54th Tibetan Uprising Day - Yonge Dundas Square Toronto

To mark the 54th Tibetan National Uprising Day on March 10, 2013, several thousand Canadian Tibetans in the GTA took part in a massive protest rally in Toronto in front of China's Consulate-General on St. George St. The protest rally was followed by a Tibetan Cultural rally at Yonge-Dundas Square. Leaders from various political parties and the Tibetan community addressed the public gathering at Yonge-Dundas Square. Here is the speech by Mark Daye of the Green Party of Ontario.

Tibetan Uprising Day

The Green Party of Canada is observing the 54th Tibetan Uprising Day this Sunday. On March 10th 1959, the people of Tibet rose against China's illegal rule. Thousands of Tibetans were massacred and His Holiness the Dalai Lama had to flee into exile. It will be an honour for me to attend on behalf of Green Party of Canada Leader, Elizabeth May.

To mark the 54th Tibetan National Uprising Day on March 10, 2013, around 3000 Canadian Tibetans in the GTA will take part in a massive protest rally in Toronto that will start at 10:00 am in front of China's Consulate-General at 240 St. George St. The protest rally will be followed by a Tibetan Cultural rally on Yonge St. starting at 11:00 AM from the Bloor St. and Yonge St. intersection to reach Yonge-Dundas Square by 12:00 noon. Leaders from various political parties and the Tibetan community will address the 3000-strong public gathering at Yonge-Dundas Square. The rally will also carry 99 dummy coffins draped in the Tibetan national flag to remember and to show respect to those Tibetans who have died so far through self-immolation in Tibet.

After the Communist Party of China came to power in 1949, China began its invasion of independent Tibet. By 1959 the People's Liberation Army of China and its military garrison controlled Lhasa, the capital city of Tibet. The Communist Party of China began its rule of Tibet, bringing irreparable destruction to Tibet's rich culture and unprecedented loss of human lives through the ruthless implementation of authoritarian Communist rule all over Tibet.

The desperation of Tibetans has led to over 107 self-immolation suicides in recent years. The situation in Tibet is an international crisis. Harper’s Conservatives recently created the Office of Religious Freedom: will it remain silent on the Tibetan question? If protecting religious minorities is really a ‘foreign policy priority’ for Canada, now is the time to send the Office’s ambassador to Tibet. 

Green Leader Elizabeth May, Member of Parliament for Saanich-Gulf Islands.

Not able to bear the loss of national independence, loss of individual freedom and destruction of rich cultural heritage including freedom of religion, on 10th March 1959 the Tibetan people rose up against Communist China's rule in Tibet. This national uprising was suppressed with use of brute military force of the People's Liberation Army of China. Although many thousands were massacred during the uprising and Tibetan leader His Holiness the Dalai Lama was forced to flee to India in exile, the Tibetan people's struggle for freedom continued with same resilience and hope. Since 2009, 107 Tibetans inside Tibet have burnt themselves alive through self-immolation to convey a strong message to China and to the world that Tibetans are as determined and committed as they were in 1959 to seek freedom, justice and equality. Through these peaceful means Tibetans also wanted to send a strong message to China that Tibetans are willing to make the ultimate sacrifice to be free, to be treated fairly and to be treated equally without discrimination in the land of their birth. Tibet, today, remains one of the most oppressed and discriminated place on earth.

Tibetans will dress in their traditional Tibetan provincial and regional costumes and accessories to showcase their rich and unique cultural identity. In this cultural rally Tibetans will also exhibit their unique spiritual and Buddhist rituals and practices.

This is an opportune time for China’s new leader to act on his recent expression supporting democracy. There can be no democracy without respect for Human Rights. Recognizing the leadership presently in exile as the legitimate leaders of the Tibetan people and upholding the earlier negotiated autonomy within China would prove China’s new direction to the world. 

~ Joe Foster, Human Rights Critic for the Green Party of Canada.

Last week, Lobsang Sangay, exiled Tibetans’ political leader, called on Canada’s ambassador for religious freedom to investigate in Tibet.

Chinese police force Nobel Peace Prize winner's wife to leave home

The 2010 Nobel Peace Prize winner's wife Liu Xia was being forced to leave her home in Beijing by plainclothes police officers Friday, she told Reuters during a phone interview shortly after the prize was awarded.

The officers said they wanted to take Liu to the prison in Jinzhou in the northeastern province of Liaoning, where her husband Liu Xiaobo is being held in an apparent effort to prevent foreign reporters from speaking to her, she said.

Nobel Peace Prize 2010 Awarded to Liu Xiaobo

The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided to award the Nobel Peace Prize for 2010 to Liu Xiaobo for his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights in China. The Norwegian Nobel Committee has long believed that there is a close connection between human rights and peace. Such rights are a prerequisite for the "fraternity between nations" of which Alfred Nobel wrote in his will.

Over the past decades, China has achieved economic advances to which history can hardly show any equal. The country now has the world's second largest economy; hundreds of millions of people have been lifted out of poverty.  Scope for political participation has also broadened.

China's new status must entail increased responsibility. China is in breach of several international agreements to which it is a signatory, as well as of its own provisions concerning political rights. Article 35 of China's constitution lays down that "Citizens of the People's Republic of China enjoy freedom of speech, of the press, of assembly, of association, of procession and of demonstration". In practice, these freedoms have proved to be distinctly curtailed for China's citizens.

For over two decades, Liu Xiaobo has been a strong spokesman for the application of fundamental human rights also in China.  He took part in the Tiananmen protests in 1989; he was a leading author behind Charter 08, the manifesto of such rights in China which was published on the 60th anniversary of the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the 10th of December 2008. The following year, Liu was sentenced to eleven years in prison and two years' deprivation of political rights for “inciting subversion of state power". Liu has consistently maintained that the sentence violates both China's own constitution and fundamental human rights.

The campaign to establish universal human rights also in China is being waged by many Chinese, both in China itself and abroad. Through the severe punishment meted out to him, Liu has become the foremost symbol of this wide-ranging struggle for human rights in China.

Banned In China

I was recently informed by someone who visited China that my blog is banned there.  My first thought upon hearing this news was 'no surprise there'. My second thought was, 'I should make a badge for my blog'.

I'm a bit busy these days, but I still wanted to proudly display my newfound censorednessism, or whatever one is when one is censored. So, rather than make a badge I simply googled 'banned in china' and I found pictures of t-shirts like the one on the right, which are available for purchase at Zazzle.com

I don't get a cut if you buy one, but I figured if I'm using their pic, I should give them credit.  Maybe one of these days I'll create my own badge, but for now I'll let people think the fit dude in the picture is me.

China to take the lead on climate?

Expectations were building for China to take the lead on climate change, as some 100 world leaders gather Tuesday to breathe new life into deadlocked negotiations.
UN chief Ban Ki-moon called the biggest-ever summit of national leaders on climate change some 100 days before a high stakes gathering in Copenhagen, which is meant to seal a successor to the landmark Kyoto Protocol.

We will have to wait and see, but China is trying to seal itself as a new world leader and the competition with India is getting fiercer, but a country like China could make very minor changes to its laws regarding pollution, industry waste and the like and due to its sheer size, would make a HUGE impact.

Any sort of pollution limitation and advances toward greener economies are still advances, but I have a feeling this may get blown out of proportion. Even with significant cuts to pollution and changes to laws, China would, like the United States, still be a major contributor to the amounts of pollution and greenhouse gases on earth.

This future is going to be very interesting.

Will this be China's biggest move yet to assert itself as the new world superpower?

That day is coming, and the west is currently funding it.

65% of China's Organ Donations From Death Row Prisoners

About 1.5 million people in China need transplants, but only about 10,000 operations are performed annually, according to the health ministry.

The scarcity of available organs has led to a thriving black market in trafficked organs, and in an effort to stop this the government passed a law in 2007 banning trafficking as well as the donation of organs to unrelated recipients.

But in practice, illegal transplants - some from living donors - are still frequently reported by the media and the Ministry of Health.

Click here for the full story from BBC News.

As I've often stated, I do NOT support the death penalty. NO government has the right to take any person's life, no matter how much we may dislike that person or what crimes they may have committed. There is also the inconsistencies in how the death penalty is applied to various racial groups, such as in the United States where the majority of those on death row are blacks. And finally there is the always present and very real possibility that the condemned person is actually innocent.

China Still Number One (for executions)

The number of prisoners put to death worldwide decreased in 2008, a human rights group said Wednesday, adding that China retained its position as the world's top executioner.

Executions in the United States were down from last year, while Iran and Saudi Arabia appeared near the top of the list of the world's top executioners, the anti-death penalty group Hands Off Cain said in a report about 2008 and the first six months of this year.

The group said that at least 5,727 executions were carried out in 2008, down from 5,851 the year before. It said that 46 countries retained the death penalty last year, three fewer than in 2007, with Burundi and Uzbekistan abolishing capital punishment, and Sierra Leone establishing itself as a de facto abolitionist by not having carried out any executions for more than 10 years.

The report said China accounted for at least 5,000 executions – or 87.3 per cent of the total – the same estimate as last year. Full Story

On the bright side, China claims that they will reduce the number in the years to come. I call that a bunch of crap. No state has the right to take ANY human life, period!

Chinese news service reported that gold medal gymnast was 13

Just nine months before the Beijing Olympics, the Chinese government's news agency, Xinhua, reported that gymnast He Kexin was 13, which would have made her ineligible to be on the team that won a gold medal this week.
In its report Nov. 3, Xinhua identified He as one of "10 big new stars" who made a splash at China's Cities Games. It gave her age as 13 and reported that she beat Yang Yilin on the uneven bars at those games. In the final, "this little girl" pulled off a difficult release move on the bars known as the Li Na, named for another Chinese gymnast, Xinhua said in the report, which appeared on one of its Web sites, www.hb.xinhuanet.com
The Associated Press found the Xinhua report on the site Thursday morning and saved a copy of the page. Later that afternoon, the Web site was still working but the page was no longer accessible. Sports editors at the state-run news agency would not comment for publication.
If the age reported by Xinhua was correct, that would have meant He was too young to be on the Chinese team that beat the United States on Wednesday and clinched China's first women's team Olympic gold in gymnastics. He is also a favorite for gold in Monday's uneven bars final.

Full Story from Sports Illustrated

NBC's Fake Olympic Fireworks

The glow of NBC's Olympic ratings victory threatens to be sullied by reports that the Beijing Olympic Committee and the network have been less-than-scrupulous in their presentation of the Summer Games.
Organizers are accused of mixing in fake CGI fireworks during Friday night's opening ceremony, while NBC is said to have added a bogus "Live" stamp to tape-delayed West Coast feed of competition coverage this weekend, and edited the "parade of nations" segment of the opening ceremony to delay the entrance of the U.S. Olympic Team.

Full story

Olympic child singing star a fake

The little girl who starred at the Olympic opening ceremony was miming and only put on stage because the real singer was not considered attractive enough, the show's musical director has revealed.
Pigtailed Lin Miaoke was selected to appear because of her cute appearance and did not sing a note, Chen Qigang, the general music designer of the ceremony, said in an interview with a state broadcaster aired Tuesday.
Photographs of Lin in a bright red party dress were published in newspapers and websites all over the world and the official China Daily hailed her as a rising star on Tuesday.
But Chen said the girl whose voice was actually heard by the 91,000 capacity crowd at the Olympic stadium during the spectacular ceremony was in fact seven-year-old Yang Peiyi, who has a chubby face and uneven teeth.
"The reason why little Yang was not chosen to appear was because we wanted to project the right image, we were thinking about what was best for the nation," Chen said in an interview that appeared briefly on the news website Sina.com before it was apparently wiped from the Internet in China.
Lin was seen to perform the patriotic song "Ode to the Motherland" as China's national flag was carried into the stadium, a key moment in the three hour ceremony.
"The reason was for the national interest. The child on camera should be flawless in image, internal feelings, and expression," said Chen, a renowned contemporary composer and French citizen.

Reporters Without Borders Radio Broadcast

Clandestine FM radio broadcast today in Beijing by Reporters Without Borders, hours before Olympic opening ceremony.
Members of Reporters Without Borders today broadcast "Radio Without Borders," China's only independent FM radio station, in Beijing just hours before the start of the Olympic Games opening ceremony. In a programme lasting 20 minutes, Reporters Without Borders secretary-general Robert Ménard and Chinese human rights activists called on the Chinese government to respect free speech.

Genocide Olympics

Don't Be Evil

I know this is not new news, but it doesn't hurt to remind you. Please visit the site and send the pre-written letter to Google.

Understatement of the year: "...A Deadly Weapon"

I read about this new weapons technology in the Toronto Edition of the Epoch Times. Aparently the Chinese tried to buy the technology from the inventor for $100 million. If you ask me, I think the inventor should be asking himself why he would want to invent such a thing. Then again, I already answered that in the first sentence. How sad.

Organ Harvesting in China's Labor Camps

This is a disturbing series of articles in the Epoch Times about harvesting organs in China. Not quite the 'feel good' China being shown on the Discovery channel this week.