Beijing's butcher is granted Australian visa
by Joseph Poprzeczny
Communist China's chief political enforcer, who also stands accused of being its pre-eminent exterminator, has been touring Australia.
The little-known Zhou Yongkang has taken the unusual but ominous step of visiting Australia unannounced on what was in all likelihood a fact-finding trip directly linked to his repressive policing duties.
The highly unusual visit sparked protests and questions about why someone with such a murderous record was permitted to enter Australia.
The concern was most evident across Australia's Chinese community, many of whose members fled or refused to return to China following the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre.
Zhou is a member of the nine-men standing committee of the Poliburo of the Chinese Communist Party - China's most powerful governing organ which wields unchecked authoritarian power.
According to Chinese-born New Zealand academic, Professor Dong Li, Zhou holds a senior cabinet post where he is assigned "to maintain law and order".
Professor Li reported: "He is undoubtedly the czar of the formidable 800,000-strong Chinese armed police, the well-equipped regular police force, all public procurators' organs, the entire judicial system and China's prison system.
"Zhou is to communist China today what Heinrich Himmler was to Nazi Germany."
Professor Li said that Zhou had a geological engineering background and held the top party post in China's biggest province of Sichuan from where he persecuted anyone designated as a dissenter.
"It was this that brought him to the attention of then Communist Party leader, Jiang Zemin," Professor Li said.
"Jiang Zemin consequently commissioned him to carry out the massive nationwide prosecution of the Falun Gong. We know that 43 Falun Gong were tortured to death in some of the concentration camps hastily set up to imprison them.
"Zhou came to international attention seven years ago when he was sued by Falun Gong practitioners in a Chicago Court that issued a summons."
However, this unwelcome publicity did not hinder Zhou since he was promoted in the following year to become China's "top cop" when he took up the post of Minister of Public Security (Police) and the General Political Commissar of the Armed Police. This meant taking command of all Chinese police forces.
"He told his men that one of the most crucial jobs ahead of them was to annihilate the Falun Gong resolutely, thoroughly and speedily," Professor Li said. "Falun Gong deaths from torture nationwide soared under his supervision with up to 2,988 being well-documented by the end of 2005."
The Epoch Times, which offers Australian readers the most comprehensive uncensored coverage of events in China, said several rallies held across Australia condemned the decision to allow Zhou to enter the country.
Spokeswoman for the Committee to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong, Li Chen Zhang, told the Sydney rally that it was Zhou who directed the clampdown on Falun Gong, Tibetan Buddhists, Christians and other dissidents in the lead-up to Beijing's Olympics.
According to Ms Li, Zhou was reported saying in the early preparations for the Games: "We must strike hard at hostile forces at home and abroad, such as ethnic separatists, religious extremists, violent terrorists and heretical organisations like the Falun Gong."
Former Australian Human Rights Commissioner, Dr Sev Ozdowski, said he believed the Australian Government should have been monitoring Zhou's activities during his visit because he was "one of the hard core" members of China's ruling Communist Party.
"He doesn't believe in law and order," Dr Ozdowski told Epoch Times. "He very much believes in unlimited rule of the Communist Party."
Several members of Australia's Chinese community have also questioned the decision of the Australian Minister for Immigrations, Senator Chris Evans, in granting Zhou a visa to enter Australia.
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