Chen’s Sabbath

By Wendy Wright | May 21, 2012

 

Rep. Chris Smith with Chen

Chen Guangcheng’s weary plea as he sought refuge in the U.S. embassy in Beijing was, “I have not had a Sunday in 7 years.” Arriving in the U.S. this weekend, his first day in America was, appropriately, Sunday.

 

This was the last leg of a harrowing journey that began with an escape from house arrest in China. The blind attorney who exposed China’s population control program was whisked from a hospital in Beijing to a plane to New York in a hasty arrangement that relieves a diplomatic challenge for China and the U.S.

 

Rep Chris Smith welcomed him at the airport. He warned that Chen would need extra protection even in the U.S., telling CNN:

 

“We’ve learned from … many other dissidents who finally got here and got asylum or protection that they are tracked, they are followed, they are harassed. So he will have to be watched — there will have to be an extra layer of protection here in New York. It has to be watched very carefully because they do things like car crashes or something happens that is made to look like an accident. So we have to keep a very, very sharp focus on his safety.”

 

China’s government relentlessly pursues dissidents, whether women with unplanned pregnancies (unapproved by the government) or human rights advocates like Chen.

 

They may be assisted in accomplishing this through support from the UN and Planned Parenthood.  You can read about the connection between China’s one-child program and international funding in Chinese Trolls and Chen’s Abusers.

 

Some congressmen worry about this link. At the same time the State Department quietly arranged Chen’s departure, a congressional committee sent a message to the Obama administration: quit funding UNFPA, the UN agency associated with China’s coercive population program.

 

UNFPA supplies China’s family planning agency with training and resources like computers.

 

Abortion advocates insist that UNFPA’s hands are clean of China’s brutal enforcement of its one child policy. Planned Parenthood lobbyists are likely busy right now working alongside UNFPA to reinsert funding in the legislation – as their international comrades pressure governments to include population reduction in the upcoming Rio+20 summit.

 

Chen arrived at a safe harbor at an opportune time. Pray for his protection so he can rest and continue his work of exposing population control programs.

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