AI report on China repression

Amnesty International issued a detailed report Sept. 21 on various forms of censorship, torture, and other forms of human rights violations in China. One of the more interesting and depressing points was that a number of innocent people have been executed because they were tortured into making false confessions. Organ transplants are a big trade for China, according to a BBC report (April 19, 2006), China is harvesting the organs of thousands of executed prisoners every year for sale on the international market.

Death penalty prisoners continue to be handcuffed and shackled on death row in all parts of China, including Beijing, AI noted: "During his visit to China in November 2005, the UN Special Rapporteur on torture met with death penalty prisoners held at the Beijing Municipality Detention Centre while they awaited appeal. He noted that they were ‘handcuffed and shackled with leg-irons weighing approximately three kilograms, 24 hours per day and in all circumstances (including during meals, visits to the toilet etc).’"

It seems like death row in China is a kind of stockyard to produce live organs for wealthy individuals overseas.