Madam Speaker, I have two petitions to present today.
The first petition is from residents living here in Canada. They say that Falun Gong is a traditional Chinese spiritual discipline that consists of meditation, exercise and moral teachings based on the principles of truth, compassion and tolerance. In July 1999, the Chinese Communist Party launched an intensive nationwide persecution campaign to eradicate Falun Gong and hundreds of thousands of Falun Gong practitioners have been detained in forced labour camps, brainwashing centres and prisons, where torture and abuse are routine and thousands have died as a result.
Canadian lawyer David Matas and former Canadian secretary of state for the Asia-Pacific David Kilgour conducted an investigation in 2006 that concluded that the Chinese regime and its agencies throughout China have put to death a large number, in the tens of thousands, of Falun Gong practitioners of conscience. Their vital organs were seized involuntarily for sale at a high price. Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting has received about 1.5 million petition signatures from over 50 countries and presented them to the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, calling for immediate action to end the unethical practice of forced organ harvesting in China and an end of the persecution of the Falun Gong.
The European Parliament passed a resolution condemning organ harvesting abuses in China and calls on the Government of China to immediately end the practice of harvesting organs from prisoners of conscience.
Therefore, the undersigned petitioners request the Canadian Parliament and government to pass a resolution to establish measures to stop the Chinese Communist regime's crime of systematically murdering Falun Gong practitioners for their organs, amend Canadian legislation to combat forced organ harvesting and publicly call for an end to the persecution of Falun Gong in China.