Big Brother is watching and listening to students on the school bus

Each South Callaway school bus will have three digital cameras installed to monitor student and driver activity.

Big Brother To Keep Students Safer

KOMU | Dec 11, 2009

Reported by: Megan Granger

SPOKANE – Bus drivers in the South Callaway School District will get some help keeping an eye on students come March.

The school board unanimously voted to install three security cameras in each of the district’s 23 buses. Together, the tiny digital cameras will capture every action that goes on inside.

“It’s got aspects to it so that we can be viewing the camera in the back and yet listening to what the kids are saying in the front,” director of transportation Donnie DeBrodie said. “It shows the entire driver. That’s what we’re looking at.”

Right now, the district is testing the system in one bus – Bus 9. One camera, just to the left of the drivers seat, will monitor students getting on and off, as well as the driver’s actions. The two other cameras stationed in the front and back will see everything that goes on in the seats.

“If I get a phone call that a bus is speeding, we can look at that film. Any damage to the seats, [we'll go back to the cameras for] such things as that,” DeBrodie said.

Drivers can press a button to mark footage if a conflict happens, which makes the incident more easy for the school district to find and view. That footage will also connect to a GPS system that tracks where the bus travels and what happens in it along the route.

The new cameras will save footage for three weeks, whereas the old single-camera VHS system deleted tape after six hours.

“Student safety and security is No. 1. We’re all about students. We realized our security system on our buses was obsolete, and in many cases they failed,” superintendent Mary Lynn Battles said.

“We’ve always had cameras on our school buses. It was the VHS system,” DeBrodie said. “What we’re doing with this is we’re simply upgrading to a digital system. For safety, for training, it’s just a better system all around.”

It will cost $52,981 to equip all 23 of the district’s buses.

“We have normally in the past several years replaced two or three buses. This year, we’re replacing one bus, and the additional savings will go to support the security system,” Battles said. “This system places our kids in a safer environment.”

Police comb nurseries for signs of radicalized toddlers

Terror ‘grooming’ watch on nurseries as police fear children as young as FOUR are being radicalised

Daily Mail | Dec 12, 2009

By Rebecca Camber

Children as young as four are being monitored by terror police who fear they could be brainwashed by Islamic extremists.

Concerns that they could be radicalised has prompted officers to visit nurseries and primary schools, a leaked police memo has revealed.

West Midlands counter-terrorism police e-mailed community groups suggesting children could be targets for terrorist recruiters.

An officer wrote: ‘I do hope that you will tell me about persons, of whatever age, you think may have been radicalised or be vulnerable to radicalisation… Evidence suggests that radicalisation can take place from the age of four.’

Arun Kundnani, of the Institute of Race Relations, later contacted the officer, who said it was ’standard’ and ‘ necessary’ to visit nurseries.

He told a newspaper: ‘The officer said it wasn’t just him or his unit that was doing it.

‘He said the indicators were children might draw pictures of bombs and say things like “all Christians are bad” or that they believe in an Islamic state.’

The revelation comes as Home Office figures show a seven-year-old is the youngest child to feature in a scheme to tackle grooming by extremists.

The child was one of 228 people referred to the Channel Project, part of Prevent, the Government’s flagship strategy to stop young people becoming terrorists.

More than 90 per cent of those identified are between 15 and 24 and most are Muslim.

The programme, funded from the £3.5billion per year security budget, has been dogged by controversy over its aims and claims by some Muslims they are being spied on.

Yesterday Sir Norman Bettison, who speaks for the Association of Chief Police Officers on Prevent, said the e-mail was a ‘clumsy’ attempt to explain the Government’s strategy.

The Chief Constable of West Yorkshire added: ‘There is no example of police engaging with nursery-age kids specifically on this issue. That is the age for learning about “stranger danger” and “The Tufty Club”.’

Anil Patani, Assistant Chief Constable of West Midlands Police, confirmed his officers had visited a nursery school attached to a primary school to speak to staff.

‘No children were spoken to during the visit and this certainly does not constitute a policy of monitoring,’ he said.

The e-mail was sent to community contacts in response to concerns some had raised over a newspaper article about Prevent, he added.

But critics say there is a risk of alienating people if counter-terrorism officers visit schools and nurseries.

Chris Huhne, Liberal Democrat spokesman, said: ‘This is an absurd waste of police time and risks putting off the very communities that we rely upon to provide intelligence about terror suspects and to come forward as witnesses in trials.’

There have been fears about radicalisation in and around Birmingham since a terrorist was caught on tape indoctrinating his five-year-old son.

Parviz Khan, who was jailed last year for plotting to kidnap and behead a British soldier, threatened the boy with a beating if he did not say he loved Osama bin Laden.

Head of Manitoba child-welfare agency suspended after string of deaths and abuse

The head of a Manitoba child-welfare agency that has been plagued with child deaths in recent years has been suspended pending a review of his operation.

Head of beleaguered Manitoba child-welfare agency suspended

Winnipeg Free Press | Dec 5, 2009

By Mary Agnes Welch

WINNIPEG — The head of a Manitoba child-welfare agency that has been plagued with child deaths in recent years has been suspended pending a review of his operation.

David Monias, the longtime executive director of the Awasis Agency, was placed on administrative leave a week ago by the Northern Authority, which is more than a year into a systemic review of how the child-welfare agency serves kids in care.

“This is done while a quality assurance review of the agency is underway,” said Rachel Morgan, a spokeswoman for Manitoba Family Services Minister Gord Mackintosh. “The Northern Authority wanted to ensure the review was unbiased.”

The Northern Authority, the umbrella office that overseas several child-welfare agencies such as Awasis, appointed its own administrator under provisions of provincial legislation. Those provisions allow the Northern Authority to suspend an executive director if he is not properly carrying out his responsibilities or if the health and safety of children are threatened.

Despite five calls to the Northern Authority, chief executive officer Marie Lands could not be reached, so it’s unclear exactly why Monias has been placed on leave.

Monias has been the agency’s head for nine years.

Awasis is one of the Manitoba’s biggest aboriginal child-welfare agencies, serving a dozen of the province’s poorest and most remote communities.

In the last year, Awasis has been plagued by a series of child deaths.

Last November, 13-month-old Cameron Ouskan died while in foster care in Gillam, Man. His foster father is charged with second-degree murder.

Earlier that fall, Rephanniah Redhead, 14, committed suicide in Shamattawa and five-year-old Farron Miles drowned about two kilometres from his foster home on Cross Lake First Nation.

The troubles at Awasis date back even farther. A 2004 inquest into the abuse, sexual assault and suicide of a Shamattawa teen came down hard on the agency for sending her back into the care of a stepfather just released from jail for sexually abusing her.

More than a year ago, the province launched a “quality assurance” review of Awasis. Normally, reviews are triggered by a child death or management misdeeds, but the province also started systematic quality-assurance reviews of each of the aboriginal agencies to find problems. Awasis was first on the list, in part because of frequent rumblings of troubles at the agency.

The report was due last month.

As of the end of March, Awasis had 604 children in care.

maryagnes.welch@freepress.mb.ca

Boy, two, snatched by social workers after mother refused doctor’s advice to feed him junk food

Daily Mail | Dec 3, 2009

By Chris Brooke

Heartbroken: Lisa Hessey was told she would have her parental rights taken away in court if she opposed a decision to place Zak in care

Like many toddlers, Zak Hessey was a fussy eater who refused his mother’s healthy home cooking.

Concerned about his falling weight, his parents sought the advice of doctors. That simple act triggered a shocking chain of events that led to the youngster being put into foster care for four months.

Paul and Lisa Hessey believe in the long-term benefits of healthy eating and rejected advice to feed their two-year-old son high-calorie snack food such as chocolate, crisps and cakes.

To their horror, social workers put Zak into foster care ‘to assess his needs’ and allegedly threatened the couple with the loss of their parental rights if they fought the decision in court.

‘I was absolutely devastated, I broke down in tears,’ recalled Mrs Hessey, 48. ‘I was scared out of my wits. I phoned Paul to tell him and he just broke down on the phone.’

But they went to court and, after four months, Zak returned home with the blessing of social services, who accepted he had good and caring parents.

Zak is now putting on some weight, but his eating problems were not cured by his time in the care of ‘experts’ and, much to the annoyance of his parents, he has acquired a taste for junk food.

Mrs Hessey, of Bolsover, near Chesterfield, said: ‘I thought I was doing the right thing going to the best people for advice when Zak began to lose weight.

‘Instead they basically accused me of neglecting him and implied it was all my fault. I have four other children and they are perfectly healthy, it was just that Zak was refusing food for some reason. They said I should just feed Zak chocolate, cakes and junk food just to get calories into him. But I objected, saying that was only a short-term answer and not a proper solution.

‘The Government and doctors are always drumming into parents the importance of healthy eating – yet they were telling us to feed Zak all the wrong things.

‘That is obviously what they were doing when he was in foster care so now it is hard to get him to eat anything else.’

Mrs Hessey and her 48-year-old husband, a lorry driver, took Zak to see a paediatrician at Chesterfield Royal Hospital in July. He was 20 months old and weighed 1st 3lb.

Mrs Hessey, whose four other children are under ten, said she was happy for Zak to be admitted for a two-week hospital assessment and was hit by a thunderbolt when she went to collect him on July 24.

She was taken into a room with a nurse and social worker who apparently told her: ‘We would like Zak to go into foster care to assess how he feeds. You have legal rights but be warned if you oppose this we will go straight to court and have all your parental rights taken away.’

Mrs Hessey said: ‘They kept saying, “If you love Zak and you want the best for him then you’ll agree to this”. They said we had been negative about eating. That was because they had been telling us we should feed Zak crisps, chocolate and cakes to get calories into him.

‘I was questioning that approach. We eat proper home-made food at our house and just have chocolate and cakes as a treat.’

She agreed to Zak going into care after hearing to the possible repercussions if she objected. Initially she and her husband couldn’t see Zak for six days.

After hiring a solicitor, they were allowed three hours a day with him during the week in the company of a social worker.

The first hearing before the family court in Derby was on September 2 and the case was adjourned for two weeks. Interim care orders were imposed and Zak returned home following a third court hearing on November 18. By this stage social workers had lifted their objections – and he had put on only 1lb.

Mrs Hessey said: ‘Social services did a complete about turn. They admitted that in foster care Zak was exactly the same with his food as he was at home.

‘They said we were very good parents. I still find it hard to come to terms with how we have been treated.’ Derbyshire County Council said: ‘We only take a child into our care either with the consent of the parents or following very careful consideration by a court.’

A spokesman for Chesterfield Royal Hospital said: ‘While we understand Mr and Mrs Hessey’s distress, Zak’s welfare was paramount and we believe we acted in his best interest.’

Pope remains silent on chilling abuse revelations

Irish Independent | Nov 28, 2009

By John Cooney

Pope Benedict XVI has stayed silent over the devastating Dublin diocese abuse report more than 24 hours after publication of its sordid revelations that have shocked Mass-going Catholics and couples with young families.

On Thursday, hours after the release of the chilling report, the Vatican chief spokesman, Fr Federico Lombardi, said issues such as abuse scandals were handled by the local Church rather than by the Holy See.

But last night the Pope’s representative in Ireland gave an assurance to the Irish public that Pope Benedict was committed to rooting paedophile priests from the ranks of the Irish clergy.

Apostolic Nuncio, Archbishop Giuseppe Leanza, told the Irish Independent that Pope Benedict had told all the Irish bishops during their meeting with him in Rome after the Ferns report of his abhorrence of child sexual abuse.

Scourge

The Pope had instructed the Irish bishops, headed by Cardinal Sean Brady and Archbishop Diarmuid Martin, to make every effort to cleanse the Irish church of the scourge of priestly paedophilia.

The Dublin commission’s report revealed that two letters seeking information from the Nuncio had not been answered, and that a similar request to the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith had told the Department of Foreign Affairs that the commission should use normal diplomatic channels.

But the commission’s chairperson, Judge Yvonne Murphy, said that the commission was independent of the Government, and that she did not avail of the diplomatic post between the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Vatican.

Asked for a specific comment on this reference to the Nunciature and the congregation, a spokeswoman for Archbishop Leanza said: “It is not the practice of a Nuncio to comment in public on Church-State relations in the country in which he is working on behalf of the Holy Father.”

Widespread sexual abuse by Catholic priests in Ireland was covered up for decades by senior clerics, report says

Widespread child sexual abuse by Catholic priests in Dublin was covered up for decades by senior clerics, a damning report will say.

Telegraph | Nov 26, 2009

Cardinal Desmond Connell, Archbishop emeritus of Dublin. Catholic News Agency.

Four Archbishops, including Cardinal Desmond Connell, will be named over their mishandling of hundreds of allegations, including not reporting crimes to the police.

The senior clerics’ motive was to protect the church above defenceless children, the report will find.

The Dublin Archdiocese Commission is the third inquiry in the last four years to rock the Catholic Church in Ireland following independent investigations into abusive priests.

The pattern of senior clerics moving abusers from parish to parish rather than dealing with the problem will also be addressed.

The 700-page report includes 45 potted histories of a sample of priests from 1975 to 2004 who were investigated by the Commission.

It is understood only ten priests will be named, as they are either dead or in jail, with the rest given aliases.

It will detail horrific abuse stories the Commission was told by victims, the response of Bishops and Archbishops and how gardai and health authorities reacted.

Justice Minister Dermot Ahern will publish the report at Government Buildings.

The role of four Archbishops, John Charles McQuaid who died in 1973, Dermot Ryan who died in 1984, Kevin McNamara who died in 1987, and the retired Cardinal, were examined.

The Commission looked at the Cardinal’s role in the late 1980s and 1990s and the use of an insurance scheme, which he inherited, to pay off victims.

Cardinal Connell, who took part in the Conclave to elect Pope Benedict four years ago, ordered a trawl through the diocesan secret archives in 1995 to determine how many clerics had been accused of child abuse.

Only 17 names were given to the police.

His successor Archbishop Diarmuid Martin, who has continually pushed for full disclosure of clerical child abuse, later found that since 1940 more than 400 children had claimed to have been abused by at least 152 priests in the Dublin area.

A High Court judge last week paved the way for the release of the report after two applications by the State to have its contents examined over fears it could prejudice criminal proceedings.

Any reference to two priests, and one of the cleric’s brothers, has been removed for publication.

Survivors of clerical abuse demanded the harrowing report be published as soon as possible to vindicate victims who for years told the truth.

Maeve Lewis, of support group One in Four, said it would also disclose collusion that took place between the Catholic Church, gardai and health chiefs at the time.

Up to 450 people have made abuse allegations against former priests in what is one of Europe’s largest dioceses, since 1940.

However, the long-running Commission of Inquiry into the Dublin Archdiocese has examined allegations against only a sample 46 priests.

Headed by Judge Yvonne Murphy, the Dublin inquiry has also been examining high-profile allegations in the Cloyne diocese in Cork.

Report: Afghanistan world’s worst place to be born

(AP Photo/Allauddin Khan)

Reuters | Nov 20, 2009

By Stephanie Nebehay

GENEVA (Reuters) – Eight years after a U.S.-led invasion ousted the Taliban from power in Afghanistan, the war-ravaged state is the most dangerous place in the world for a child to be born, the United Nations said on Thursday.

It is especially dangerous for girls, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) said in launching its annual flagship report, The State of the World’s Children.

Afghanistan has the highest infant mortality rate in the world — 257 deaths per 1,000 live births, and 70 percent of the population lacks access to clean water, the agency said.

As Taliban insurgents increase their presence across the country, growing insecurity is also making it hard to carry out vital vaccination campaigns against polio, a crippling disease still endemic in the country, and measles that can kill children.

“Afghanistan today is without a doubt the most dangerous place to be born,” Daniel Toole, UNICEF regional director for South Asia, told a news briefing in Geneva.

A Taliban-led insurgency and militant attack on an international guest-house in Kabul that killed five U.N. foreign staff last month prompted the world body to evacuate hundreds of international staff from Afghanistan for several weeks.

Some 43 percent of the country is now virtually off-limits to aid agencies due to insecurity, according to Toole.

The Taliban have been building their forces in their traditional southern and eastern Afghanistan stronghold and are increasing attacks in the north and west. Teaching girls is one of the practices they forbid.

Some 317 schools in Afghanistan were attacked in the past year, killing 124 and wounding another 290, Toole said.

“We have seen a drop in the number of children who are attending schools and particularly young girls,” he added.

School enrollment in Afghanistan had risen to 5 million, including 2 million girls, against 1 million with virtually no girls in 2001 when the Taliban were ousted from power, he said.

“In both countries, Afghanistan and Pakistan, we’ve made some progress but we’re starting to worry about back-tracking on that progress given the high rates of insecurity and the ongoing conflict,” Toole said.

“The most dramatic indication of back-tracking is the deliberate attacks against girls’ schools,” he added.

Separately, UNICEF director Ann Veneman spoke to reporters in New York on Thursday about the Convention on the Rights of the Child, a pact aimed at protecting children worldwide that was adopted by the U.N. General Assembly 20 years ago.

Veneman said it was “frustrating” that Washington has not ratified the pact, noting that the United States and Somalia were the only two states in the world that remain outside it.

The spokesman for the U.S. mission to the United Nations, Mark Kornblau, said that the administration of President Barack Obama was “committed to undertaking a thorough and thoughtful review of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.”

Click here to read the full report (pdf)

School CCTV seized after kids filmed changing

manchestereveningnews.co.uk | Nov 6, 2009

by Yakub Qureshi and Neal Keeling

POLICE seized video footage from a primary school after children were filmed on a CCTV system as they changed for gym lessons.

The recording was seized after angry parents protested outside Charlestown Primary School in Salford.

The parents had discovered that the school’s surveillance cameras were running round the clock and some children had been inadvertently filmed changing into gym gear in their classrooms before PE lessons.

Staff at the school had contacted police to ask them to remove the protesting parents. But after speaking to the parents officers took the footage from the cameras and a computer hard drive.

Police have studied the images and decided no further action is needed.

The school has disconnected the cameras involved in the row. there is no suggestion the footage was being used inappropriately.

But now Salford council is to review the use of all CCTV at its 82 primary schools. The review will look at which schools have cameras, where they are sited and what they are used for.

Parents say they were assured that cameras at Charlestown – installed to improve security – would be kept switched off most of the time. Police were called to the 220-pupil school on Monday after dad Jason Lowe began collecting signatures for a petition.

Mr Lowe, who has two sons at the school, said: “We were originally told that the cameras would hardly ever be used. But in the last week we have just found out that they are recording all the time.

“The children have to get changed in the classrooms because there are no changing facilities. We think it is wrong that the cameras are there. It is a breach of their privacy.”

Headteacher Daniel Gauld, who has been at the school since 2006, was not available for comment.

The school is highly rated by Ofsted. Chairman of the school governors, Davina Heyhoe said: “The cameras were installed in 2006, prior to the current headteacher’s appointment.

“They were put in to help improve security for pupils and for equipment. Parents would have been fully aware of the system, which complies with all the appropriate legislation.

“The system was renewed for the start of term with two new cameras put in for a specific security need. Charlestown is an open plan design inside so the cameras are sited at the most strategic points to help with security. In some cases, this means their coverage includes some classroom areas that are also walk-through routes.

“We were responding to concerns from some parents about the cameras being on while children got changed for gym class and had planned to put caps over the lens when required.

“However, the head decided this was not adequate and these particular cameras have been disconnected from the system pending a better, long-term solution which satisfies parents and still provides security for the school.”

Cllr John Warmisham from salford council said: “Data Protection laws govern the privacy of individuals but I want to be clear that we give schools the right guidance for capturing and recording images of children.

“Our parents need to be confident that schools have the right procedures in place to protect any images they have of children and I want to be sure that parents have been properly informed about cameras in their child’s school.

“Closed-circuit TV in schools is relatively new but it looks like it is here to stay and we need to ensure that our procedures and guidelines keep pace with this.”

Police Officer Uses Taser On 10-Year-Old Girl

4029tv.com | Nov 17, 2009

OZARK, Ark. — Ozark police said they were called to a home where a mother asked for help with her unruly child, but the 10-year-old’s father said he’s outraged at the force police used against his daughter.

“I would like to say Ozark police Tased this little girl right here. Ten years old and [they] shot electricity through her body, and I want to know how the heck in God’s green earth can they get away with this,” said the girl’s father, Anthony Medlock.

Medlock said his daughter was at her mother’s house when Ozark police Officer Dustin Bradshaw shocked her in the back with a Taser and arrested her.

“If you can’t pick the kid up and take her to your car, handcuff her, then I don’t think you need to be an officer,” Medlock said.

Medlock said his daughter does show signs of having emotional issues, but she “doesn’t deserve to be treated like a dog. She’s not a tiger.”

According to a police report, the officer was called to the home by the mother and witnessed the child kicking and screaming.

The officer’s statement said the girl’s mother, Kelly Hamlert, told him to use a Taser on her if he needed to.

The officer did shock the girl after he said she kicked him in the groin.

“He had no other choice. He had to get the child under control,” said Ozark police Chief Jim Noggle.

Noggle said the officer shocked the girl for about a second.

Ozark police said it is their policy to use a Taser on someone who is a threat to others, no matter their age.

Noggle said simply restraining the child could be harmful.

“Well, if he tried to restrain her, he might hurt her by restraining her. If you grab somebody, you can slip an arm out of joint. They can slip from you and fall on the ground,” Noggle said.

“I don’t know what kind of policy it is. I don’t think it’s right,” Medlock said.

Medlock said this is not the first time the girl’s mother has called police to take her daughter to a juvenile facility. He said he will now try to get custody of his daughter.

“She just wants somebody to love her, and I do,” he said.

40/29 News checked with several other police agencies about their taser policies. The Fort Smith Police Department said it will only uses a Taser on a person 14 years old or older if they are a threat to someone.

Fort Smith Police said it’s usually the discretion of each police department to make their own policies on using a Taser.

Noggle said no action is being taken against the Ozark officer who used the Taser on the girl, and he said her case will go before the juvenile court system.

Congress examines China’s coercive one-child policy

“Abort it! Kill it! Terminate it! You cannot give birth to him or her!” is just one example of the several banners in the streets of China

BP | Nov 16, 2009

by Cindy Ortiz

WASHINGTON (BP)–Congress heard testimony Nov. 10 regarding China’s one-child policy, which employs widespread forced abortions and sterilization as population control methods, ahead of President Obama’s trip to the communist nation.

Witnesses before the Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission noted that pregnancies in China must be authorized by the government. The hearing occurred two days before Obama left for Asia Nov. 12 to meet with Chinese officials.

This year marks the 30th anniversary of China’s one-child policy, which was implemented to curb the birth rate of the world’s most populous country. It limits women to one child, although exceptions are made, especially in some rural areas for couples whose first child is a girl. The policy has been enforced somewhat differently recently, the commission was told.

A measure codifying the policy, the Law of Population and Family Planning of the People’s Republic of China, went into effect in 2002. The family planning officials “illegally” enforce the law through forced abortions and sterilizations, lawyer Jiang Tianyong said at the hearing. Jiang has been persecuted for defending human rights activists.

In its 2009 report issued in October, the Congressional-Executive Commission on China said, “‘Termination of pregnancy’ is explicitly required if a pregnancy does not conform with provincial population planning regulations in Anhui, Hebei, Heilongjiang, Hubei, Hunan, Jilin, Liaoning and Ningxia provinces.”

All couples are required to apply for a birth permit before a pregnancy. If a couple has an unauthorized pregnancy, it must be terminated. After having the limited number of children — one in most areas — a spouse must be sterilized. Refusal results in forced sterilization. If the couple has more than one child, the woman will be forced to have an abortion, Harry Wu, director of Laogai Research Foundation, said at the hearing.

Families that abide by the law and get abortions receive a “One Child Parent Glory” certificate, something the government is using to “beautify” the policy, Annie Jing Zhang of Women’s Rights in China told the commission.

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom issued a letter to Obama Nov. 10 regarding his trip to China. “The letter makes the point that you cannot engage in China … without having very serious and candid dialogue about protection of human rights,” USCIRF Chairman Leonard Leo said at a news conference before the hearing.

Rep. Chris Smith, R.-N.J., who chaired the commission hearing, said, “I believe the Chinese government would respond to the president if he were to take the lead in speaking up in defense of human rights in China.”

Jiang appealed to Obama to speak to Chinese officials about reinstating his law license, which was revoked along with those of other attorneys earlier this year for defending human rights cases.

Smith criticized the Obama administration for its restoration of federal money for a United Nations agency that supports China’s coercive family planning policy.

“It is outrageous that the Obama administration lavishly funds — to the tune of $50 million — organizations, including the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), that partner with China’s National Population Planning Commission,” Smith said.

The Chinese leadership, however, thinks the policy is a great accomplishment, because China’s fertility level (1.7 live births per woman) is lower than replacement level, said Nicholas Eberstadt, a political economist at the American Enterprise Institute. Exclusive of immigration, 2.1 births per woman is the fertility level that ensures a non-declining population.

China’s low birth rate means an age and gender crisis loom within the next two decades.

According to the most recent Chinese population survey, there are 120 males for every 100 females, Eberstadt testified. An ordinary human population ratio would consist of 105 males to 100 females, meaning — by Chinese government estimates — that by the year 2020 there will be 24 million more men than women. The result will be dim marriage prospects, contributing even more to the lack of child births.

The dearth of children also means China eventually will lose its comparative labor advantage to competing countries such as India and Bangladesh. Population projections show that by 2030, India will become the world’s most populous country, with 1.53 billion citizens compared to China’s 1.45 billion. On top of that, China’s shrinking working-age population will have to shoulder an increasing workload (financial and otherwise) of caring for a massively elderly population.

Chinese demographers also predict that in 2025 there will be a generation of only children in China, Eberstadt said. These children will have no siblings, aunts, uncles or cousins.

“It’s as if we’re all going to be privileged to watch a sort of science-fiction movie that will be playing out on our watch. We have never seen anything like this before,” said Eberstadt.

At the age of 35, Feng Junhua was in her ninth month of pregnancy when she was forced to have an abortion by family planning officials in June in Guan county of Shandong province. The injection that aborted the child caused hemorrhaging and killed Feng, according to the CECC report.

“We believe this is the worst women’s rights violation in the history of the world. Forced abortion … is a crime against humanity,” Smith said.

Families or women who refuse to have an abortion are charged a hefty fine or get their homes destroyed by the government.

“They went to their home, took their valuables, their beds … their tractors, their TV, their clothing. Those that don’t have anything left, [they] took … their children,” Jing Zhang of Women’s Rights in China said at the hearing. “The same method that was used in [the 1989] Tiananmen Square massacre now is being repeated in various, different villages.”

More than 500 Chinese women commit suicide every day, according to worldhealthcare.org, Smith said. The suicide rate for women is three times higher than that of men.

“I don’t think that this suicide rate is unconnected to the forced abortion in China,” Reggie Littlejohn, an expert on the policy for Human Rights Without Frontiers, said at the news conference before the hearing.

“Abort it! Kill it! Terminate it! You cannot give birth to him or her!” is just one example of the several banners in the streets of China that the Family Planning Commission uses to promote the policy, Wu said in his written testimony.