiles, was arrested and sentenced to two years in 

prison for another trumped-up case of ‘‘involvement in robbery.’’ On December 5, 

2010, Uiles was arrested for ‘‘illegal drug possession.’’ After nearly a year of detention, he was discharged but was placed under ‘‘residential surveillance,’’ a form of 

house arrest. 

Another case we would like to highlight is the case of Ms. Huuchinhuu Govruud, 

a human rights defender, dissident writer and activist. A month ago, Huuchinhuu 

died of cancer at the age of 61 in her home place of Tongliao Municipality. Until 

her last breath, at her deathbed she had been monitored and guarded by Chinese 

State Security personnel around the clock for her ‘‘possible threat to the national 

interest and state security of China.’’ 

Huuchinhuu’s son, and only family member, Mr. Cheel Borjigin, himself has also 

been diagnosed with brain cancer and is receiving chemotherapy in Minneapolis, the 

United States. As an outspoken critic of the Chinese Government, returning to visit 

his mother had been totally impossible for Cheel. His multiple requests to the Chinese Government to allow his mother to come to the United States for medical treatment have been turned down. 

In early November 2010, Huuchinhuu was arrested by the Chinese authorities for 

rallying the Mongolians via the Internet to cheer for the scheduled release of Hada. 

71 

After nearly two years of enforced disappearance and extrajudicial detention, 

Huuchinhuu was placed under house arrest in one of her relatives’ residences in 

Tongliao Municipality. She was denied the right to communication, including by 

Internet, phone access and postal service. 

On November 28, 2012, Huuchinhuu was tried behind closed doors and pronounced guilty by the Tongliao Municipality People’s Court for ‘‘providing state secrets to a foreign organization.’’ Since then, she has virtually been placed under indefinite house arrest. 

In 2007, she was denied a passport for her ‘‘possible threat to the national interest and state security of China.’’ Since then, her requests to visit her son in the 

United States and receive medical treatment abroad have consistently been rejected 

by the Chinese authorities. 

Mr. Chairman, over the past 14 years, hundreds other Mongolian dissidents, activists and writers have been arrested, detained, sent to jail and placed under house 

arrest for expressing their political views, promoting and protecting freedom of 

speech, freedom of press and freedom of assembly. 

In addition to these cases of Mongolian political prisoners, dissidents and activists, here I would like to turn to the worsening humanitarian crisis unfolded in 

rural Mongolian communities as a direct result of the Chinese authorities’ intensifying economic exploitation, resource extraction, cultural eradication and environmental destruction in Mongolian areas. The very survival of the Mongolians as a 

distinct people is threatened. Their right to maintain their traditional way of life, 

and their right to access their land, water and other resources are completely denied. The Mongolians who maintained their pastoralist way of life for thousands of 

years are now forced by the Chinese authorities to give up their traditional life-style 

to give way to expanding Chinese encroachment. 

Since 2001, the Chinese government has implemented the so-called ‘‘Ecological 

Migration’’ policy in rural Mongolian pastoralist communities. This policy was officially instituted to forcibly relocate the entire Mongolian pastoralist population from 

their ancestral grazing lands to the predominantly Chinese populated agricultural 

and urban areas in the name of ‘‘protecting the grassland eco-system’’ and ‘‘improving the living standard of rural communities.’’ 

Another policy adopted for the purpose of putting an end to the Mongolian traditional way life was the ‘‘Livestock Grazing Ban’’ (or ‘‘jin mu’’). Under this policy, 

Mongolian herders grazing livestock on their own pastures were considered criminals and subjected to large fines or confiscation of their livestock. 

Mr. Chair, when I testified before the Commission in 2002, these policies were 

just adopted. 14 years later today, these policies achieved their determined goal 

with the desired outcome: putting to an end to the millennia-old nomadic civilization 

within the borders of China. 

According to a statement posted on May 30, 2012 on the official website of the 

Central People’s Government of the People’s Republic of China, the State Council 

Steering Committee meeting hosted by Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao passed the 

‘‘Twelfth Five-Year Plan for the Project on Resettling Nomadic People within 

China.’’ The announcement marks a major and seemingly final step toward eliminating the remaining population of nomad herders and eradicating the thousands 

of years old nomadic way of life in China. 

According to the statement, the Twelfth Five-Year Plan aimed to resettle the remaining nomad population of 246,000 households or 1.157 million nomads by the 

end of 2015. The socio-economic and political purposes of the plan were stated ‘‘to 

accelerate the development mode shift of animal husbandry and grassland eco-system protection in pastoralist areas, to maintain ethnic harmony and frontier stability, and to lay a firm foundation for building an all around prosperous society.’’ 

Another earlier statement posted on August 3, 2011 on the Chinese State Council 

website states that the Chinese Ministry of Finance allocated a special fund of 1.7 

billion Yuan to the project of resettling nomadic herders particularly in ‘‘Xinjiang 

(including Xinjiang Development Corps), Inner Mongolia and Tibet.’’ 

With the Mongolian out, now it is time for the Chinese to be in. In 2009, the Chinese Central Government announced in that the Mongolian regions became the 

largest ‘‘energy base of China.’’ Chinese extractive industries immediately started to 

rush to the Mongolian grasslands to open up coal, gas, oil, and other minerals, not 

only destroying the natural environment, but also escalating the tension between 

the Chinese and the Mongolians. 

Tensions have escalated between the Mongolian herders and the Chinese authorities as clashes took place almost on a daily basis. In 2011, the brutal killing of a 

Mongolian herder named Mergen by a Chinese mining truck sparked a large-scale, 

region-wide protest by Mongolian herders and students. Chinese authorities mobiVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:27 Mar 16, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00075 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6621 U:\DOCS\23081 DIEDRE
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lized the People’s Liberation Army and large numbers of police forces to crackdown 

on the protest. 

Since then violent clashes have been widespread between Mongolian herders, who 

are attempting to defend their land, and Chinese miners, who open up mines recklessly to destroy the grassland for profit. Defending the interest of the Chinese miners and settlers, Chinese authorities are using excessive force, including police and 

prison system to crack down on the Mongolians. Many herders who defended their 

land and demand justice have been assaulted, injured, hospitalized, arrested, detained, and sent to jail. 

As a result of large-scale unregulated mining, unscrupulous resource extraction 

and uncontrolled agricultural practices by the Chinese, Mongolian grassland ecosystem has seriously been destroyed; lakes and rivers are dried up; underground 

water is depleted; air and water is heavily polluted; the Mongolians herders who 

have been kicked out of their land have become landless and homeless on their ancestral land. 

In response to these humanitarian crisis and environmental destruction, Mongolian herders are standing up to defend their right to survival. In the past year alone 

nearly 80 major protest and clashes are reported, and no less than 1000 herders 

have been arrested, detained, and sent to jail for defending their land. 

We ask the Commission to continue to pay closer attention to the development 

of deteriorating human rights situations and deepening humanitarian crisis in the 

Mongolian areas of China, and pressure the Chinese Government to take a prompt 

action to prevent the situations from becoming worse. 

Thank you. 

Enghebatu Togochog 

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DISSIDENTS WHO HAVE SUFFERED FOR HUMAN RIGHTS IN CHINA: A LOOK BACK AND A LOOK FORWARD

DECEMBER 7, 2016

Witness Biographies 

Chen Guangcheng, Chinese legal advocate; Distinguished Visiting Fellow, 

Institute for Policy Research and Catholic Studies, Catholic University 

Mr. Chen Guangcheng is a Chinese legal advocate and activist. Mr. Chen is from 

rural China, where he advocated on behalf of people with disabilities, and exposed 

and challenged abuses of population planning officials, including forced abortions 

and sterilizations. Mr. Chen was imprisoned for his activism for four years. Following an additional two years of extrajudicial confinement at his home, Mr. Chen 

escaped in 2012 and came to the United States with his family. His courageous escape from China is detailed in his 2015 memoir, ‘‘The Barefoot Lawyer: A Blind 

Man’s Fight for Justice and Freedom in China.’’ In addition to his position at the 

Catholic University, Mr. Chen is also a Senior Distinguished Advisor to the Lantos 

Foundation for Human Rights and Justice. 

Penpa Tsering, Representative of His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Office of 

Tibet, Washington, DC 

Mr. Penpa Tsering is the Representative of the Office of Tibet in Washington, DC. 

He was born in 1967 in Bylakuppe, south India and is a member of the Tibetan 

Parliament. He studied at the Central School for Tibetans, Bylakuppe, and topped 

the merit list in Class XII. He graduated with an Economics Major from the Madras 

Christian College, Chennai. During his student days, he served as the General Secretary of both the Tibetan Freedom Movement and Nigerian Tibet Friendship Association. Later he served as the General Secretary of the Central Executive Committee of Do-mey. He then worked as the Executive Director at the Tibetan Parliamentary and Research Centre in New Delhi from 2001–2008 before being sworn 

in as the speaker of the 14th Tibetan Parliament in 2008. Penpa Tsering was elected to the 12th, 13th, and 14th Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile. He was elected as the 

Speaker of the 14th Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile with Mr Karma Choephel on 31 

May 2006. During the 15th Tibetan Parliament-in-Exile in 2011, he again held the 

Speaker’s post. 

Yang Jianli, President, Initiatives for China/Citizen Power for China 

Dr. Yang Jianli is President of Initiatives for China/Citizen Power for China. Dr. 

Yang is a scholar and democracy activist internationally recognized for his efforts 

to promote democracy in China. He has been involved in the pro-democracy movement in China since the 1980s and was forced to flee China in 1989 after the 

Tiananmen Square massacre. He holds Ph.Ds in mathematics from the University 

of California at Berkeley and in political economy and government from Harvard 

University’s Kennedy School of Government. In 2002, Dr. Yang returned to China 

to support the labor movement and was imprisoned by Chinese authorities for espionage and illegal entry. Following his release in 2007, he founded Initiatives for 

China, a non-governmental organization that promotes China’s peaceful transition 

to democracy. In March 2010, Dr. Yang co-chaired the Committee on Internet Freedom at the Geneva Human Rights and Democracy Summit. 

Bob Fu, Founder and President, ChinaAid Association 

Pastor Bob Fu was a leader in the 1989 student democracy movement in 

Tiananmen Square and later became a house church pastor. In 1996, authorities arrested and imprisoned Pastor Fu and his wife for their work. After their release, 

they escaped to the United States and, in 2002, he founded the ChinaAid Association. ChinaAid monitors and reports on religious freedom in China and provides a 

forum for discussion among experts on religion, law, and human rights in China. 

Pastor Fu is frequently interviewed by media outlets around the world and has testified at U.S. congressional hearings. He has also appeared before the European 

Parliament and the United Nations. Pastor Fu holds a double bachelor’s degree from 

People’s University and the Institute of Foreign Relations, and he has taught at the 

Central Party School in Beijing. In the United States, he earned a master’s degree 

from Westminster Theological Seminary, where he is now working on his Ph.D. 

Wei Jingsheng, Chairman, Overseas Chinese Democracy Coalition 

Mr. Wei Jingsheng is a long-time leader of the opposition against the Chinese 

Communist dictatorship. He was sentenced to jail twice for a total of more than 18 

years due to his democracy activism, including a groundbreaking and well-publicized essay he wrote in 1978: ‘‘The Fifth Modernization—Democracy.’’ He is a winVerDate Nov 24 2008 13:27 Mar 16, 2017 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00079 Fmt 6601 Sfmt 6621 U:\DOCS\23081 DIEDRE
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ner of numerous human rights awards and the author of the book ‘‘The Courage to 

Stand Alone—Letters from Prison and Other Writings.’’ After his exile to the United 

States in 1997, he founded and has been the chairman of the Overseas Chinese Democracy Coalition which is an umbrella organization for many Chinese democracy 

groups, with members in dozens of countries. He is also the president of both the 

Wei Jingsheng Foundation and the Asia Democracy Alliance. 

Wang Xiaodan (Danielle Wang), Falun Gong practitioner and daughter of 

former political prisoner Wang Zhiwen 

Ms. Wang Xiaodan was born in Beijing, China. Danielle Wang began practicing 

the exercise and meditation system Falun Gong in her youth with her father, Wang 

Zhiwen. In 1998, she moved to America for her studies and the following year the 

Chinese Communist Party began its persecution of Falun Gong practitioners. This 

put her father in prison and set her on the path of calling for help in hopes of rescuing him for the next 17 years. He was released in 2014, but was denied exit from 

China when Danielle and her husband attempted to bring him to the United States 

in August 2016. 

Rebiya Kadeer, President, World Uyghur Congress 

Ms. Rebiya Kadeer is a prominent human rights advocate and leader of the 

Uyghur people. She is the mother of 11 children, and a former laundress turned millionaire. She spent six years in a Chinese prison for standing up to the authoritarian Chinese government. Before her arrest in 1999, she was a well-known 

Uyghur businesswoman and at one time among the wealthiest individuals in the 

People’s Republic of China. Ms. Kadeer has been actively campaigning for the 

human rights of the Uyghur people since her release from prison in 2005. She has 

been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize several times since 2006. Despite Chinese 

government efforts to discredit her, Ms. Kadeer remains the pro-democracy Uyghur 

leader and heads the World Uyghur Congress, which represents the collective interest of Uyghurs around the world. 

Æ