The Canadian former politician relentlessly denounced the horror of organ harvesting in China. He was also a great friend of Bitter Winter.
by Marco Respinti
Next month, May 2022, Bitter Winter will celebrate its fourth anniversary. We are often quoted and applauded, including by governments and international institutions. Occasionally, we are criticized, attacked, and hacked. Most, if not all, of these attacks can be traced back to China and its agents. However, while they have written that we are biased, they never dared to say that a single piece of news, picture or video that we have published is false. We take this as a badge of honor since we all know the mastery of the CCP and its many agents in the art of forgery and fabrication.
In four years, readers of Bitter Winter have learned the scope and magnitude, harshness and violence of every angle of the persecution waged on by the neo-post-national-communist regime of China against religious groups, ethnic minorities, and dissidents. All forms of CCP’s ferocity rival each other in cruelty, but undoubtedly forced organ harvesting is one of the most horrible.
In spite of the documents produced by direct testimonies and independent sources, that grave crime still continues in China today and is still denied by China’s fellow travelers. It begun by decimating Falun Gong, and went on in later years to hit other groups such as Tibetans, Christians, members of The Church of Almighty God, and Uyghurs.
Today the world has no excuse for ignoring this slaughter after the immense and capillary work done, among others, by Doctors Against Forced Organ Harvesting (DAFOH), the International Coalition to End Transplant Abuse in China, the late Chinese dissident Harry Wu (Wu Hongda, 吳弘達, 1937–2016), and the China Tribunal.
But there has been a time when the landscape was foggy and to document, especially abroad, the tragedy that so many people were suffering in China was extremely hard.
It was then that two human rights activists arose from the fog to bring light to this obscure and ghastly matter. They were David Matas (a Canadian lawyer specialized in refugee, immigration, and human rights law, and a senior legal counsel of B’nai Brith Canada) and David Kilgour (1941–2022).
Kilgour passed away on April 5, 2022. Those suffering persecution in China, all friends of truth, freedom, and justice, and Bitter Winter sincerely mourn him.
A Canadian national, Kilgour graduated from the University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, with a major in Economy, in 1962, and from the University of Toronto Law School in 1966. He then served as crown attorney in northern Alberta, as Canadian Cabinet minister, and as an independent MP in the House of Commons of Canada. He started as a member of the Progressive Conservative Party, left it to join the Liberal Party, and at the end of his political career quit the latter as well. He was in fact never searching for power, and while believing that politics can achieve much, he grew dissatisfied with short-sighted party politics and with the stink of non-transparent money.
Democracy and the respect for human rights have always been the lighthouse of his political activity in many fields, but it was in respect of the Chinese persecutions of innocents that Kilgour gave his best.
At a time when rumors of forced organ harvesting in China were growing but no one had yet produced a serious analysis of the matter, Kilgour joined with Matas and broke the ice. The two gathered as much evidence and testimonies as possible, checked them, double-checked them, tried to verify every single piece of information and, on July 6, 2006, released what they humbly defined a preliminary investigation, under the title Report into Allegations of Organ Harvesting of Falun Gong Practitioners in China. In a way, it was really preliminary, as it called for further investigation.
While not allowed to travel to China, though tireless efforts Kilgour and Matas were able to match the allegations coming from Falun Gong practitioners. For the first time ever, they directly challenged the narrative of the CCP as to the numbers of human organs available in China for transplants. While Beijing claimed, and claims, that all organs for transplants come from voluntary donations, the “Kilgour-Matas Report contested the claim. The two independent researchers estimated that from 2000 to 2005, 41,500 organs used for transplants had an unexplained source.”
Of course, the “Kilgour-Matas Report” ignited much criticism, much of which was directly or indirectly fueled, and funded, by the CCP. In fact, however, even some on the other side of the barricade were astonished by their findings and privately admitted they had been shocked by the report.
It was then time for Kilgour and Matas to abandon humility and bring their challenge higher. After more in-depth research, on January 31, 2007 they produced an updated and larger version of their report, Bloody Harvest: Revised Report into Allegations of Organ Harvesting of Falun Gong Practitioners in China, and two years later, in 2009, they published it in the form of a book with the same title.
In the meantime, Ethan Gutmann, an American researcher, now Senior Research Fellow in China Studies at the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, published another important book on the subject, The Slaughter: Mass Killings, Organ Harvesting, and China’s Secret Solution to Its Dissident Problem. And then they were three. Kilgour, Matas, and Gutmann joined forces, and their following effort was another huge update of both “Bloody Harvest” and “The Slaughter,” published on June 22, 2016.
The whole matter was now under the eyes of the world, documented, well-researched, unmatched. Many refused again to see reality. Too many still do, claiming criticism of China on organ harvesting is just a “Falun Gong conspiracy,” but nothing was ever the same after the Kilgour-Matas-Gutmann studies.
In 2012 the whole matter was then furtherly investigated through a new book, a collection of savvy essays, including writings by Kilgour, Matas and Gutmann, entitled State Organs: Transplant Abuse in China, edited by Matas himself and Dr. Torsten Trey, the founder and executive director of DAFOH. It is the legitimate heir to the unvaluable “Kilgour-Matas Report.”
Finally, in 2014 a documentary film, Human Harvest (活摘), directed by Canadian filmmaker Leon Lee, followed the investigative work done by Kilgour and Matas, bringing truth through the powerful strength of images and live voices.
Kilgour was also a co-founder of ETAC, the International Coalition to End Transplant Abuse in China.
In 2010, Kilgour and Matas were nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. In fact, who works more for peace than the one who debunks lies, defends the innocents, and saves lives? Of course, Kilgour and Matas were never awarded the prize, but this tells us more about the world we live in than about the two human rights defenders.
Now for Kilgour it is too late to receive that prize. As a believer, I trust he is enjoining a much greater prize where he is now.
Let me also proudly remember the friendship he always displayed for Bitter Winter, which he greeted enthusiastically, promoting it and sharing its articles regularly, and often sending short comments to us. We do not presume to be at the same level of David Kilgour, a hero and a true seeker of truth. But we will continue the fight, honoring his memory.