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Groups call for ban
on Beijing mayor
By Su Yung-yao / Staff Reporter
With Chinese purchasing delegations set to resume visits to Taiwan next week,
including one led by Beijing Mayor Guo Jinlong (³¢ª÷Às), human rights organizations
recently sent a letter to government agencies accusing Guo of human rights
violations and asking that he be denied entry.
The Taiwan Falun Dafa Institute and the Taiwan Friends of Tibet alleged that Guo,
who had assumed important government posts in the Tibetan Autonomous Region,
Anhui Province and Beijing, had violated human rights by planning and ordering
the oppression of members of the Falun Gong spiritual movement as well as
Tibetans.
Data from the Taiwan Friends of Tibet and the institute shows that Guo was
transferred to Tibet as the vice secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)
Tibetan Committee at the end of 1993, and in 2000 was made secretary of the
committee.
During the same period, the oppression of Tibetans by the Chinese government
reached its apogee and because of Guo¡¦s success in oppressing Tibetans, he was
promoted to CCP secretary of the Anhui Provincial Committee in 2006, the groups
said.
In November 2007, Guo was transferred to Beijing and became the city¡¦s mayor in
January 2008, as well as executive president of the Olympics organizing
committee for the Beijing Olympics.
Beijing authorities also committed human rights violations to ensure stability
in the runup to the Olympics ¡X measures that Guo is believed to have
orchestrated, the groups alleged.
They called on the Mainland Affairs Council and the National Immigration Agency
to deny Guo entry into the country, adding that not only should the government
verify whether Guo had perpetrated acts that violate human rights, they should
also check whether team members accompanying Guo had perpetrated similar deeds.
The government should not give such Chinese officials access into the country,
the two groups said.
Despite the groups¡¦ protests, sources have said that the immigration agency had
already approved the visa applications for Guo and his group, and that they
would arrive in Taiwan as scheduled.
Translated by Jake Chung, Staff writer
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