New Zealand Government officials met with Canadian dignitaries on Tuesday to discuss the organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners in China.

Green MP Keith Locke, Labour MPs Steve Chadwick and Russel Fairbrother, National MP Wayne Mapp, and independent MP Gordan Copeland, met former Canadian Secretary of State for Asia Pacific David Kilgour and International Human Rights Lawyer David Matas in a select committee room at Parliament House.

National MP Wayne Mapp said he hoped to raise China's organ harvesting in Parliament on Thursday.

He said politicians feel there are a number of things they need a higher level of evidence about before they can act.

"One is the scale of the camp system in China, we know it's extensive but we don't know how big it is. Is it small or big?

"The second thing is the number of Falun Gong practitioners arrested without trial.

"The third thing is 3032 people tortured to death for practicing Falun Gong, we need to substantiated that."

Mr Matas replied the details for each victim are in the appendix of the report he wrote with Kilgour called the Bloody Harvest.

Mr Kilgour then asked Mr Mapp if he had read the report. He said he hadn't.

Mr Kilgour asked the MPs to table the report in Parliament. It is a revised report released in January that almost doubles the evidence of their first report.

Mr Mapp replied it would be better if they tabled the Bloody Harvest at a Select Committee meeting.

Auckland City Councilor and member of the Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong in China (CIPFG) Cathy Casey also attended the meeting with the MPs.

"Last year I had my kidney removed and I know why people would go to China – it's not their fault. There are 300-400 people on waiting lists in New Zealand for a kidney transplant," Dr Casey said.

Auckland's sister city - Guangzhou brought the city around $50 million last year, mainly through international students. Dr Casey said when the new mayor is elected she will ask him to raise the organ harvesting issue with his Chinese counterpart.

"What kind of society is this that we allow these atrocities to happen?" she asked.

MFAT meeting

Mr Matas and Mr Kilgour also met a Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT) official earlier on Tuesday.

Mr Matas and Mr Kilgour expressed their concern about the looming Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with China to the MFAT official, because they said, a large number of goods from China are made in forced labour camps.

The MFAT official replied that a customs inspector in Beijing would ensure that no Chinese products made in forced labour camps would enter New Zealand.

Mr Kilgour said one customs official was "laughable".

Fair Trade not Free Trade

Mr Kilgour asked 250 people at a public forum called Behind the Rise of China at Victoria University, whether they supported a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with China. Two people raised their hands in support.

The panelists raised concerns about the organ harvesting of Falun Gong, Internet repression, human rights abuses, the two China's – the one perceived by Westerners and the one the Chinese people see, unsafe products from China, counterfeit goods, and the use of slave and child labour.

Amnesty International campaign manager Gary Reese said unfortunately the use of child labour was on the increase again in China.

"Labour rights are virtually nonexistent in China.

"There is only one union and it is sanctioned by the Government. It is not doing a good job," he said.

Amnesty International estimates 250,000 people are detained in labour camps in China, and a 2006 US State Department report shows that more than 50 percent of the prisoners held in these camps are Falun Gong practitioners.

Mr Matas said getting statistics about executions in China is very difficult because the Chinese regime will not give them to outsiders.

"Amnesty International tabulates deaths from executions by tabulating newspaper reports. And there is no way newspapers document all executions," he explained.

Mr Matas has been involved in investigating the Holocaust.

The Bloody Harvest report is available in 17 languages and provides 33 different kinds of evidence of state-sanctioned organ harvesting in China, Mr Kilgour told the MPs.

Evidence from the Bloody Harvest report

41,500 organs transplanted in China could not be accounted since 2001

There is no donor system in China - executed prisoners supply the Chinese organ trade.

A Chinese surgeon removed the eyes of 2000 Falun Gong practitioners, appendix 18.

Phone calls to 15 hospitals in China to inquire about the use of Falun Gong practitioners organs in transplant operations, appendix 14.

SOURCE: Bloody Harvest: Revised Report Into Allegations of Organ Harvesting of Falun Gong Practitioners in China. Kilgour, D., and Matas, D. January 31, 2007. www.organharvestinvestigation.net