‘I Have the Need to Try and Save These Orphans’

BEIJING —  Dr. Zhang Shuyun is a 53-year-old graduate of Beijing Medical University who worked at the Shanghai Children’s Welfare Institute as a laboratory technician.

Beginning in 1989, she and several colleagues at the institute acted to reform what they believed was a policy of neglect at the orphanage that led to the deaths of hundreds of abandoned infants. After her appeals to authorities ended in failure, Zhang collected case records on several hundred orphans and fled overseas.

A principal source of information contained in a new Human Rights Watch report on China’s orphanages, she was interviewed by The Times on Friday by telephone from London. Times researcher Anthony Kuhn assisted with the interpretation and translation of her remarks.

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Question: Why did you start to work for the reform of the Shanghai orphanage?

Answer: I am a doctor. I am a citizen of the People’s Republic of China. I have the responsibility and the need to try and save these orphans and care about their situation. . . . So I went at this work with the rights given to me by the PRC. And it wasn’t just me. Several friends jointly, and not secretly, reported our concerns to the government.

Q: How did this thing happen?

A: The roots of the problem are very deep. Over the past decade, the orphanage gradually opened up to the public and to foreigners. This ought to have been a good thing. On the contrary, because many foreigners came and many sympathetic people donated money . . . those cadres [officials] felt that this was a profitable money tree for them to shake. They then treated it as their own pan of gold from which to extract profits. Their focus of attention became how to swindle more donations out of people and get rich. They took the “superiority of socialism” and plundered it for themselves.

China has family planning policies that only permit one child per family, so there are many female infants who are abandoned by their parents. From among these, they [orphanage staff] picked out a certain number of kids who were fairly good-looking, who were fit for visitors to see and adopt, and in this way they made big profits. . . . There were kids dying from abuse and neglect every day, but there was a steady stream of new ones coming in. You may have noticed that in the report, I listed in detail the situations of kids at the orphanage from January to February 1992, without missing a one. Of the 26 children, 24 were girls, and all had exam records made when they came in. Aside from one or two who were a bit underweight, they were all fine when they came in, but within weeks or months, they had all been starved to death. Only a small number of the kids managed to survive and grow up.

Q: Why didn’t officials take measures to stop abuses?

A: Once we reported the problem, the situation got complicated. These government officials thought the matter was very serious; they thought it was a human rights problem. We considered it a humanitarian problem--that these children should be adequately clothed, fed, cured, educated. But they took it as a political problem and inflicted political persecution upon us and the orphans. Sixteen or 17 Shanghai municipal congress delegates, many lawyers, journalists and several tens of co-workers gave it their best effort, but all ended up in despair. All these people who spoke the truth were later subjected to some kind of persecution or attack.

Q: Why did you leave China?

A: There was no way to solve the problem in China. After seeing the persecution that the orphans suffered, I wanted to speak out and seek justice for them. I also wanted justice for the municipal congress delegates, lawyers and journalists who fought for the children’s rights.

Q: What kind of persecution did you and your sympathetic colleagues face?

A: When we were reporting on the problems at the Shanghai Children’s Welfare Institute, we did it all publicly. We wrote no secret letters. We put our names and telephone numbers on letters and sent them personally to the Shanghai municipal government, municipal party committee and even the mayor and vice mayor. We always treated the matter in the most responsible fashion.

But the result was that all these materials fell into the hands of [orphanage Director] Han Weicheng and the civil affairs bureau. They used the materials to track down the witnesses and orphans and persecute them and keep them from telling the truth. Some were transferred out; others had their pay docked. I am very worried about these witnesses and friends.

Q: What next? Return to China?

A: Of course, I hope for the opportunity to return. . . . If the Chinese government will not permit me to return, I am very willing to do research overseas on China’s orphan problem. I am interested in researching the psychology of orphans . . . and I hope such research would be of use back in China.