The Relay for Human Dignity
A Global Human Rights Torch Relay (HRTR), inspired by the Olympic torch, is to be lit in Greece on Thursday 9 August and will travel around the world to put human rights on the agenda in the lead up to the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
Over 25 countries and more than 100 cities will be taking part in this torch relay that is going to span five continents. Initiators of the torch, a coalition of people who came together over concerns about organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners in China, include former Canadian secretary of state David Kilgour, former Australian Human Rights Commissioner Dr Sev Ozdowski, former Australian Olympian Jan Becker and Australian Democrat Senator Andrew Bartlett.
Adherents of the peaceful, spiritual practice Falun Gong, have been vilified, detained and tortured in China for over eight years, but last year the horrific story surfaced that imprisoned practitioners of Falun Gong in China were being killed to service a lucrative trade in organs.
Rev. Dr. Gordon Moyes, a NSW Upper House Member and long-time campaigner of human rights, said, “This is the worst crime that anybody can imagine can happen in the 21st century. The present Chinese regime has failed to honour its promise to the International Olympic Committee to address human rights concerns”.
Australians are among the initiators of the Human Rights Torch Relay. Dr Gordon Moyes will be hosting a press conference on Friday 10 August 2007 at 12.00pm in the Jubilee Room, NSW Parliament House to highlight and condemn the ongoing detention and persecution of Falun Gong practitioners in China.
Other speakers include: Dr Sev Ozdowski (Human Rights Commissioner 2000-2005); Phil Glendenning (Director, Edmund Rice Centre); and Bich Phan (Vietnamese Community of Australia).
“We as a nation need to draw a line in the sand against the ongoing genocide and persecution of Falun Gong practitioners at the hands of the Chinese Communist Party”, Dr Moyes said. We must protest against the escalation of violence and fear in China in order to restore and protect the principles of democracy, religious rights and human dignity”.
