Chinese Saga of Olympic Shame Continues.... -- Cries from Around the
World: 'Freedom First, Olympics Second!'

'Freedom First, Olympics Second!'

DC demonstration coincides with a letter from Reporters Without Borders
to call attention to China's lack of progress in its promise to improve
human rights for the Olympics in Beijing

By Gary Feuerberg

Epoch Times Washington, D.C. Staff

Jul 09, 2007

http://en.epochtimes.com/news_images/2007-7-8-olympicschain.jpg
Reporters Without Borders initiated its "Beijing 2008" campaign with a
handcuff Olympic symbol to remind people of the nature of the Chinese
communist party. (www.rsf.org)

When the statue of the Victims of Communism Memorial was dedicated on
June 12, the speakers, including President Bush, spoke of the victims of
communism as if they were all from the past. The Memorial commemorates
the more than 100 million who perished under Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot and
other tyrants. But communist regimes are still left standing in the
world, and their prisons are still holding political and religious victims.

Today, communism still rules over 25%% of the world's population and its
oppressive nature has not changed.

On Monday, July 2, the Victims of Communism Memorial, with its statue of
a replica of the Goddess of Democracy, was a gathering place for a
peaceful demonstration against the leading surviving communist regime,
the People's Republic of China.

The statue is an inspiring bronze figure of three meters. The Memorial
is located at the intersection of Massachusetts Ave., New Jersey Ave.
and G Street, N.W., two blocks from Union Station. The monument and its
dedication three weeks earlier had caused a bit of a stir with the
communists. "The Foreign Ministry of Communist China and the leader of
the Russian Communist Party both denounced the Memorial," according to
the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation website.

Most of the protesters at the Victims Memorial on Monday were members of
the China Peace and Democracy Federation (CPDF) and were calling for a
renewal of the "June 4th" Democracy Movement, echoing the pro-democracy
movement that was brought to a sudden end by tanks and the PRC army at
Tiananmen Square on June 4, 1989.

"Today, in the United States, the statue of the Goddess of Democracy is
standing again, and here we initiate a second June 4th. We demand an end
of this evil regime," said CPDF chairman Baiqiao Tang. At the time when
Beijing was the epicenter of the pro-democracy movement, Tang was
participating as a pro-democracy student activist in Hunan province,
China. After the Tiananmen Square massacre, Tang fled south to Guangdong
province, but was found and arrested, and spent three years in jail for
his pro-democracy advocacy.

The crowd laid fresh flowers at the feet of the goddess and bowed before
the statue for a moment of silence. They were showing respect for the
"souls" killed by Communism worldwide, two-thirds of whom were Chinese,
said Tang.

Freedom First, Olympics Second!

Besides the pro-democracy sentiments, the Olympic boycott is another
rallying cry by those opposed to Chinese communism.

"China holds the world's record in mass murder, and to host the Olympics
is an undeserved reward for crimes against humanity," said John Kusumi,
president of the China Support Network (http://www.chinasupport.net/).

Kusumi said it was not just the atrocities of the past and the killing
of 80 millions that he objected to, but its continuation into the
present that made it unconscionable for the United States to participate
in the Olympics. He referred to the rounding up of Falun Gong
practitioners and the organ harvesting as matters that shock the
conscience. He asked: how can we participate in "games" when
"life-and-death issues" are at stake?

The timing of Kusumi's remarks coincided with a campaign launched by
Reporters Without Borders to call attention to the Beijing Olympics and
the lack of any progress in addressing the human rights situation in
China that was promised when the Olympics were awarded to Beijing in
2001. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) held a session in
Guatemala City from July 4 to 7, just two days following this
demonstration at the Victims of Communism Memorial.

With only 13 months left before the start of the Games, the press
freedom organization said in a letter June 28 to International Olympic
Committee president Jacques Rogge, it was time to call "attention to the
cynicism of the Chinese government's refusal to allow greater freedom of
expression and release the approximately 100 journalists and
cyber-dissidents it is holding."

"Throughout the world, concern is growing about the holding of these
Olympics, which have been taken hostage by a government that balks at
taking action to guarantee freedom of expression and respect for the
Olympic Charter's humanistic values…," says the letter to IOC president
Rogge. It continues:

"You know better than anyone that the…Communist Party attach[es] the
utmost importance to the success of the Olympic Games for their own
sakes, but without keeping any of the promises they have made. Mr.
[Rogge], it is not too late to get the Chinese organisers, who are for
the most part also senior political officials, to release prisoners of
conscience, reform repressive laws and end censorship…"

Kusumi summed it up at the July 2 demonstration by the phrase, "Freedom
first, Olympics second!"

Reporters Without Borders' campaign "Beijing 2008" uses an eye-catching
graphic of the Olympic rings replaced by handcuffs. "The organisation
will distribute this campaign ad all over the world for one year,
without any let-up," says Reporters without Borders. The graphic is
available in a high-definition version (EPS, 300 DPI, CMJN) and in six
languages at www.rsf.org.

"Communism is Not Dead Yet!"

Although President Bush was criticized at this gathering for speaking
primarily in the past tense, it was pointed out that the president read
from his speech: "The evil and hatred that inspired the death of tens of
millions of people in the 20th century is still at work in the world."

Tianliang Zhang, Epoch Times commentator, reminded the crowd that the
Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is continuing mass killings of Falun Gong
practitioners and suppresses political dissidents, Christian home
churches, Tibetan monks and ordinary people. The Victims of Communism
Memorial is different than other memorials such as the Vietnam Veterans
Memorial, he explained, in that the suffering continues under communism.
"Communism is not dead yet," Zhang said.

Zhang referred to the Epoch Times publication of the Nine Commentaries
on the Communist Party two and half years ago, which describe the crimes
committed by the CCP and its evil nature. This series of articles
ignited a mass campaign of "moral awakening." More than 23 million
people have denounced the CCP by quitting it or its affiliated
organizations, he said.

"The Communist Party can do evil because its propaganda brainwashes
people, and its violence compels people to comply and cooperate with
it," Zhang said. The Nine Commentaries helps people to see through the
CCP lies and encourages them to resist the evil. This has led to "a mass
consolidation of righteous forces in China," and non-violent resistance
campaign in China. People are helping other people by spreading the Nine
Commentaries and helping those who have not quit the CCP to do so, he said.

"This process is the process of dissolving the CCP peacefully. It is
also a process of peaceful transformation of China from a Communist
Party regime to a free society," said Zhang.

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