By Halima Mautbur
Grey-haired Kunlun Zhang watches from the front row of the courtroom, arms crossed, just a shadow’s length away from a stuffed nylon dummy, clad in a grey suit, sitting at a table for the defence.
“The people have charged former Chinese dictator, Jiang Zemin, with, among other charges, conspiracy to destroy the spiritual practice of Falun Gong, torture, abuse of authority, genocide and crimes against humanity,” says the judge at the front of the courtroom.
The judge is actually a Falun Gong practitioner holding a mock trial of Zemin, the former president of China, in Baker’s Lounge of Carleton University.
But a real trial of Zemin may soon start, as Zhang has applied to have Zemin charged under Canada’s Anti-Terrorism Act, which permits prosecution for torture committed against Canadian citizens, even if it occurred in a foreign country.
Zhang was imprisoned in China four times between 2000 and 2001 for his belief in Falun Dafa, also known as Falun Gong, which directs people to live by the principles of truth, compassion and forbearance. Falun Gong is an ancient form of meditation, but was only offered to the public in 1992. There are now about 100 million practitioners around the world.
China banned Falun Gong in 1999, calling it a dangerous cult. But Zhang says it was banned because Zemin, who was president of China at the time, feared its popularity would threaten his power.
“There are hundreds of thousands of Falun Gong practitioners that have been tortured,” says Zhang through an interpreter. “It’s about human life.”
But initiating the case hasn’t been easy, says Lingdi, Kulun Zhang’s daughter.
“When he launched lawsuit, and we prepare testimony, he just refused to talk about (it) and we can’t proceed. It’s a very difficult experience for him, even these last few years,” she says, as she distributes pamphlets about Falun Gong to those walking by, some of whom stop to watch the mock trial.
“It was the worst time in my life,” says Zhang. “It’s like living through it again, sometimes, when I try to recall details.”
Eventually he did talk about his experiences so the case could proceed. The real case is now waiting for Canada’s Attorney General to give his consent before it can go to court. Zhang is the first Canadian to attempt this.
He first came to Canada in 1989, as a visiting scholar to McGill University, leaving behind a teaching position in China’s Shandong Art University to study western art.
But a few years after moving to Canada, he was introduced to Falun Gong by his wife, Shumei, who had discovered it while vacationing in China.
Zhang says he had been searching for principles “teaching people to be good” and found it in Falun Gong, which he says “expresses the higher principle of the universe, the meaning of life.”
“It open my eyes, for my creating of art,” he says. “In the past art creating, (I) need inspiration, sometimes (I) think very hard to get inspiration. Now I have so many great inspiration come to my mind.”
But after finding Falun Gong and becoming a Canadian citizen in 1995, Zhang returned to Jinan City, in China’s Shandong province, in 1996 to take care of his elderly mother-in-law while working as director of the sculpture research centre in the Shandong Art University.
Three years later, however, his life changed for the worse.
In 1999, then-Chinese president Zemin banned Falun Gong . Zhang says he was constantly threatened by the police, who tapped his phone. After one phone conversation they even came banging on his door demanding to know whom he had been talking to.
On June 30, 2000, after handing out Falun Gong flyers, Zhang says his home was ransacked by police accusing him of being a cultist and confiscating Falun Gong material. He was detained for a month, first in the local police station and later at the Liu-Chang-Shan detention centre, and says he was beaten and tortured with electric shocks.
“My arms, my legs and body were burnt in many places,” he wrote in a statement about his imprisonment. “I could smell the burning skin and flesh. … My left leg was badly injured and I could not walk properly afterwards. It took months to heal.”
He says he was kept with 18 other men in a cell of only 20 square metres, sleeping on the concrete floor and having to do everything, including going to the bathroom, in each others’ presence. He and a few others started a hunger strike in protest, and eventually he had to be taken to a hospital.
“I was very baffled, all we’re trying to do is to be good people,” he says.
He was arrested three more times throughout 2000 and 2001, eventually being sent to one of the worst labour camps in China, the Wangcun Labor Camp in Zibo City, where he says he was again subjected to torture and also brainwashing. He says he was subjected to constant 24-hour monitoring and the use of “deceitful and misleading rumours … as well as psychological attacks,” to make him renounce his beliefs.
He even says he was videotaped in prison, as many others were, and that it was broadcast to the public to show him as having renounced his beliefs and being well treated in the camp.
But one night he says a guard came into his cell asking, “Why are you detained here? I don’t understand. If I had the power to open the door even I would let you go – but don’t tell that I said this.”
Although Zhang says that with time he was treated better than the other prisoners, the brainwashing eventually became more severe. He says he now knows that was because Canadian diplomats were trying to secure his release, after his daughter launched a campaign to free him.
Lingdi started petitions, wrote letters to Canadian MPs and held press conferences. Amnesty International also took up her father’s case.
“That was really proud experience, like so many people helped us, so many people supported us,” she says. “Compared with China you feel so lucky here in Canada.”
Her smile grows as she recalls being in the airport surrounded by friends, Falun Gong practitioners and journalists when her father returned to Canada in January 2001.
Zhang, for his part, says he felt like he was coming home. “When I ride bus, people shake hands with me and say welcome,” he says.
But Lingdi says her father wasn’t the same when he returned. “It was very hard for him, he was severely brainwashed in China, and when he came back he was repeating things he himself even doesn’t believe, … he tried to stop it, he know it’s wrong, but he can’t control his own brain,” she says.
Zhang, who now lives in Ottawa, is still painting and creating sculptures in preparation for an upcoming exhibit. He says Falun Dafa helps him to deal with what happened, as he tries to get Zemin and 21 other guards, police officers and officials charged with inflicting torture upon him. Other practitioners around the world are also trying to get Zemin charged for torturing them.
“In the States, various lawsuits have been filed, but in Canada nothing has been done,” says Cullum McConnell, president of the Falun Dafa club at Carleton University. McConnell also organized the mock trial of Zemin. “I think we all feel it’s really a persecution of mankind, to a certain extent.”
But McConnell says he expects the Chinese government to try preventing the case from going forward.
Sylvain Beaudry, the press secretary of Attorney General Irwin Cotler, declined comment. But David Matas, one of Zhang’s lawyers, says he thinks Cotler will give his permission.
“Nobody’s ever asked for this before,” Matas says.
If the case succeeds, those charged could face up to 14 years in jail.
“He (Zhang) is a legal pioneer, and he could help … make visible a remedy that would be available to victims,” says Matas. “The reality is there are many torture victims in Canada, and their past victimization is a problem in terms of their integration into Canadian society because they continue to be traumatized.”
Zhang says he hopes Cotler will allow the case to proceed. “This is a matter of great significance,” says Zhang. “I was hoping Canada can make decision that I, as a Canadian citizen, will feel proud of.”