The Kilgour–Matas report is a 2006/2007 investigative report into allegations of live organ harvesting in China conducted by Canadian MP David Kilgour and human rights lawyer David Matas. The report was requested by the Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong (CIPFG), a US-based organisation founded by the Falun Dafa Association, after allegations emerged that Falun Gong practitioners were secretly having their organs removed against their will at Sujiatun Thrombosis Hospital. The report, based on limited evidence, concluded that "there has been, and continues today to be, large-scale organ seizures from unwilling Falun Gong practitioners." China has consistently denied the allegations.CTV.ca News Staff (6 July 2006) , CTV.ca. Retrieved 8 July 2006.Canadian Press (7 July 2006) "Report claims China kills prisoners to harvest organs for transplant", canada.com. Retrieved 8 July 2006.

According to US Congressional Research Service (CRS), the Kilgour-Matas report did not introduce new or independently-obtained testimony and relied largely upon the making of logical inferences. CRS also noted that the conclusion of the report had heavily relied on the transcripts of telephone conversations allegedly made by CIFPG members from outside China to PRC detention centres, hospitals and police bureaus, in which call respondents had reportedly indicated that it was a common practice to harvest organs from live Falun Gong detainees.

The initial 6 July 2006 report found that, "the source of 41,500 transplants for the six-year period 2000 to 2005 is unexplained" and concluded that "there has been and continues today to be large scale organ seizures from unwilling Falun Gong practitioners." U.N. special rapporteur Manfred Nowak said in March 2007 that the chain of evidence Kilgour and Matas were documenting showed a "coherent picture that causes concern", which the United Nations Committee Against Torture followed up in November 2008 with a request for "a full explanation of the source of organ transplants", to investigate the claims of organ harvesting, and to take measures to prosecute those committing abuses. Other investigators, such as Ethan Gutmann, followed the Kilgour–Matas report; Gutmann estimating that between 450,000 and 1 million Falun Gong members were detained at any given time, and estimated that tens of thousands may have been targeted for organ harvesting.

Upon release of the initial report on 6 July 2006, Chinese officials declared that China abides by World Health Organization principles that prohibit the sale of human organs without written consent from donors. They denounced the report as smears "based on rumours and false allegations", and said the Chinese government had already investigated the claims and found them without any merit. The report is banned in Russia and China. Among international concerns, the US National Kidney Foundation expressed that it was "deeply concerned" about the allegations.National Kidney Foundation Statement about Alleged Human Rights Violations in Organ Donation National Kidney Foundation, 14 August 2006. Retrieved 18 August 2006

In 2009, the authors published an updated version of the report as a book, titled Bloody Harvest, The killing of Falun Gong for their organs, and in the same year received an award from the International Society for Human Rights.

Background

Falun Gong

Falun Gong is a spiritual discipline that combines meditation and exercises with a moral philosophy, emerged in China in the 1990s; by 1999 the number of practitioners was estimated in the tens of millions.

In July 1999, following a large-scale demonstration to request official recognition, Chinese authorities initiated a nationwide campaign to suppress the group, and created the 610 Office to oversee and coordinate the elimination of Falun Gong.Sarah Cook and Leeshai Lemish, ‘The 610 Office:Policing the Chinese Spirit’, China Brief, Volume 11 Issue 17 (9 November 2011).James Tong, Revenge of the Forbidden City, Oxford University Press (2009). The suppression that followed was accompanied by what Amnesty International called a "massive propaganda campaign",Amnesty International 'China: The crackdown on Falun Gong and other so-called "heretical organization"' 23 March 2000 as well as the detention and imprisonment of tens of thousands of Falun Gong adherents.Freedom House, The Politburo's Predicament: Confronting the Limitations of Communist Party Repression, January 2015 Former detainees reported that in some labour camps, Falun Gong practitioners comprised the majority population, and were singled out for abuse.Chinese Human Rights Defenders, Re-education through Labor Abuses Continue Unabated: Overhaul Long Overdue , 4 February 2009 Under order from Beijing, practitioners are subject to coercive "reeducation" and torture, sometimes resulting in deaths.Andrew Jacobs. 'China Still Presses Crusade Against Falun Gong', The New York Times, 27 April 2009. Due to limited access to victims and labour camp facilities, however, many specific reports of abuses are difficult to independently corroborate.

Organ transplantation in China

China has had an organ transplantation programme since the 1960s. It is one of the largest organ transplant programmes in the world, peaking at over 13,000 transplants a year in 2004."Health-System-Reform-in-China" The Lancet, 20 October 2008. Retrieved 24 September 2010 Involuntary organ harvesting is illegal under Chinese law, although under a 1984 regulation it became legal to remove organs from executed criminals with the prior consent of the criminal or permission of relatives. By the 1990s, growing concerns about possible ethical abuses arising from coerced consent and corruption led medical groups and human rights organizations to start condemning the practice. These concerns resurfaced in 2001, when The Washington Post reported claims by a Chinese asylum-seeking doctor that he had taken part in organ extraction operations.

By 2005 the World Medical Association had specifically demanded that China cease using prisoners as organ donors. In December of that year, China's Deputy Health Minister acknowledged that the practice of removing organs from executed prisoners for transplant was widespread – as many as 95% of all organ transplants in China derived from executions,Congressional Executive Commission on China Annual Report 2006 p. 59; note 224, p.201 and he promised steps to prevent abuse.Jane Macartney, "China to 'tidy up' trade in executed prisoners' organs", The Times, 3 December 2005

Sujiatun The first allegations of systematic organ harvesting from Falun Gong practitioners were made in March 2006 by two individuals claiming to possess knowledge of involuntary organ extractions at the Sujiatun Thrombosis Hospital in Shenyang, Liaoning province. Within one month of press coverage, third party investigators, including representatives of the US Department of State, said that there was insufficient evidence to prove the allegations.Congressional Research Service report, Congressional Research Report #RL33437 , page CRS-7, paragraph 3 In 2006 and 2008, United Nations Special Rapporteurs raised questions about the sources of organs, the short waiting times for finding perfectly matched organs, and the correlation between the sudden increase in organ transplants in China and the beginning of the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners. These requests were not satisfactorily addressed by the Chinese authorities. In November 2008 the United Nations Committee Against Torture noted its concern at the allegations and called for China to "immediately conduct or commission an independent investigation of the claims", and take measures "to ensure that those responsible for such abuses are prosecuted and punished". Chinese dissident Harry Wu, who exposed organ harvesting from prison inmates at laogai (hard labour camps), questioned the credibility of the Sujiatun whistle-blowers. But Harry Wu's July 2006 article showed his views in his 21 March letter were formed before completing his investigation, and were not based on his full investigation. Further, Harry Wu characterized the volume of organ harvesting described by the pseudonymous informant "Annie" as "technically impossible", but in fact it is technically possible, according to the Matas/Kilgour report. On 14 April 2006, the US state department wrote that "U.S. representatives have found no evidence to support allegations that a site in northeast China has been used as a concentration camp to jail Falun Gong practitioners and harvest their organs", adding "independent of these specific allegations, the United States remains concerned over China’s repression of Falun Gong practitioners and by reports of organ harvesting."

Soon thereafter, in May 2006, The Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong asked David Kilgour as well as Canadian human rights lawyer David Matas to investigate the broader allegations of organ harvesting from Falun Gong adherents in China. Kilgour and Matas agreed to investigate.

The report

First report

On 20 July 2006, Kilgour and Matas presented the findings of their two-month investigation as Report into Allegations of Organ Harvesting of Falun Gong Practitioners in China. The report presented 33 strands of circumstantial evidence that Kilgour and Matas felt, in the absence of any disproof, cumulatively allowed the conclusion that "the government of China and its agencies in numerous parts of the country, in particular hospitals but also detention centres and 'people's courts', since 1999 have put to death a large but unknown number of Falun Gong prisoners of conscience. Their vital organs, including kidneys, livers, corneas and hearts, were seized involuntarily for sale at high prices, sometimes to foreigners, who normally face long waits for voluntary donations of such organs in their home countries". The report called attention to the extremely short wait times for organs in China – one to two weeks for a liver compared with 32.5 months in Canada – noting that this was indicative of organs being procured on demand. It also tracked a significant increase in the number of annual organ transplants in China beginning in 1999, corresponding with the onset of the persecution of Falun Gong. Despite very low levels of voluntary organ donation, China performs the second-highest number of transplants per year. Kilgour and Matas also presented material from Chinese transplant center web sites advertising the immediate availability of organs from living donors, and transcripts of telephone interviews in which hospitals told prospective transplant recipients that they could obtain Falun Gong organs. The authors qualified their findings by noting the difficulties in verifying the alleged crimes, such as: independent bodies were not allowed to investigate conditions in China, eyewitness evidence was difficult to obtain, official information about organ transplantation was often withheld, and Kilgour and Matas themselves were denied visas to go to China to investigate.

Second report