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THE BYRON SHIRE ECHO Advertising & news enquiries: Mullumbimby 02 6684 1777 Byron Bay 02 6685 5222 Fax 02 6684 1719 editor@echo.net.au adcopy@echo.net.au Available early Tuesday at: http://www.echo.net.au VOLUME 22 #26 TUESDAY, DECEMBER 4, 2007 22,500 copies every week
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Torch sheds light on human rights abuses
Lazarus leaves Greens after standoff Michael McDonald Byron Shire Councillor John Lazarus resigned from the Greens last Thursday after a standoff with other Greens councillors over his behaviour. Last September Cr Lazarus was censured 5-1 by his fellow councillors with Crs Barham, Staples and Tabart absenting themselves from the vote, citing a conflict of interest as moves were already under way to bring a complaint against Cr Lazarus to the local Greens branch.
One of the Xing Jian Dancers, Sammi Ming, performs in Railway Park as part of the Human Rights Torch Relay. Photo Jeff Dawson
Replicating the journey of the Olympic Torch the Human Rights Global Torch Relay arrived in Byron Bay on Sunday morning. The global relay’s mission is to highlight human rights violations in China particularly those against Falun Gong practitioners, which make up two-thirds of reported cases of torture from China’s labour camps. Other prisoners include democracy and environmental activists, lawyers, Christians and Tibetans. Accusations of abuse levelled at the Chinese government include arbitrary detentions, organ harvesting from living
prisoners of conscience and systematic torture. Ian Cohen MLC and Byron Shire Councillors Westheimer, Tucker, Tabart and Mangleson addressed the gathering in Railway Park and called for the public to lobby the new federal government and the state government to increase pressure on China over its human rights abuses in the lead up to the Beijing Olympics. ‘Medical experimentation using people who happen to be Falon Gong practitioners and harvesting their organs is a barbaric practice,’ said Ian Cohen. ‘Unless China changes its human rights record
the Olympics will be a farce. The Chinese government would do well to take notice of these issues, and the Australian government would also do well to stop blindly following the economic attraction of the Chinese marketplace and recognise that we can trade with China but certain basic conditions must apply.’ According to the Human Rights Torch Relay site – www.humanrightstorch.org – hundreds of thousands of Chinese citizens are held as political prisoners without charge or trial, including democracy activists, lawyers, human rights defenders, religious leaders,
journalists, trade unionists,Tibetan Buddhists, Uighurs, ‘unofficial’ church members, Falun Gong practitioners, environmental activists, health and reproductive rights activists, and political dissidents ‘People have been evicted from their homes to make way for commercial construction, and beaten or killed if they protest; any meagre payment offered to them is usually stolen by corrupt local officials,’ the site says. ‘Millions of Chinese are also sent without trial to slave labor camps, where they are tortured and forced to work long days producing consumer goods.’
The Byron Ballina Greens issued a brief statement of events which wished Cr Lazarus well as an independent on Council but what went on at the Greens meeting last Thursday was much more colourful. Cr Lazarus told The Echo, ‘The Mayor and I had a standoff when she was not able to get a resolution to expel or suspend me from the Greens. The meeting… did not come to a resolution that satisfied the Mayor. ‘The Mayor was initially seeking expulsion in the complaint, but moved to supporting a 12 months suspension (which would have prevented me standing with the Greens at the next Council election). After three and half hours of the meeting, and after straw polls and failed 12 month and six month suspension motions, the Mayor, looking visibly stressed, stated continued on page 2