(Clearwisdom.net) December 10 was International Human Rights Day. This year the practitioners from our area got together as we have done the past few years to urge people everywhere to pay attention to the brutal persecution of Falun Gong practitioners by Jiang Zemin's group in China. Let us work together and use peaceful and sensible means to stop this inhumane persecution that has lasted for five years.

Mr. Li Hongzhi began introducing Falun Gong to the public in 1992. The impact it had on improving people's health and moral standards was outstanding, which immediately made it very popular among the Chinese. Within merely seven years, up to a hundred million people had become practitioners.

The Chinese Communist regime was originally founded on violence, deception, and fighting. Under this government, the pure and noble concepts that Falun Gong is based on - Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance - became more and more intolerable to the entirely selfish and evil power that Jiang Zemin represents. It represents a fundamental contradiction to the "falsehoods, evilness, and violence" that Jiang's survival relies upon. Out of extreme fear, jealousy, and hunger for power, Jiang used his power and applied all the evil measures that have been developed since the creation of the Chinese Communist Party against Falun Gong practitioners, starting an unprecedented brutal persecution against millions and millions of decent people who, with no political interest whatsoever, only wanted to improve themselves.

The Chinese Communist Party has an anti-human ideology that states that the party is above everything else. The whole party needs to follow the central political bureau. The whole nation is its political machine, which includes the military, police, national security, judicial system, propaganda organizations, foreign relation departments, etc. Jiang's group utilized all these forces to implement its genocidal policy against Falun Gong practitioners. They used more than 2,000 newspapers, 1,000 magazines, and hundreds of local TV and radio stations under the Chinese Communist Party's control to spread lies about Falun Gong and to stir up people's hatred against it. They used hundreds of different methods of torture, including beating, electric shock, burning, force-feeding, tying and hanging, sexual abuse, and injection with drugs. They tortured steadfast practitioners both physically and mentally, causing the death of at least 1,154 practitioners. They have spent one-quarter of the nation's resources to destroy Falun Gong. They spent 4.2 billion yuan in December 2001 alone to create the brainwashing centers used to persecute Falun Gong practitioners. They have used hundreds of billions of yuan to hire millions of people to persecute practitioners. In the meantime, Jiang's group has blocked any accurate information about Falun Gong in an attempt to keep the truth from being publicized and has used every conceivable means, including bribery and threats, to prevent people from learning the actual facts.

But human beings should remember that heavenly principles always prevail and people still have their consciences. A dark cloud cannot block the sun for longer than a few seconds. The slander and deception can only trick people temporarily. This suppression over the past five years not only did not destroy Falun Gong, it caused the glory of "Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance" to spread to over 60 countries.

Practitioners have not been afraid, and persistently have explained the facts to people of all walks of life. They have displayed their peaceful and sensible characters and showed the world that they are kind and unselfish and not intimidated by a bullying state power. They have motivated those who had been deceived to re-examine who is right and who has been deceived. More and more people have also recognized the brutality and the evilness of this persecution.

In China, more and more people have been put off by Jiang's propaganda, and more and more people have been eager to find out what Falun Gong really is. Outside of China, Jiang and his accomplices are facing at least 47 lawsuits for the crimes they have committed, including genocide and torture. From Europe to America, from Asia to Africa, the voices of righteousness are everywhere. Evil is coming to the end of the road.

As a matter of fact, this persecution is not only against Falun Gong practitioners. It is also against the morality, conscience, and character of the entire human race. Thus it opposes everyone in the world. Once the moral concepts are lost, human beings will only be concerned about their own self-interests and will ignore other people's life and death struggles. Eventually everyone will be against each other, and no place on earth will be safe. Today in China, corrupt officials do whatever they want, and fake and inferior products crowd the marketplace. People killing other people for money is no longer newsworthy. These reflections of a corrupt society are the result of moral degradation. The heaven-bestowed human rights that people rely on to live may soon all be lost.

Robert Jackson, the judge who participated in the Nuremberg Trials after World War II said: "We will punish the crimes that are so very organized, vicious, and anti-human. Apathy toward them will not be tolerated by the human civilization, because if such crimes happen again, civilization will be no more." His comment applies equally well to the genocide of Falun Gong practitioners.

No matter how turbulently the current course of history is proceeding, no one can escape the heavenly principle that states "one will reap what one sows." The prelude to a "trial by history" has begun. Let us clearly recognize the brutality and illegitimacy of this persecution. Let us stand on the side of righteousness, punish the evil, reward the good, and choose a wonderful future for our own lives.

Falun Dafa Practitioners in Hong Kong

December 10, 2004