Wei
Jingsheng Foundation News and Article Release Issue: A489-W277
魏京生基金会新闻与文章发布号：A489-W277
Release
Date: September 29, 2009
发布日：2009年9月29日
Topic:
Wei Jingsheng Speaks As a Witness for the Suppression of Chinese Workers by the
Chinese Communist Party at the TLHRC Congressional Hearing
标题：魏京生在美国国会听证会上作证中共对工人的迫害及魏京生的证词（全文）
Original
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-----------------------------------------------------------------
Wei
Jingsheng Speaks As a Witness for the Suppression of Chinese Workers by the
Chinese Communist Party at the TLHRC Congressional Hearing
On
Tuesday, September 29, 2009, The Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission (TLHRC) of
the US Congress held a hearing about human rights in China on the eve of the
60th Anniversary of the People's Republic of China. Two of the most outstanding human rights champions in the US
Congress, Rep. Frank Wolf and Rep. Chris Smith, co-chaired the hearing.
Various
experts were invited to testify at the hearing, including Wei Jingsheng of the
China Labor Union, Harry Wu of the Laogai Research Foundation, Ting Shum of the
League of Chinese Victims, and Sophie Richardson of Human Rights Watch.
One
of the main purposes of the hearing was about Chinese workers' rights. As the hearing announcement stated:
"In its 2008 report to the Congress, the U.S.-China Economic and Security
Review Commission states "prisoners are still exposed to a physically and
psychologically exhausting regimen of physical labor and propaganda
sessions." Additionally, over
the last several years there has been a surge in protests demanding workers'
rights. According to the 2008
State Department Human Rights report, "workers and their advocates
suffered harassment and intimidation by criminal elements often hired by
employers." "
Mr.
Wei's speech concentrated on the deteriorated condition of the Chinese workers
and emphasized Chinese workers' rights, especially needs of labor unions in
China. In particular, he
emphasized that "various resistance activities by the Chinese people are
getting stronger and stronger, yet the cooperation between the Chinese bureaucratic
capitalist government and the international capitalists have made the workers
and the lower class citizens in China lose confidence and hope in both the self
reform by the Communist Party and in international support. Their resistance has been more and more
leaning toward using violence, with more and more political elements of
anti-government. Currently, we
have only two choices, either help these workers and lower class citizens in
China to push for a peaceful evolution from the root of the social system, or
leave it to fall into an civil war which becomes unavoidable. We must understand, people cannot be
satisfied for a long period of time in simply living on the edge of
survival."
Photos
of the hearing:
1.
Wei Jingsheng testify in the US Congressional hearing on Chinese workers'
rights:
http://www.weijingsheng.org/pic/newsletters/newsletters2009/newsletters2009-6/WeiJS090929testify-3.jpg
2.
Congressmen Frank Wolf (right) and Chris Smith (left) chair the hearing:
http://www.weijingsheng.org/pic/newsletters/newsletters2009/newsletters2009-6/hearing090929lineup-3.jpg
3.
Testifying in the Congressional hearing (Harry Wu, Huang Ciping, Wei Jingsheng,
Li HongKuan, Shum Ting, Sophie Richardson):
http://www.weijingsheng.org/pic/newsletters/newsletters2009/newsletters2009-6/hearing090929lineup-3.jpg
4.
Side view of hearing room:
http://www.weijingsheng.org/pic/newsletters/newsletters2009/newsletters2009-6/hearing090929back-3.jpg
5.
Hearing room:
http://www.weijingsheng.org/pic/newsletters/newsletters2009/newsletters2009-6/hearing090929side-3.jpg
6.
Reporter interviews Wei Jingsheng
http://www.weijingsheng.org/pic/newsletters/newsletters2009/newsletters2009-6/WeiJS090929interviewed-3.jpg
__ __ __
The
following is the full text of his speech which will be included in the
Congressional record.
The
Human Rights Situation of the Chinese Workers and Social Groups
--
Wei Jingsheng
1.
About the Chinese Workers with Fixed Contracts
Generally,
one could categorize Chinese workers into three types: those workers having
fixed contracts, those having temporary contracts, and the immigrant
peasants. Fixed contract workers
include those workers who have city registration with long-term working
contracts. Regardless of whether
they are in state-owned enterprises, private, or joint ventures, they have low
wages. According to the labor
disputes publicly reported, most workers' wages are in the range of 100 to 200
US dollars per month.
The
worker safety protection and health insurance are also very poor. Currently, because China's health
system severely leans toward the wealthy class, the medical conditions for the
poor are even less than they were in the 1960's and 1970's. When workers are sick, they cannot get
normal health care, and even have to give up curing efforts because they cannot
afford high priced medical bills.
These workers are often limited to stay in the poor and old
government-owned apartments because they cannot afford high housing prices. These apartments are tiny and crowded
with poor sanitation.
Unlike
what some scholars believe, despite that most of these people have the
so-called "iron rice bowls", they do not really have a stable life
with guarantees. Just like other
kinds of workers, they are living at the edge of poverty. Over the last few years, increasingly
there are often large scaled riots by the workers. The workers confront the armed police who come to suppress
them, and even sometimes beat the business owners, partners and investors to
death. All this conflict reflects
the terrible condition of these workers with fixed income in both state-own
enterprises and private businesses.
2.
Workers on Temporary Contracts and of Immigrant Peasants
The
situation of temporary workers who have city registration yet are without fixed
work and contract is similar to the peasant workers who immigrate to the city
without city registration. They do
not have workers' protection and health insurance. Their housing conditions are even worse than those of the
workers on fixed wages. They have
less income on average. Sometimes,
they might have a relatively higher wage but could lose their jobs any
time. These people with unstable
and unsafe living conditions compose half of the employed population. They are the lowest class regarding
their rights protection within the workers class. Small portions of them have to make a living through crime
and quasi-crime, and thus have become the social base of city mafia.
3.
Issue of Labor Unions
There
are laws of workers' union formulated and issued in China. However, the Chinese Communist Party is
a totalitarian party representing the big business enterprises of both China
and the West. In fact, they only
allow activities by the official "workers' unions", and forbid the
true workers' organizations that are independent of these official
"workers' unions". In
most labor disputes, these official "workers' unions" of the Chinese
Communist Party usually represent the interests of the government or the
capital side. The workers do not have
organizations that truly represent their own interests. Thus the labor cost of the Chinese
workers is pressed to the lowest possible limit. While their wages are low, their labor protection and
benefits are almost to zero. The
pollution and environmental protection is controlled by the business side, and
thus lowered to the minimum as well.
The super low priced products made in China are based on the
prerequisite of exploiting workers' rights and interests, as well as giving up
the environment protection standards.
Suppressing labor union activities and the environmental protection
movement is driven by the interests of both Chinese bureaucratic capitalists
and the big business enterprises from the West in China. It is the result of politics interfering
with economic activities.
Because
workers are generally living at the edge of poverty, they really need to create
organizations that will strive for their own interests, thus they need
independent labor unions. However,
the Chinese Communist government always uses the official power to suppress the
labor unions and make them very difficult to survive in open. Thus there are a lot of underground
labor unions and labor unions in disguise, which are just of variety of
religious and rights-defending groups.
The organizational function of these underground labor unions, religious
groups and rights-defending groups are behind some of the large-scale protest
events that are reported on by the news media. Replacing the public "labor unions" permitted even
sponsored by the Chinese government, these groups have effectively organized
the people.
4.
The Chinese Communist Regime's Suppression of the Non-Governmental Groups of
the People
The
Chinese government's suppression of the underground labor unions is a
well-known fact. These underground
labor unions are often organizations that lack systematic operations and
experience. Their leaders often
spontaneously rise due to the nature of events. They have enough authority but lack experience, and thus easily
are damaged by the police and governmental espionage. Naturally, the union affairs these leaders care about are
narrow. We need to provide them
with more guidance and help to gain knowledge and experience, as well as help
them to get connected to each other through the means of the overseas networks.
The
rights-defending groups could and have already provided some help to the
people, mainly composed of the above-mentioned workers. However, because of the Communist
regime's suppression and arrests, the public activities of the rights-defending
movement are extremely restricted.
The
reason that various religion and belief groups have been able to develop in an
extreme speed is because people are living in an unsafe environment that lacks
both medical and social protection, and has no trust in the government and
society, etc. These conditions
make many average people join the religions and belief groups in seeking mutual
help and spiritual comfort. These
kinds of spontaneous groups are treated as huge threats by the Chinese
Communist Party.
The
Falun Gong is an example. Their
practices, which are beneficial to people's health, have attracted a large
group of people to join in. Their
moral standard is obviously in conflict with the Communist's anti-human
culture, and thus they have formed a huge group of people beyond the Communist
Party. To the Communist Party, it
is damaging to the social base of the party, thus the suppression. More, in the name of "anti-cult
laws", the Communist Party has legalized and regulated their suppression.
Not
only toward the Falun Gong, but also toward all the other religious and belief
groups outside the official recognized churches, the Communist Party started
its full-scale suppression. They
used cruel torture to Falun Gong practitioners and members of religious groups
to force them to give up their beliefs, yet have received strong resistance
from these practitioners and believers.
The resistance also received sympathy from most of the people, which illustrates
that these groups that include workers are indeed the organized groups of
mutual help by the people that possess powerful forces.
Finally,
I must emphasize that various resistance activities by the Chinese people are
getting stronger and stronger, yet the cooperation between the Chinese
bureaucratic capitalist government and the international capitalists have made
the workers and the lower class citizens in China lose confidence and hope in
both the self reform by the Communist Party and in international support. Their resistance has been more and more
leaning toward using violence, with more and more political elements of
anti-government. Currently, we have
only two choices, either help these workers and lower class citizens in China
to push for a peaceful evolution from the root of the social system, or leave
it to fall into an civil war which becomes unavoidable. We must understand, people cannot be
satisfied for a long period of time in simply living on the edge of survival.
-----------------------------------------------------------------
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中文版
Wei
Jingsheng Foundation News and Article Release Issue: A489-W277
魏京生基金会新闻与文章发布号：A489-W277
Release
Date: September 29, 2009
发布日：2009年9月29日
Topic:
Wei Jingsheng Speaks As a Witness for the Suppression of Chinese Workers by the
Chinese Communist Party at the TLHRC Congressional Hearing
标题：魏京生在美国国会听证会上作证中共对工人的迫害及魏京生的证词（全文）
Original
Language Version: English (Chinese version at the end)
此号以英文为准（英文在前，中文在后）
如有中文乱码问题，请与我们联系或访问:
http://www.weijingsheng.org/report/report2009/report2009-09/WeiJStestify090929hearingCongressA489-W277.htm
-----------------------------------------------------------------
魏京生在美国国会听证会上作证中共对工人的迫害及魏京生的证词（全文）
2009年9月29日，美国国会兰托斯人权委员会(TLHRC)在中华人民共和国成立60周年的前夕举行有关中国人权的听证会。美国国会多年支持人权的两位大将弗兰克﹒沃尔夫及克里斯﹒史密斯众议员主持了会议。
不同的专家被邀在听证会上听证，其中包括中国团结工会的魏京生，劳改基金会的吴弘达，中国冤民大同盟的沈婷，及人权观察的Sophie Richardson.
听证会的主要议题之一是有关中国工人的权益。魏京生的证词强调这些年来工人的环境恶化。他倡议维护中国工人权利及独立工会在中国的重要性。他特别强调：“中国官僚资产阶级政权和国际资本的合作，使得中国的工人和其他下层阶级人民，对中共的自我改革和国际支持逐渐失去了信心和希望。反抗越来越倾向于使用暴力，且越来越带有反政府的政治色彩。现在我们只有两个选择：要么帮助工人和下层阶级推动和平的、社会制度根本性的演变；要么就是一场不可避免的内战。我们必须明白，人们不可能长期满足于生活在生存线的边缘。”
相关照片：
http://www.weijingsheng.org/pic/newsletters/newsletters2009/newsletters2009-6/WeiJS090929testify-3.jpg
http://www.weijingsheng.org/pic/newsletters/newsletters2009/newsletters2009-6/hearing090929lineup-3.jpg
http://www.weijingsheng.org/pic/newsletters/newsletters2009/newsletters2009-6/hearing090929lineup-3.jpg
http://www.weijingsheng.org/pic/newsletters/newsletters2009/newsletters2009-6/hearing090929back-3.jpg
http://www.weijingsheng.org/pic/newsletters/newsletters2009/newsletters2009-6/hearing090929side-3.jpg
http://www.weijingsheng.org/pic/newsletters/newsletters2009/newsletters2009-6/WeiJS090929interviewed-3.jpg
__ __ __
以下为留作国会记录的魏京生作证的证词：
《中国工人和社会团体的人权状况》
-- 魏京生
一、 固定工的状况
中国的工人分为三种：固定工；临时工和农民工。固定工指的是有城市户口，有长期工作合同的工人。无论在国营企业还是私有、合资企业，他们的工资都很低。根据公开报道的劳资纠纷的案例来看，大部分工人的工资在每个月100美元到200美元之间。
劳动安全保障和医疗保险也很差。因为中国的医疗制度严重倾向有钱的阶层，穷人的医疗条件甚至不如六、七十年代。工人有病得不到正常的医疗；甚至因为付不起高额的医疗附加费用而放弃治疗。住房也因为付不起高房价，普遍住在破旧的政府房里：狭小拥挤，卫生条件很差。
不像一些学者所误解的那样，大部分的固定工虽然是铁饭碗，但是并不是生活得很稳定，很有保障。他们和其他几类工人一样生活在贫困线的边缘。所以近几年来，常常有大规模的工人暴动，并且和前来镇压的军警对峙，甚至将资方人员殴打致死。这些都表明在国营企业和私人企业的固定工的生存状况十分糟糕。
二、 临时工和农民工
有城市户口但没有固定工作的临时工，和没有户口进城找工作的农民工的状况大致相似。他们没有劳动保护和医疗保险，住房也比固定工更差。平均工资比固定工更低；有时有较高的工资但随时会丢掉工作。这种不稳定和不安全的状况大约占就业人口的一半，是工人阶级中权利保障最低的阶层，也是生活状况最差的阶层。一部分人不得不以犯罪或准犯罪的手段谋生，构成了城市黑社会的社会基础。
三、 工会问题
中国已经制定和发布了工会法。但是中国共产党是代表中国和西方大资产阶级的专制党。他们在实际上只允许官方工会活动，而禁止工人组织独立于官方的工会。中共的官方工会在劳资纠纷中通常在绝大部分情况下代表官方或资方的利益。工人没有代表自己利益的组织，所以中国工人的劳动成本被压到最低限度。工资很低，劳保福利也接近于零。而污染和环境保护也是以资方的利益为标准，降到最低限度。中国的超低价格的商品，就是以剥夺工人的权利和利益，以及放弃环境保护标准为前提的。压制工会活动和环境保护运动，是中国官僚资产阶级和西方在华大企业的利益所驱动的，是政治干预经济活动的结果。
由于工人普遍生存在贫困的边缘，他们非常需要有组织地争取自己的利益，需要独立的、代表工人权利和利益的工会。而政府总是用政府力量压制工会，使得他们无法公开地生存。于是就产生了大量的地下工会和变形的工会，也就是形形色色的信仰团体和维权团体。一些能够上到新闻媒体的大规模群体事件，都有地下工会和信仰团体、维权团体的组织作用。这些团体替代了中共容许的公开活动的工会，起到了组织人民的作用。
四、 对非官方的人民团体的镇压
对地下工会的镇压已是众所周知的事实。地下工会通常缺乏有系统、有经验的机构。他们的领袖通常是自发的，自然形成的群众领袖，有足够的威望但缺乏经验。很容易遭受有组织、有经验的警察和特务机关的破坏。这种群众领袖所关注的工会事务也必然很狭窄。需要给他们提供更多的知识和经验方面的指导和帮助，并由海外的人员帮助他们增加横向的联系。
维权团体可以并且已经给以工人为主的人民提供了一些帮助。由于政府的压制和逮捕行为。维权团体的公开活动受到了极大的限制。难以达到正常的效果。
宗教和各种信仰团体发展速度非常迅速的原因，是人们生活在不安全的环境之中。医疗和社会保障的缺乏；对政府和社会缺乏信任等等原因，使得大量的普通人参加到宗教和信仰团体中，寻求互助和心灵上的慰籍。这种自发的群众团体被共产党看作是巨大的潜在威胁。
以法轮功为例。他们的有益于健康的修炼迅速吸引了大批人参加；他们在道德修养方面又明显与中共的反人类的文化相抵触；并且形成了中共以外的庞大的人民团体。
这就导致中共认为他们在破坏中共的社会基础，因此对他们进行了镇压。甚至以《反邪教法》的名义立法，把镇压合法化、常规化。
从这个时候开始，不仅仅对法轮功，而是对除了官方教会以外的所有宗教和信仰团体，展开了全面的镇压。对被关押的法轮功和宗教人员施以酷刑，强迫他们放弃信仰。但遭到了法轮功和宗教信徒们的剧烈反抗。这种反抗也得到了大部分人民的同情。这些也说明宗教和信仰团体是包括工人在内的人民组织起来互助的团体，是有着强大生命力的人民团体。
最后，我要强调中国境内各种人民反抗的活动越来越强烈。然而，中国官僚资产阶级政权和国际资本的合作，使得中国的工人和其他下层阶级人民，对中共的自我改革和国际支持逐渐失去了信心和希望。反抗越来越倾向于使用暴力，且越来越带有反政府的政治色彩。现在我们只有两个选择：要么帮助工人和下层阶级推动和平的、社会制度根本性的演变；要么就是一场不可避免的内战。我们必须明白，人们不可能长期满足于生活在生存线的边缘。
（魏京生基金会首发。请注明出处：www.WeiJingSheng.org）
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