Cong. Chris Smith (NJ-04), Chairman of the U.S. Commission on China, and longtime advocate of blind Chinese human rights leader and former prisoner Chen Guangcheng and other Chinese human rights leaders, was a guest speaker and award presenter at the Oxi Day Foundation's Second Annual Celebration in Washington, D.C. on October 25.
"For the pivotal role played by Greek patriots in bogging down overwhelming Axis forces early in World War II, the Washington Oxi Day Foundation reminds us that Winston Churchill said “Hence, we will not say that Greeks fight like heroes, but that heroes fight like Greeks," said Smith in his remarks.
"Braving 51 months of nightmarish incarceration, preceded by house arrest and followed by 18 months more cut short only by his escape, and torture and beatings, throughout it all, Chen Guangcheng fought like the Greeks in his defense of women and babies exploited by China’s draconian one child policy.
"Mr. Chen’s brilliant mind, indomitable spirit and unimaginable courage exposed pervasive forced abortion—deemed a crime against humanity at the Nuremberg Nazi War Crimes Tribunal—and was relentless in using his self-taught legal skills to seek redress.
"Unfazed by both the difficulty of the task or the inherent risks, Mr. Chen said Oxi—no—to this insidious government cruelty towards woman and children and argued that his clients in Linyi—and all women in China for that matter—deserve better," Smith said.
Chen’s daring escape to the U.S. Embassy in late April 2012 and his amazing evasion of China’s secret police en route caused an international frenzy. The AP reported on May 2 that Chen felt that he had been pressured to leave the U.S. Embassy by U.S. Embassy officials and go to a state hospital and he specifically asked that "a message be conveyed to U.S. Rep. Chris Smith: ‘Help my family and I leave safely.’" A day later, while still be held by the government in a state hospital, Chen was able to call into an emergency congressional hearing chaired by Smith.
At two congressional hearings chaired by Smith on May 3 and May 15, (Click here to view video of the May 15 hearing. Click here to watch CSPAN video of Smith's May 3 hearing.) Chen testified by telephone and pleaded for the protection of his extended family -- especially his mother, brother, and nephew -- and friends. Smith also chaired an emergency hearing on Chen on October 31, 2011 when all contact with Chen was lost. The congressman nominated Chen for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010, along with two other persecuted Chinese human rights advocates—Gao Zhisheng and Liu Xiaobo. Liu won ultimately won the 2010 prize. Since November 2011 until Chen's escape, Smith had been repeatedly thwarted in his attempts to get a visa to travel to visit Chen by the Chinese government. Smith's emergency hearing on Chen in Nov. 2011 was before the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, which Smith chairs.
A self-trained legal human rights advocate, Chen Guangcheng escaped house arrest on April 22 from his home in Dongshigu village, Linyi city, Shandong province, where he and his family had been detained without charge for 19 months. After escaping from home confinement, Chen met the U.S. Ambassador and Administration officials at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing and received medical treatment. Chen has represented farmers, the disabled and other groups, is perhaps best known for the attention he drew to population planning abuses, particularly forced abortions and forced sterilizations, in Linyi, in 2005. In deeply flawed legal proceedings, authorities sentenced him in 2006 to four years and three months in prison. Following his release in September 2010, Chen, his wife Yuan Weijing, and their six-year-old daughter were subjected to beatings, home confinement and constant surveillance. Throughout the detention, Chinese authorities undertook forceful measures to prevent and harass journalists and supporters--notably actor Christian Bale of the Batman movies--who attempted to visit the family.
The Congressional-Executive Commission on the People’s Republic of China is a congressionally-mandated, bipartisan panel made up of Members of the House and Senate and Presidential appointees serving in the Obama Administration.
