captioning performed by vitac captioning performed by vitac >> i think it's very important to report that in china brothers and sisters are illegal and women are treated as criminals if they have a child without

explicit government permission. and your story and i know she herself as suffered the great exploitation herself and tens of millions have sfrd this dough grading and this horrific abuse of women. again, that's what chen guancheng's cause was. for that he has been so brutally mistreated. i'd like to now turn to my distinguished colleague emory burkel, who is a registered nurse, a lawyer, a former assistant attorney general for the state of new york. he also chairs the subcommittee on health for the veterans affairs committee. bob will join us in a moment. we do have chen guancheng and

then we'll go to emory. he joined us may 3rd and provided very useful insights to say the least. we'll yield to him momentarily so he can speak from his hospital bed again in china. emory, if you wanted to say a few words. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and i want to thank the chairman for his steadfast pursuit of human rights throughout the world. as you mentioned, 30 years he has been vigilant for all human rights and i want to thank all of you for being here, for your pursuit of justice, for human rights in china. future generations are going to look at you for your devotion to creating a free china. so thank you all very much for your courage, for your willingness to be here and

testify before us. we so appreciate all that you do. we just want to work with you to shed a light on this terrible injustice that exists in china. >> we will go to questions momentarily. miss mei mentioned how her husband was detained. again, i think for the purposes of understanding the depravity of the policy, i invited with the help of harry wu a woman who ran a program who went under the sued anymore of mrs. gao. she self-described before this committee in this room just several years ago at a hearing that i chaired, she said by day

was a monster, by night i was a wife and mother of one child. she said that they used detention against family members the way mrs. may talked a moment ago to hold family members, to put them in prison as they looked to find a woman who was trying to escape the family planning cadres. that is a reality that goes on every day in china that is so grossly underappreciated by so many of us in policy making positions. and, again, when you talk about that kind of abuse of women that is unprecedented in world history where an entire generation of chinese women have been made to suffer that rule with barely a peep of dissent from the obama administration, many of our friends in the european union and elsewhere and and when you get groups like the u.n. population fund who say repeatedly that the program in

china is totally voluntary when it is totally involuntary, it is a whitewash that has no comparison either. so thank you for sharing that detail that is so extremely important that it's not just, if that wasn't enough, the mother herself, the woman herself who is so hunted and degraded by the chinese dictatorship, they also look at the rest of the family in a way that parallels what's going on with chen guancheng. it's not just him and his family, it is the rest of the family, the extended family. i'll put in the record a list of ten members of his family, including friends, who are deeply concerned about it that we know the government has arrested, detained, beaten and friends that reggie little john spoke so passionately about and

chen, who has suffered the loss of his hearing and that was just a few weeks ago. we do now have chen guancheng on the line. >> emory, would you join us? mr. chen, you are on. >> mr. chen, welcome back.

>> translator: i just want to talk to what happened to my other family members. around midnight a group of government led by the local township leader and raided my elder brother's home at midnight. >> translator: around midnight a group of thugs of the local

authorities broke into my elder brother's home and just started beating them violently. >> translator: and my elder brother was taken away by this thugs and without any reasoning

and then they came back and started beating up my nephew and for -- they use sticks and violently beating up him and then for three hours he's bleeding on his head and his face was not stopped and so this is so violent that my nephew to my knowledge had to defend himself. pinterest >> translator: this attack against my nephew for so-called

intentional homicide is totally trumped up charge. and for himself at his own home to be accused of committing this crime of intentional homicide against the intruders is totally absurd and irrational, unreasonable.

>> translator: 40 thugs and guards raided my home in the past year and beat me and my family seriously. this is a pattern already. this is not the first time he had against my family. >> translator: and after my nephew was beaten up and he actually was waiting and waiting to surrender himself and the police come back again and violently beat up my

sister-in-law and -- >> translator: so my brother of course was taken away without any reasoning by the authorities and then the lawyer, the attorney, who has already got

the commissioned paper signed by my neff you've's wife and even though he has the signature by his wife, the detention center and the bling security officers reduced to and by calling that document as a fake document, although they know that it true and also they just wanted to have my nephew's rife and to surrender herself.

>> translator: and what have been done by the chinese -- by the public security officers is a total of violation against the chinese' own constitution and the chinese own criminal law. of course those charges against me neff you've -- my nephew as well.

>> translator: the same tactic that was used against me in 2006 when they tried to prevent -- this try -- are being used against my nephew. >> translator: and i do think those charges are trumped up charges and these people has already been on the wrong side -- on the opposite side of the rule of law in china.

>> translator: and this is so far what i have learned about my extended family members. so right now i am not able to communicate with them anymore because all their communication tools were confiscated already. thank you for your attention. >> very briefly i've invited the people who are testifying today on your behalf. first, bob fu.

reggie han, ch hi ling and mrs. mei. we're also joined by congresswoman bass and congresswoman burkele from new york. briefly the focus of the hearing has been about your safety and your wife and children. with a particular emphasis on your cause, fighting as you did so bravely to defend women from forced abortion and to rally

congressional support and hopefully executive branch support and hopefully worldwide support for your extended fam y family, as well as your friends. if i could ask you very briefly, has the united states government, our embassy, been able to in any way make contact with your extended family and your friends who are at grave risk and who are suffering beatings?

>> translator: for that question i'm not very clear on the specifics but i do know, however, the u.s. embassy has been communicating with me every day. >> if i could, your wife and your children, how well are they doing under this enormous burden?

>> translator: they're doing fine, especially my two children. they kept telling my wife and i that this is such a wonderful place, we can play outside and you can tell what they told my wife and i how terrible they have been back to our hometown. they were only allowed to pick one outing every day.

>> translator: because my wife and her children had been under such a long time of and when i saw them under these circumstances, i felt very saddened.

>> translator: i suggested he hire his own lawyers and not teak government-pointed lawyers for his family members. >> this is reggie. i'm wondering -- i'm wondering whether there is any lawyer that has been accepted to be the lawyer for chen -- we heard there are 13 who offered, at least one has had his license revoked. i'm wondering specifically ab t

about. >> translator: i do know that many lawyers are waiting and wanting to go and i feel they will be able to go to and they're planning to go. >> mr. chen, henry burkele just asked do you know that all of

america is listening to your voice right now. there are large numbers of media here and c-span is broadcasting there thought america. what would you like to tell the american public?

>> translator: i want to extend my gratitude and thankfulness to all those who care and love my family and myself and our situation, especially to american people. and who shows your care about the equality and justice. those are university. >> mr. chen, xi ling would like to say something.

>> translator: the question was we're very proud of you as a hero of american and many chinese women are very encouraged by your courageous act and what mr. chen just answered, he said i'm not a hero, i'm just do what my conscious asked me to do. i cannot be silent when facing these evils against the women and the children.

>> translator: and she also said many, many christians have been fasting all over the world and praying for you. and mr. chen said what i have done out of my conscience and conviction. i cannot be silent when we see and face this kind of evils.

>> translator: you are the first man stand up for this 30 years china one child policy on behalf of 400 million chinese babies who were forcibly aborted and killed so we praise you and we thank and appreciate you. >> we'll stand with you until the very end. you will be set free. >> mr. chen, thank you so very much. we will continue, this is the third hearing. the first one was last november when we thought you had disappeared. this is the third hearing and i can assure