 Involuntary organ harvesting is illegal under Chinese law; though, under a 1984 regulation, it became legal to remove organs from executed criminals with the prior consent of the criminal or permission of relatives.Growing concerns about possible ethical abuses arising from coerced consent and corruption led medical groups and human rights organizations, by the 1990s, to condemn the practice.These concerns resurfaced in 2001, when a Chinese asylum-seeking doctor testified that he had taken part in organ extraction operations.