Date: 1997-10-23
Speaker: LINDA SMITH (republican)
Chamber: H
State: Washington

Mr. Speaker. last Friday Representative PELOSI. Representative WOLF. and myself. LINDA SMITH. asked the Attorney General. Janet Reno. to launch a formal inquiry and prosecute all violators of U.S. laws who have illegally trafficked in human organs. A little over a week ago. there was a documentary shown by ABC. and it showed footage of men and women of Asian descent in China lined up in rows. with one person holding them with their hands behindjheir back and another person with a rifle to their head. You watched then a military leader. I do not know what the rank. walk behind them and reposition the gun. It was so that the execution made sure that the organs were left in the best order for the person that was in the red army. the Peoples Liberation Army hospital run by the military just a short ways away. ready for the kidneys from these executed prisoners. It went on to show that this was a common practice. as testified by doctors in the United States and China. People that have been involved. it is reported that there are nearly 4.000 of them at least last year just for the harvesting. as they call it. of their kidneys. If these allegations are true. we are talking about men and women being treated like animals. no more than like cattle being lined up to be used for the benefit of someone else. I believe America is too good for this. but they are way too good for participating in it. because something more was revealed. I have known this for some time. Some of the tapes that were delivered to the administration a year ago asking them to defend. to do something. to speak out showed that Americans were involved. The tape goes on. though. and shows some things new. and it shows that the Chinese government or folks from China have been coming in on student visas and that they are actually the agents that market for $5.000 down a prisoners vital organ. In this case it was kidneys. They say. though. that they can match anybody. because they have thousands. maybe millions of people. of whatever match and they can take blood type and tissue type and make sure that the rejection is low. because they have so many specimens to draw from in their prisons. The reports we get from American Amnesty and other groups is that the increase in the arrests is growing at a great rate in China for folks that just get together to pray In a church. or are of the wrong religion. not okayed by the government. coming together. like possibly Moslem in some cases. Catholic. and that this is what they fill their prisons with. So this is not people even who are hardened criminals. We have asked the Attorney General to go through all the American laws. We have found so far it is against the law to traffic in organs and to get consideration from them. So the people involved and the corporations that set up the dialysis and stayed involved and corporate heads who have testified to this. we have asked them to be deposed. We have asked the people that are selling. that we have identified and given the names and the visa numbers to the FBI. to be retained and not allowed to leave the country. But more than that. we have asked the President next week when he hosts a party for the President of China to ask him to put a stop to this atrocity carried off by his military in modern hospitals set up by American equipment. dialysis corporations. We need our President to speak out. because that has what has been good about America for many years. Often not foreign policy that is passed by Congress. but a leadership that speaks out and says we have a balanced approach to dealing with other countries. I plead with the President tonight to please speak out for people around the world. and I plead for this Congress to pass a resolution in the next few days. tomorrow. next week that calls for a united voice against this practice.