Tong Zeng

Tong Zeng (Chinese name: 童增，born June 3, 1956), Chinese scholar, social activist, chairman of China Federation of Demanding Compensation from Japan, and chairman of Zhongxiang Investment Co., Ltd. Tong Zeng wrote a paper in 1990, which triggered a civil movement to safeguard the dignity and rights of victims of World War II. Tong Zeng was suppressed by the Chinese government in the early stages. In the report on human rights in China published by the State Department of the United States in 1996 (Part I, Section D), it was also mentioned that Tong Zeng was unfairly treated. but, He had persisted in exposing the truth about various war and anti-humanity crimes for more than 30 years. He has been fighting for justice for the forgotten war victims. He gradually moved the Chinese official, and sometimes got the Chinese official media coverage. He was nominated as a Nobel Peace Prize candidate for the first time in 2015.Tong Zeng's efforts have contributed to the opportunity for the two nations with deep grievances to face up to history and contributed to keeping the two countries away from war and promoting peace. This also coincides with the primary objective of the Nobel Peace Prize, which is to "promote the unity between the two countries". In 2017, Tong Zeng and Japanese lawyer Onodera Toshitaka were nominated as candidates for the Nobel Peace Prize. In 2019, Henrik Urdal, Norwegian political scientist and the current director of the Peace Research Institute Oslo ([[PRIO]]) independently predicted the "5-person shortlist" for the Nobel Peace Prize that year. In addition, a long list of predictions was attached. Tong Zeng's name appeared the fifth, and US President Trump was the third. Tong Zeng was also the first to question the "Human Genome Project". In 1998, he publicly opposed the collection of blood samples of the elderly in China by some institutions in both China and the United States for the so-called purpose of studying the model and analysis of the mortality of the elderly. American Science Weekly reported on this matter, and Gale Onefile, ProQuest of Cambridge Information Group, The National Institutes of Health (NIH), Vdocuments, etc. have been reprinted. In 2003, Tong Zeng published the book "The Last Line of Defense", in which it proposed that "SARS might be produced in a laboratory or a genetic weapon aimed at the Chinese". In the preface of the book, Tong Zeng said: "Though the cause of the SARS virus has not been found, this book gives people a new thinking." The China Youth Daily first reported on it, and The Associated Press also reported on it. Follow up the report, Amazo can still find this book. On July 6, 2019, Tong Zeng wrote to recommend that the United Nations should learn from the historical lessons of Einstein and other scientists who failed to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons after the war, and must prevent the militarization and weapons of biological genetic research in some countries. It is urgent to formulate international conventions to regulate their behavior and prohibit the use of human genetic resources to develop and manufacture biological and chemical weapons and genetic weapons. At the end of 2019, when the COVID-19 pandemic broke out, Tong Zeng not only raised his concern to the Chinese government that the virus may be originated from laboratories, but also sent a letter to the Secretary-General of the United Nations and the World Health Organization， asking them to conduct thorough inspections all biological, viral, and genetic laboratories around the world. On March 18, 2020, Tong Zeng launched a signature campaign on a well-known international signature website to require UN agencies to verify the biological, virus, and genetic laboratories of the five permanent members of the council. He has obtained More than 10,000 people who signed support. On October 5, 2020, through the Facebook platform, Tong Zeng called on more than 50 countries around the world to submit a motion to the United Nations to verify the biological, virus, and genetic laboratories of the five permanent members.

File:Tong Zeng (in Beijing) was answering questions from Hong Kong media about the Japanese bombing of Chongqing 65 years ago. (5 June 2006).jpg

Tong Zeng (in Beijing) was answering questions from Hong Kong media about the Japanese bombing of Chongqing 65 years ago. (5 June 2006)

Early life

Tong Zeng's father, Tong Qiangmeng, graduated from the mechanical department of Chongqing University in 1956. His mother, Mu Huifang, graduated from accounting at a technical secondary school. Tong Zeng was born in Chongqing, China on June 3, 1956.Tong Zeng was born in Chongqing, China on June 3, 1956. Unfortunately for Tong Zeng, when he was just one year old, his father was assigned to work in a factory after graduating from college. Within a year, he was sent to a labor camp for three years for expressing opinions different from the government at the time. Three years later, he was assigned manual labor for 19 years. Chen Zongshun (pseudonym: Liu Bai), a well-known Chinese biographer, has published four books about Tong Zeng over the past 20 years, three of which record Tong Zeng's early life., In particular, the book "Tong Zeng: the hero of our times" published in Hong Kong in 2015 is still on the sales list of the publishing house. Chinese freelance writer Guan Mingqiang wrote a long documentary report on Tong Zeng in 1998, which also detailed his early life., In these works, Tong Zeng's early life is written in detail. Tong Zeng's childhood was greatly influenced by his grandfather. He sits next to his grandfather every night and listens to the old man teaching Chinese history. At the age of 10, Tong Zeng's cherished "History Book Series" was torn up by the people sent by the local government. After they left, Tong Zeng shed tears and hid the broken pages under his bed. In the dead of night, he Then put these pages together to read.

Tong Zeng was deprived of his right to high school when he graduated from junior high school due to political reasons from his father. In order to continue his studies, he went to a cousin's house far away from Chongqing, begged her for help, and became a temporary "student" in the middle school where she taught. In order to gain the goodwill of the school, Tong Zeng had to do heavy physical labor besides studying. For the first time, he carried coal for the school. He went over mountains and ridges. There were 50 catties of coal in the basket, and only 20 catties were left when he arrived at the school. Later, Tong Zeng finally entered high school.

After graduating from high school, 19-year-old Tong Zeng went to the countryside to work in agriculture and open up wasteland to grow tea, like many of his peers in China at the time, but he has not forgotten to read and study. One day, the cadres of the township government confiscated the ancient Chinese poem "Three Hundred Tang Poems" placed beside the pillow on Tong Zeng's bed. Because the book was relatively old and yellowed, they mistakenly regarded it as an ancient "pornographic book". Tong Zeng became anxious and chased down the mountain from the mountain to the bottom of the mountain along the path, explaining that it was not a "pornographic book" but an ancient Chinese poetry book. Until the township cadre was having lunch in a village, Tong Zeng looked at the opportunity, grabbed the book back in his hand and ran...

At the age of 21, Tong Zeng taught temporarily in local rural elementary schools and middle schools, teaching Chinese, history, geography and other courses.

At the age of 22, he was admitted to Sichuan University in China, and studied economics there. In 1982, he was assigned to teach at the Beijing Industry Management Institute. In 1985, he signed up for the international law professional examination for overseas graduate students funded by a Hong Kong foundation, but was not admitted. In 1986, he was admitted to Peking University for a master's degree in law.

Since 1987, Tong Zeng has published some articles in some Chinese newspapers. He once proposed the " the theory of the new period"At that time, he put forward four major civilizations: "spiritual civilization", "material civilization", "environmental civilization" and "institutional civilization". Among them, he mentioned environmental protection to civilization construction for the first time. .Tong worked with others to write "Where is the World Going?" in 1989, in which he specifically discussed the development trends of poverty and hunger, [[military competition]], population crisis, lack of resources, and environmental degradation.

Activism

The origin of China Federation of Demanding Compensation from Japan

Tong Zeng was credited to be the first Chinese citizen to ask for compensation from Japan for its war crimes during World War II. In 1990, Tong Zeng wrote an essay--"The Enlightenment of Europe Revisiting War Reparations for China", which was later revised to "China Demands Japan's Compensation for War Victims without Delay", which was sent to China's National People's Congress in March 1991. Media from Hong Kong and Japan reported on it. For the first time, Tong distinguished "war compensation" from "civil compensation", and he was the first person to propose that "Chinese civilian victims have the right to claim compensation from the Japanese government and enterprises", raising the issue of protecting the human rights of war victims to a theoretical level. It laid the legal foundation for the Chinese people's demanding compensation from Japan. At the same time, a large number of volunteers gathered around Tong to start the movement of demanding compensation from Japan. At the end of 1992, according to the AP, the ChicagoTribune and other reports, Tong Zeng had been supported by 300000 signatures.

The awakening of the victims of World War II

From 1991 to 1994, Tong Zeng received nearly 10,000 letters from victims of World War II from all over China. Tong called on the victims of World War II to write to the Japanese Embassy in China for an apology and compensation. In October 1992, the Emperor of Japan visited China for the first time. Tong publicly expressed his request for the Emperor of Japan to apologize for the invasion of China during World War II and compensate the Chinese victims. During the Emperor of Japan's visit to China, Tong was sent away to Chongqing by his company for a "business trip." In March 1994, Tong asked the visiting Japanese Prime Minister Hosokawa to apologize and pay compensation to the Chinese victims of World War II. He also called on the victims of World War II to protest in front of the Japanese Embassy in Beijing. The Chinese government stopped Tong and he was detained for three days. In 1995, the Fourth World Women Conference was held in Huairou, Beijing. Tong was an NGO representative approved by the United Nations and participated in the "Comfort Women Forum". He participated in many preparatory meetings for it in Beijing. However, a few days before the meeting, Tong was sent to remote areas out of China.

In 1992, Tong Zeng called on the Chinese media to find comfort women in China. After that, a Shanxi elementary school teacher in China wrote to Tong for finding comfort women. The incident of Chinese comfort women was only then made public. Zhang Shuangbing followed Tong to defend the rights of comfort women to this day. In 1992, three Korean comfort women went to Beijing to find Tong. The uterus of the three elderly women had all been removed by the Japanese army. They also showed Tong Zeng the scars left by them. Tong sent them to the South Korean Embassy in China. One of the Korean comfort women named Hong Aizhen, who also wrote a letter of thanks to Tong.

30 years of achievements

On August 15, 1995, the Japanese Prime Minister apologized for invading Asian countries during World War II. Tong Zeng made a positive evaluation of this. The New York Times also made an objective evaluation of Japan's apology. Tong Zeng has been persisting in asking the Japanese Prime Minister to apologize for aggression against other countries during World War II, since he launched a campaign to demand Japan's apology and compensation in 1990. Later on, South Korean civilian groups and Japanese anti-war groups also strongly demanded the Japanese government to apologize. Further, a large number of Japanese veterans came to China and apologized in a variety of places there, and some even found the descendants of Chinese victims to apologize for. CNN, AP, and other media reported on the incident.

From 1994 to 2007, Tong and the Chinese war victims initiated and urged 25 lawsuits filed in Japanese courts with the help of over 300 Japanese lawyers. Japanese courts also affirmed the Nanjing Massacre, Pingdingshan Massacre, Comfort Women, Facts of war crimes such as war labor, human body testing, and germ warfare. After 2007, Tong Zeng and his team urged five Japanese companies to apologize or compensate victims in China and reached a settlement. Japanese companies compensated the Chinese victims with about 300 million yuan. In addition, China's Zhongwei Company sued Mitsui Merchants in the Shanghai Maritime Court of China. After 20 years of litigation, it finally received 240 million yuan in compensation from Mitsui Merchants in 2014. According to Tong, the ultimate goal of his 30 years’ continuous efforts in this cause is to promote China-Japan friendship and world peace.