The UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide was signed by China in July 1949 and ratified in April 1983. The former leader of China, Jiang Zemin, has been sued for genocide in a US Federal Court in Chicago. He is sued for gross violations of human rights and crimes against humanity in his brutal persecution of Falun Gong. The lawsuit was filed in October 2002 during Jiang’s visit to the US.
France
On December 4th 2002, William Bourdon and Georges-Henri Beauthier, two human rights lawyers renowned for their trials against Chilean dictator Pinochet in Belgium and France, filed a suit for crimes of torture at the Court of Nice against Li Lanqing. The Chinese Vice-Premier was then on an unofficial visit in France. The plaintiffs are four Falun Gong practitioners, including two French women. The complaint was based on the UN Convention Against Torture, which France signed in 1984 and which allows it to arrest and prosecute any person guilty of torture. It is the first time in Europe that a Chinese leader has faced such a complaint.
In June 1999, Li Lanqing was personally asked by former Party Leader Jiang Zemin to head the “610 Office”, which is primarily responsible for the massive and violent persecution of Falun Gong. This special unit has the express permission to act outside the law and against human dignity.
Switzerland
March 18, 2003, Tuesday, Geneva — A Switzerland-based international non-governmental organization, “Track Impunity Always,” and the Swiss Falun Dafa Association jointly conducted a press conference at the Hotel Cornavin in downtown Geneva to announce that they will file a lawsuit in Switzerland against the former President of China, Jiang Zemin. Jiang Zemin will be sued for torture, genocide, and other crimes against humanity.
North America
On October 18, 2002, individual plaintiffs filed a class action lawsuit in the United States District Court of the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division against Jiang Zemin and Falun Gong Control Office (Office 6/10). The complaint was filed under seal and the defendants were served by alternate service upon security agents designated by the courts as appropriate substitutes for personal service on October 22, 2002.
The lawsuit is a civil action for compensatory and punitive damages for torts committed in violation of international and domestic law, that is instituted pursuant to specific statutory authorization, namely the Alien Tort Claims Act (28 U.S.C. § 1350) and the Torture Victims Protection Act (106 Stat. 73 (1992)).
Plaintiffs are members of and represent a designated class of Falun Gong practitioners who have resided in China in the past, or are currently residing in the Peoples’ Republic of China, who were subjected to torture and other major human rights abuses as part of Jiang’s genocidal policy of seeking to totally eradicate Falun Gong. Individual plaintiffs also include U.S. citizens or alien residents of the U.S. who were purposefully, intentionally, subjected to discrimination based on their belief in the spiritual practice of Falun Gong and their co-extensive attempt to protest peacefully the persecution of Falun Gong in China during Defendant Jiang’s visit to Iceland in June of 2002.
Specific causes of action pleaded in the complaint are torture; genocide; the right to life; the right to liberty and security of the person, and to be free of arbitrary arrest and imprisonment; the freedom of thought, conscience and religion, and the freedom to hold opinions without interference and to associate freely; violations of the above-cited rights and protections as embodied in customary international law; and conspiracy to commit violations of civil rights within the jurisdiction of the U.S.
