Christian Pastor Cai Zhuohua Spent Three Years In Chinese Laogai Slave Labour Camp
His Crime… Distributing Bibles
His Slave Labour.. Making Olympic Footballs
Pastor Cai Zhuchua is one of thousands of Christians who have been beaten, imprisoned and even murdered by the Communist Chinese government in the last few years for crimes such as saying prayers with friends, possessing a bible or singing Christian hymns. You can read about Pastor Zhuchua’s story at China Aid (link here).
The camp where the Pastor was imprisoned and forced to make souvenirs for the upcoming Beijing Olympics is part of Communist China’s huge Laogai slave camp system. The slave camps are an integral part of the Chinese economy. Over a thousand slave labour camps hold an estimated over 3 million slaves. The slave labour camps’ connection with the Chinese trade in body parts of executed persons is well established and certainly there to be seen by anyone with a few minutes and a connection to the internet.
What Would Bussa Say To Mia Mottley?
What would he say to us all…?
In the following Barbados Advocate article Miss Mottley says there is really no difference in investment dollars coming from China and those coming from Canada, the USA and the U.K.
I wonder what would Bussa say to that statement?
$1 Billion Sweet Deal
BARBADOS is in line to benefit from a large slice of the $1 billion in Chinese investments expected into the Caribbean by 2011.
Additionally, the island and its regional neighbours, who have diplomatic relations with Beijing, will also share in a comprehensive assistance package aimed at stepping up co-operation between China and the Caribbean like never before.Deputy Prime Minister Mia Mottley made it clear, however, that no political conditions are tied to the massive deal, neither should Barbadians fear that the expected large inflow of Chinese capital would be matched with a similar influx of labour from that country.
The Minister of Economic Affairs and Development, who recently returned from a two-week trip including China, Hong Kong and London, yesterday, met with key investment stakeholders and a tourism team headed by Minister of Tourism, Noel Lynch, at her Warrens office to inform them of these developments. She then brought members of the media up to date immediately after during a news conference.
Mottley, who was in China to attend the second China/Caribbean Forum, said that country’s package sought to improve links in trade, investment, agriculture and fishing, tourism and tr ansportation, finance, and human resource development.
A major part of this would the new US$500 million preferential loan aimed at encouraging Chinese companies to invest in the Caribbean in host of areas including tourism, telecommunications, infrastructure construction, and agriculture.
Other significant parts of the Chinese offer to Barbados and the Caribbean included:
– 2 000 training opportunities for regional government officials and technical professionals over the next three years.
– Chinese business delegations visiting to inspect the trade and investment environment and seek co-operation opportunities.
– Implementing memoranda on tourism co-operation and encouraging more Chinese travel to the Caribbean for bus iness and leisure.
– The hosting of Caribbean product exhibitions in China to promote regional products there and increase exports to that country.
Mottley said: The ball is in our court. We have not been given a package of assistance to sit down at home and receive it, but we have been given opportunities to be able to make something of it. I do not know when last a Government has placed before the region a potential of US$500 million in preferential loans to fuel Foreign Direct Investment into the region as a whole .
She said it was up to Caribbean players … to identify key investment opportunities, make contact with the Chinese, let them know that they have a cheaper source of capital than would otherwise be available to them .
It is up to us to learn and to develop the efficiency and the knowledge for market access into China. We will obviously never be able to have a trade surplus in goods with China but we can certainly improve our exports in goods, and we can certainly more than improve our export in services to China and it is in that context that we need to be able to do it, she noted, adding that the language barrier would be remedied through joint ventures.
The Deputy Prime Minister said Barbados was alread y moving to access what was on offer from the Chinese including a strong technical assistance frame work for co-operation in agriculture that would be pursued aggressively by the relevant ministry, submitted plans in order to access a loan for improvement s to the Fairchild Street market, and targeting Chinese tourists mostly through cruise as well as potentially investment or working with those one or two hotels that are willing to step outside of the traditional mould .
With a recent raging debate about the use of Chinese labour here and throughout the Caribbean, the minister said local and regional labour would always come first, saying Barbadians had nothing to fear where the new China assistance and an influx of labour from that country was co ncerned.
Is it any different than the investment that is coming from the US Canada or the UK? The reality is that once you start diplomatic and commercial relations with people you are going to get a cross border flow of money, a cross border flow of people, a cross border flow of product; that’s what engaging other countries is about, she asserted.
… above from the Barbados Advocate $1 Billion Sweet Deal
Further Reading On China’s Slave Labour Camps
Barbados Free Press 
She’s right you know, US and UK were (are?) big on slaves as well. Heck why should it be problem slaves mingling in a slave population, China has slaves, Owen has slaves. I can see the PR blitz: Barbados the land of sun, sea and slaves!
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Anyone who believes that a potential “world power” will give away money (aid) without strings attached is in need of a mental examination!!!
Mia took 21 people on a jaunt, and seeks to justify that expense.
Owen was there a few weeks ago, so she had to “match” him…that is all.
… did she get to the Wild Goose Pagoda, …. like Owen?
How much does it cost me the taxpayer
to send TWENTY ONE PEOPLE to London,
and thence to China??
(or to NYC, then LAX, thence to China -take yer pick!)
How many million$???
And QEH dey, suffering for tiles and bandages.
Our contry is becoming so hand to mouth it is sickeningm they got to China with cap in hand looking to take whatever crumbs fall off the table.
Is this really the direction that we want to take this island ?
Only because we are so desperate that we accept money from any and everywhere?
Plenty money but as you said no money to right the wrongs in so many areas of Barbados and the Hospital is a prime concern.
our politicians have become cartoons in that there actions and stupidity are not to be believed in the context of who they really are.
Its like watching reruns of the roadrunner.
You are always on China’s case. This article is food for thought.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070921/ts_nm/china_safety_mattel_dc
I was just about to send you a link thinking that this wasn’t a current topic on your board. Please read: http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20070921/business/business6.html
Now who is going to work for these people?
Anonymous…while i agree that their reputation may have been jolted the other day….personally I believe that was due to ulterior motives…no doubt in my mind about that…..but it is no excuse to ease up on China….they come into the Caribbean, prey upon our people who are more or less helpless as they need a job, and treat them like s**t. There are no 2 ways about that. I have seen that here with my own 2 eyes. Just recently a masters student did her thesis on a closely related issue…she actually posed as an employee and when you read the report on how they treat staff here….my God!
Funny stuff:
In Barbados we are clear that once you come into this market that you must adhere to the labour laws and labour standards and the cores and culture that attaches itself to this job market; on this there is no room for accommodation.
(Not reading the papers I see)
She said with China’s advanced technology in agriculture, the region could benefit in areas such as crop planting and farming, agriculture equipment production and agriculture technology exchanges.
(What does a country that has so crippled its agricultural industry want with agricultural technology? “People” farming I suppose)
After your wonderful stay have a negro child as a souvenir.
Should they change the name to the Barbados Chinese Party?
Certainly they don’t deserve the Labour name any more now that they don’t pay people and then import Chinese workers who live in crates are paid 1/4 wages.
Let me say that the issue of knowing about a country’s labour law is only theoretical in nature in the Caribbean. The onus is on the staff member to know the labour law because only God can help you if you don’t. Once Jamaican employers see that they can get away with it due to employee ignorance you bet they are going to do it. (Benn there done that…on the employee side that is..except I know the law inside out!!) How likely is it that those who wouldn’t know their name on a piece of paper if they saw it, be familiar with the labour laws which are there to protect them? Those are the people most likely to end up in the sweat shops if and when they come. The sad part is that this reminds me somewhat of the middle passage….except the slaves are already here…colonisers are on their way!
anonymous
of course Mattel took part of the blame
They are as responsible as China for letting in dangerous goods through poor design, lead paint or otherwise.
Mattel is so tied to China and cheap labour that the staged mea culpa ( no its my fault scenario ) was somewhat pathetic.
Aside from many well documented human right abuses inside China, China has used it veto to prevent the UN from going into Darfur to stop the murder of 100’s of thousands of helpless citizens by feuding, power hungry, factions.
China wants oil from Darfur and does not want to rock the boat. They are prepared to flush these human beings down the toilet for the almighty dollar at the same time as we are asking to do business with them.
The sad truth is that instead of demanding better of China, we continue to turn a blind eye and do whatever it takes to beg for scraps from the table.
Reality check….that’s the Caribbean for you. I am awaiting these factories….maybe this is what my new PM meant when he said that he was bringing in the factories and putting the people to work! Wait until they get here and realise Caribbean work ethic! Let me speak for Jamaica….it is going to be very interesting!
We could kill two birds with one stone, export our convicts as an expendable work force and cut down on the the over population in the prison systems, at-a-girl Mia!
Beijing police round up and beat African expats
· Diplomat’s son among victims at nightclub
· Deep bias combines with crackdown on drugs
Jennifer Brea in Beijing
Wednesday September 26, 2007
Guardian
At least 20 black men, including students, tourists and the son of a Caribbean diplomat, were arrested in a popular nightclub district of Beijing on Friday, several of the group being severely beaten on suspicion of dealing drugs, witnesses said.
African expatriates in Beijing and witnesses claim the episode revealed a pervasive prejudice toward dark-skinned foreigners in China.
According to five bystanders, teams of police, dressed in black jumpsuits and reportedly wielding batons and taser guns, cordoned off a street in the popular Sanlitun nightclub district at around midnight and rounded up almost all the black men there. Many of the men were beaten.
The raid took place in front of hundreds of stunned expatriates outside the packed bars and clubs of the neighbourhood, which is popular with Beijing’s burgeoning foreign community.
“I saw a guy being beaten by these kids. He wasn’t doing anything. He wasn’t fighting back,” said one witness, a white American college graduate working in Beijing.
“I have not really ever seen anything so brutal,” said another American. “There was blood on the streets. They were basically beating up any black person they could find.”
Beijing police yesterday declined to confirm or deny the incident.
The detainees included 22-year-old Joslyn Whiteman, son of Grenada’s ambassador. One witness said he saw police grab Mr Whiteman and beat him repeatedly, despite onlookers crying out, “Stop! He’s a diplomat!” According to the South China Morning Post, Mr Whiteman spent the night in a hospital with concussion. “Obviously I’m very angry,” the ambassador, the elder Mr Whiteman, told the Post. “My son was arrested and beaten for no reason … I will be taking this up with the authorities and looking into the matter.”
Chinese investment in developing countries, and especially Africa, has prompted a reverse migration and a growing number of African and other black people are migrating to China to study, work and learn the language. However, many African immigrants have entered China illegally and work as drug mules, a trade that is highly lucrative but which can bring the death penalty.
African dealers in Beijing offer a wide range of drugs, from cocaine to ecstasy, to a mostly expat market. Sanlitun was once a dealers’ haven but has been substantially cleaned up by roundups. None, though, approached the scale or violence of that on Friday night, described as “excessive” and “chaotic” by witnesses. “I wasn’t surprised [by the use of violence],” one person said. “I’ve seen this kind of thing happen before, but never against foreigners in front of other foreigners.”
This latest raid comes as part of the effort to clean up Beijing ahead of next month’s annual meeting of Communist party leaders and the 2008 Olympic Games, based in the city.
Africans say that living in China in the face of pervasive prejudice can be challenging. When Beijing rolled out the red carpet for more than 40 African heads of state last November, billboards depicting Africans clad in leopard skin underwear, and an indigenous man from Papua New Guinea, plastered the city.
This chinese issue is not going away in the Caribbean. There continue to be some very serious concerns in Trinidad about their presence and possible threat to national security.
A number of African Nations are now regreting their decision to accept loans and technical assistance because only the chinese have been benefiting from the arrangement. One just has to look at what the Chinese hae done in Mozambique and Angola. We therefore cannot allow them to do the same in Barbados.
Some Caribbean Gov’ts seem to be all so ready and willing to accomodated the chinese because of among other things concessionary loans that they border on selling out the respective countries.
According to the Trinidad Guardian Newspaper dated 28th September 2007, the Government wants to change the Immigration regulations to allow Chinese to apply for visas without photographs, police certificates of good character for the previous 5 years or character references.
Perhaps this is to allow chinese prisoners to enter the island and work legally. This move would certainly help the chinese but will pose a serious threat to the national security of Trinidad and Tobago.
Beware therefore of Mia Mottley’s pronouncements of all the benefits to be derived from the latest Chinese assistance.
Group: Churches sell sweatshop crosses
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071121/ap_on_re_us/crucifixes_sweatshops
NEW YORK – A labor rights group alleged Tuesday that crucifixes sold in religious gift shops in the U.S. are produced under “horrific” conditions in a Chinese factory with more than 15-hour work days and inadequate food.
“It’s a throwback to the worst of the garment sweatshops 10, 20 years ago,” said Charles Kernaghan, director of the National Labor Committee.
Kernaghan held a news conference in front of St. Patrick’s Cathedral to call attention to conditions at a factory in Dongguan, a southern Chinese city near Hong Kong, where he said crosses sold at the historic church and elsewhere are made.
Spokespeople for St. Patrick’s and another New York landmark, the Episcopal Trinity Church at Wall Street, said the churches had removed dozens of crucifixes from their shops while they investigate the claims.
“I don’t think they have a clue where these crucifixes were made — in horrific work conditions,” Kernaghan said.
Kernaghan said the factory’s mostly young, female employees work from 8 a.m. to 11:30 p.m. seven days a week and are paid 26 cents an hour with no sick days or vacation. Workers live in filthy dormitories and are fed a watery “slop.”
Kernaghan said factory workers took photos and smuggled out documents detailing practices there. While none of the crucifixes sold in New York were identified as made in China, they bore serial numbers matching products made at the factory in question, Kernaghan said.
Joe Zwilling, a spokesman for St. Patrick’s, said church officials had not heard about the issue before Tuesday. Trinity spokeswoman Diane Reed said her church had been “under the impression that these were mass-produced in Italy.”
St. Patrick’s and Trinity bought the crosses from the Singer Co., a religious goods company based in suburban Mount Vernon. Co-owner Gerald Singer said the religious objects were made in China and purchased through a Chinese manufacturer called Full Start.
“Whether they came out of a sweatshop, we do not know,” Singer said. “We asked Full Start to sign off that there are no sweatshop conditions involved, and no children and that they abide by Chinese law. This is a black eye for us.”
An after-hours call to a U.S. office of Full Start Ltd. in East Providence, R.I., was not immediately returned Tuesday.
A man at the Full Start factory in Dongguan said the allegations were “totally incorrect.”
The working conditions at the factory were “fine,” said the man, who refused to give his name. The 200-plus employees work from 8 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. each day, with an hour and a half break for lunch, he said.
The employees were rarely asked to work overtime, but were compensated when they did, he said. When pressed for more details, the man said he wasn’t in charge of those issues and hung up the phone.
Kernaghan said the crosses were exhibited at an annual trade show organized by the Association for Christian Retail, a Colorado-based trade association that works with thousands of religious stores across the country.
Bill Anderson, president and chief executive of the Christian trade association, issued a statement saying: “While we occasionally hear this issue raised, and believe there are factories in China where human rights are violated, we believe claims that products sold through CBA member stores are made in these shops are irresponsible and unfounded.”
Dongguan lies at the center of China’s export manufacturing industry, which relies heavily on low wages to remain competitive. Factories there have been accused in the past of labor abuses, including those making products for McDonald’s, Disney, Mattel and the Beijing Olympics.
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