WASHINGTON, D.C. – Remembering the thousands murdered, tortured, harassed and wrongfully imprisoned in China, the House of Representatives today passed three separate resolutions to honor the victims of the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre, to condemn escalating levels of religious persecution in China, and to reject the state-sponsored, bogus ordination of “Catholic” leaders. 

 “The Chinese Government continues to systematically violate the rights of its citizens to freedom of thought, conscience, and religion or belief,” said Rep. Chris Smith, Vice-Chairman of the International Relations committee.  “It is unprecedented, but wholly appropriate that the House pass three resolutions in one day to remember, and seek freedom for all prisoners of conscience, all believers, democrats, and human rights activists, who will one day triumph in China, but now suffer grievously.”

Smith, who has held more than two dozen hearings on human rights in China managed and led the floor debate on all three resolutions and authored the Tiananmen Square resolution. 

“Everyone in the House chamber today remembers the events that occurred in Tiananmen Square on June 3 and 4 in 1989.  Burned for all time into our memory is the image of the lone protester on Tiananmen Square who held up the tanks sent to crush the demonstrators.  Yet we also remember that the police grabbed that heroic figure, and swept him away, like so many others, to an unknown fate.”

“Those tanks, under orders of the Communist Government of China, then crushed under their treads the movement for democracy in China.  The Communist government killed, tortured and imprisoned thousands for daring to question its illegal monopoly on power.  Hundreds, perhaps thousands, are still imprisoned and persecuted for exercising the rights guaranteed to them by their constitution, and the rules of all civilized societies.”  

Smith, who has authored legislation to prohibit US internet companies operating in China from working with the government against democracy advocates, drew a strong contrast with the amount of information the Chinese people have on the true events in Tiananmen Square in 1989.

“Most Chinese today, unfortunately, have no accurate knowledge of what happened in Tiananmen Square.  China blocks uncensored internet sites and weblogs, and places misleading information on internet sites available in China, often with the collusion and cooperation of U.S. internet companies such as Yahoo and Google.  As part and parcel of the Tiananmen cover-up, the Communist government sentenced journalist Shi Tao to ten years in prison, using information provided by Yahoo, for using his Yahoo email account to send foreigners a copy of a Chinese government memo warning of possible trouble during the 15th anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre.”

“We cannot forget these people.  We must not collaborate with the Chinese Communists to erase history,” Smith said.