THE FOLLOWING IS ONLY AN INCOMPLETE LIST. WE WILL UPDATE THIS AS WE RECEIVE MORE REPORTS.

Chinese government blocks the passage of information in all means, including:

1. Forcing domestic peoples to be silent by using their dictating power like army and police;
2. Preventing international media, even those physically in China, from obtaining the first-hand facts;
3. Spreading lies all over the world after cutting the contact between people and foreign media.

As early as before July 20th, Falun Gong practitioners had already been harassed, wiretapped, tailed. However, the situation became extremely severe after July 20th and the persecution towards Falun Gong was escalated as shown in the records below. Thus, this report is divided into two parts:

• Part 1. Before July 20th
• Part 2. From July 20th to August
• Part 3. From September to October
• Part 4. From November to December
• Part 5. From January, 2000 to February
• Part 6. From March up to present

Part 6 From March up to present

March 18, 2000

Changchun City, Jilin Province

• Falun Gong practitioners from Nong'an county near Changchun city are facing brutal beatings after being sent back from their appealing in Beijing. Some were hung up and beaten. They were fined 5000 Yuan at the same time.  If practitioners could not afford the fine, their houses would be torn down, and food and furniture would be confiscated. They are being deprived of their basic livelihood.
• It is said that Jilin province has the largest number of Falun Dafa practitioners going to appeal, 2/3 of them are from Changchun city.  It is also said that if a practitioner goes to appeal twice, he/she will be sent to a labor camp.  Some released practitioners have been taken from their homes again and will be sent to labor camps after 15 days of detention.
• In Heizuizi Womens Labor Camp, there is a sudden increase in the number of detainees from 300 to 800 since the beginning of this year.  In addition, Tiebei Prison, Tiexi Prison, Daguang Detention Center and Balibao Custody Center also have similar situations.

• Recently, ChengDu police arrested the family of Ms. Deng Chaozhong, who allegedly provided the venue for a Falun Gong Conference.  Ms. Deng has been formally arrested.  Her husband, Mr. Chen and her daughter Chen Min (neither of them attended the Conference), were detained by the police for disturbing public order.  Prior to this incident, Ms. Deng’s other daughter, Chen Lan, her son-in-law and his mother were detained for 15 days for going to Beijing to appeal to the Central Government and People’s congress.  Ms Deng’s home has been ransacked twice.
• At present, all attendees of the ChengDu Conference are under surveillance and investigation.

March 21, 2000

Beijing

• According to internal sources from the Army, army units are undertaking or have undertaken the following measures: all soldiers must promise not to practice Falun Dafa; all immediate family members of military officials must promise not to practice Falun Dafa. After several practitioners from the Air Force Command Institute were arrested for appealing to the central government, no faculty members and students are allowed to leave the campus. Some practitioners in Xicheng District detention center of Beijing started hunger strike since the 12th and 13th of this month.  They request the return of their confiscated Dafa books, freedom to practice and an unconditional release.  Several practitioners have been fed forcibly during the strike.
• Xiao Fengwen, 47 year old and living in Huajia Di of Chaoyang District in Beijing, had already petitioned twice to the government.  After the second petition, she was remanded to the Chaoyang District detention center.  During the detention, she was forced to wear a torture device named "dog chain" for four days because of practicing Falun Gong.  When undergoing forced feeding as she was on a hunger strike, a cell supervisor with the last name "Gao" kicked her mouth with a foot wearing leather  shoe. He also used an iron spoon in attempt to pry open her mouth. As a result, her mouth bled and her teeth were loosened. The supervisor also instructed prisoners to beat her as forcefully as they could.  All those who practiced Falun Gong during detention had been beaten or fined.  In the end, cell supervisors ran out of handcuffs, and had to borrow from male cells.
• My name is Yan Baoshuang, 36. I originally worked for the Sanhe City Normal Training School in Hebei province.  Later I was fired because of appealing to the government. Last year on Oct.28 I went to appeal, and was detained for 10 days.  Then on Dec. 4, I went to appeal again, and was detained in Sanhe Public Security Bureau.  During my detention, I was beaten and forced to kneel on the ground for practicing Falun Gong.  At that time, my fingers went black and my face turned pale because of the torture. One month later, my left thumb was still numb, and even today it has not recovered completely. I was detained 52 days before being released. Then on Feb. 4, 2000, for the third time I went to Beijing and practiced at Tiananmen Square.  I was taken away by a police van and detained in Tiananmen police station.  The police beat me for displaying Dafa banners:  I was hit once in my left eye, and several times in my right eye; they also grabbed my hair and hit my head against the wall.  Not until one month later did the swelling in my right eye subside.  On Feb. 6, I was transferred to the Chaoyang District Detention Center in Beijing for 30 days’ detention.  Afterward, I was sent to the regional representative office in Beijing and was detained another 11 days.  Finally, we were released after 3 days on a hunger strike.

• It is said that Falun Gong practitioners in some cities in China have started group morning practices or exchanges.  Usually the size of the groups range from several to a few dozen, and they are flexible and loose in form.

• It is said that a Workers’ College in Daqing city of Heilongjiang province is offering classes for Dafa practitioners (the number is available).  The purpose of the classes is to "transform their mind". Practitioners are not allowed to go home and must pay 180 yuan on a daily basis.
• In addition, some policemen (plainclothes, editor’s note) have always been seen at the railway station of Daqing city to detect and intercept practitioners from going to Beijing to petition.

Nanchang No.3 Detention Center located at N. 27th street is well known for brutality against Falun Dafa practitioners.  Beatings, verbal abuse, and torturing devices are prevalent.  The Center cadres, as well as prisoners organized by the cell heads work together to torture practitioners.

To give an example, Jail Commissar Zheng beat the practitioners every week.  He shouted abuses at the practitioners, full of scurrilous and obscene language.  He kicked and forced the practitioners to read the articles in the newspaper that attacked Falun Gong.  If practitioners didn’t read, he would kick them.  Once he was slapping a practitioner’s face when he was surprised to find that she was his niece when the practitioner raised her head.  He said to her, " how come it’s you!".  This practitioner only obtained Falun Dafa in April, 1999, but she was very determined to practice.  She was one of eight practitioners shackled together.

Women jail No. 19 in the third detention camp is the place with the most demon-nature.   As long as practitioners were seen to be practicing, they would be beaten and have cold water poured on their body.  The practitioners were shackled together with their hands roped together with hemp string.  The officer pulled practitioner’s hair and punished them to stand still.  If they were found to touch the wall, the officer would bump them against the wall.  Once the practitioners were punished to stand still up to 60 hours (Two days and one night).  The feet of the practitioners were swollen and bleeding due to the long-time standing with shackles.  Even though the situation in the jail was severe, the practitioners did not stop practicing.  Whenever they were seen practicing, they would be doused with cold water by the officials on duty.  Jiang Lanying in Women Jail No.19 was hung up by the head of the jail for practicing.  The head of the jail pumelled her armpits with her elbows, trampled on her, punched and kicked her, and poured urine through her open collar.  The head of the jail didn’t stop torturing Jiang Lanying until one prisoner said, " Do you still have even the slightest human feelings left?"  One night, the criminal offenders led by the head of the jail beat Jiang Lanying,  the beating  woke all the prisoners in the neighboring jail-No.18 across the wall..  The jail head did not stop the beating until all the prisoners in No.18 were shouting at the head of the jail.

In addition, it is heard that during the "two sessions", to prevent Dafa practitioners from going to Beijing to appeal, the government put many practitioners who did not explicitly promise not to appeal into detention centers.  The No.1 and No.3 detention centers of Nanchang city are packed with Dafa practitioners.

Persecution of Falun Gong Practitioners in Some Regions of Sichuan Province (Case Collection)

1. Mianyang City

Falun Gong practitioner Xia Hai, a graduate student, 26 years old in the 9th Institution of the Ministry of Nuclear Industry, was sent to the Xinhua Labor-reform Farm for labor-education due to appealing to the Central Government in Beijing on behalf of Falun Gong.

From the time when he arrived in Winter until now, the prison administrators only allow him to wear one sark, to cover an extremely thin quilt at night, yet he has done very heavy physical labor.  Facing the persecution, Xia Hai is very firm and persevering.

Dozens of Falun Gong Practitioners, including Wu Zhengrong, Hu Zhaoyi, and Gao Bing,  jointly signed a letter to the People’s Congress on behalf of Falun Gong on February 26.  As a consequence, police in Mianyang arrested them without notifying their family members, and incarcerated them in the Xiaoqiao Chokey.  While in prison, they are tortured and abused, and were deprived of food for two days.

Currently, Gao Bing is still in custody. Gao Bing and his family are peasants, and his child is only 3 years old. His wife is not a Falun Gong practitioner, none the less, her village branch-secretary levied a fine of 5000 Yuan, otherwise, they would dismantle her house. His wife told the branch-secretary: she did not have money to pay the fine . If you dismantle my house, my whole family will have to go to Tiananmen Square to beg for food.

"Well, if like that, then forget it,."the branch-secretary said,  "The superior fined me , so I had to admit that I had bad luck. "  Jiang yiyun, a Shuangshe villager in the city of Jiangyou, was arrested for the second time for signing a letter to the People’s Congress.  Currently, he is missing.

Falun Gong practitioner, Lu Jian, a chief of the Confidential Section in the Deyang City was criminally detained for 28 days simply because he wrote a letter to the commissions of Sichuan Province and the Deyang City on behalf of Falun Gong last November. . One month after his release, he was rearrested  without cause, and was sentenced to one-year of labor-reform. At present, he is incarcerated in the Xinhua Labor-reform Farm.

Ms. Wu Huizhen tried to go to Beijing twice to appeal, but was stopped and sent back. . After being detained for 3 months, she was recently sentenced to labor-reform.  At present, she is incarcerated in the Nanmu-Temple Womens Prison of Zizhong County.

It is reported that, at present, practitioners in custody include Luo Zhiyu, Zhou Min, and others, all due to appealing in Beijing.  Due to writing to the People’s Congress, practitioners who are still in jail include Li Rongfei (retiree from the Deyang Second Heavy Machinery Factory), Wang Aiyun, etc.
Gong Xingcan, a staff in the Deyang Post Office, was arrested for appealing in Beijing.  After being detailed, he has been dismissed by his work unit.

More than 300 Falun Gong practitioners, including Meng Hualong, of the Deyang Factory of Flame Resistant Materials, are all under resident surveillance because dozens of practitioners in the factory went to Beijing to appeal.

Wenbin Li, an employee of a subsidiary of Chengdu Tobacco Factory in Zhiyang, was detained by the police because he went to Beijing and appealed to the government.  He was fired afterwards.

Ms. Guozhen Su was sent to a labor camp and would be kept there for two and a half years because she went to Bejing to appeal to the Central Government on behalf of Falun Gong. No one is taking care of her mother now, a blind old lady who stays at home by herself.  There are many similar cases in Guangyuan recently.

Ms. Chengqiong  was detained by the police because she went to Beijing and appealed to the government in December, 1999. She has been missing since being released from the detention center.

Yun, a Falun Gong practitioner in Mianyang, was deceived by the ticket office of Civil Airline in Chengdu and captured by Zhu and Liao, two policemen who pretended to be Falun Gong practitioners (please refer to news from Minghui on February 29).  He was detained in Jiuru Detention Center in Chengdu for 10 days, and then transferred to police from Mianyang.

Six Falun Gong practitioners from Chengdu Seamless Steel Factory including Dairong Chen, Xiao , Du and others went to Beijing and appealed to the Office of Civil Affairs.  Upon being registered, they were sent to the Office for Chengdu Affairs in Beijing and detained there for three days.  After being transferred back to Chengdu police, they were detained in a Drug Rehabilitation Center for seven days, then placed in Jiuru Detention Center until now.  Meanwhile, Fang Jing and many other practitioners have also been kept in Jiuru Detention Center because they wrote to the People’s Congress (about Falun Gong).

An Editor-in-Chief from a newspaper agency in Chengdu went to Beijing to report on the NPC Conference.  He was detained by the police as he walked by Tiananmen Square because the police suspected him to be a Falun Gong practitioner.  He was astonished when he was taken to the Office for Chengdu Affairs in Beijing and detained there together with the six ladies mentioned above (Chen etc.).

He requested to call 110 (emergency phone number to alert the police, similar to 911 in US) to report the absurd treatment, but was denied.  Two days after going on a hunger strike, his identity was verified and he was released.

Zheng Li, a Falun Gong practitioner in Factory 062, a subsidiary of The National Department of Aeronautics and Industry, went to Beijing to appeal to the government.  He was sent back to Longquan by the police and been detained since.  When Xiufang Tu, his wife, went to give him some clothes, she was asked if she was also a Falun Gong practitioner.  After answering "yes", his pregnant wife was also detained.  Their house was searched thoroughly by the police afterwards.  The document from the hospital showing Xiufang’s pregnancy was presented to the police by her relatives.  But the police ignored it and insisted to detain her for 15 days before her release.

Persecution of Falun Gong Practitioners in Jilin Province (Case Collection)

1. Shulan City

• In September of 1999, Mr. Wang from Shulan City traveled to Beijing to appeal on behalf of Falun Gong.  He was arrested by the police and sent to a Jilin Representative Office in Beijing.  There, he was tortured and ultimately jumped from the fifth-floor of the building and died.  However, no one from the police department, or any government agency, paid attention to his death.  The whole event ended unofficially without an investigation.
• Villager Xie Guichen from Shenshou village of Baiqi Town in Shulan city was detained because he went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong.  He was on a hunger strike for 7 days during the detention.  The police force fed him in Baiqi police station and then sent him back to a re-education camp.  Because he would not give up practicing Falun Gong, he was sent to Nanshan detention center of Shulan City for 50 days.  He was forced to drink urine and to smell stints in the lavatory. His teeth were loosened from beatings from the prisoners in the detention center; his face was bruised and swollen from beatings.  And, at night other convicts would pour buckets of cold water on him from head to toe so he could not sleep.  Currently,, he is still under detention along with 40 other Falun Gong  practitioners in Baiqi detention center.
• Zhaoping, Zhu from the 6th community of Baoan village was requested by some policemen to beat female Falun Gong practitioners at the Local Government’s Representative Office in Beijing for appealing in Beijing. He refused to do so.  Therefore, the police continuously beat and tortured him for more than ten days. The police then sent him back to his hometown. He has been held in the Baqi Seniority Home until now.
• It is reported that Jiang Yihong (Communist Party member) from the 4th community of Baoan Village was going to be sentenced to 3 years in prison by the police because he went to Beijing twice to appeal to the government.

• More than 3000 Falun Gong practitioners who were sentenced to one-year labor education are now being held in the Heizuizi Female Jail in Changchun City. These practitioners were physically abused and forced to work.  These practitioners are charged with the crime of disturbing social order because they insisted on practicing Falun Gong or appealing to the government. The sentences were given without going through due process.

March 23, 2000

Shenzhen, Guangdong Province

• Yu Hui, a practitioner in Shenzhen, was sentenced to one-year labor camp for insisting on practicing Falun Gong.  After two of her articles "Pure and Noble Heart" and" Appealing Statement" were published on Minghui web site, her name vanished from the list of Falun Gong practitioners in Futian Detention Center. (All names of the crime convicts in this center can be looked up by visitors.  Whereas the roster of Falun Gong practitioners is kept by the policeman at the reception window and is not available to visitors.)  According to the policemen in the Detention Center, Yu Hui is currently on a hunger strike. Due to the Yu Hui event, the practitioners in the Center are detained in isolation.
• It is reported that on March 10 Zhang Xuyin, a Dafa disciple in Shenzhen, was detained in Futian Detention Center on suspicion of sending the above mentioned two articles to Minghui web site for publishing.  On March 20, Zhao Yanke, Dafa disciple in Shenzhen, was also detained on criminal changes in Futian Detention Center, on suspicion that he had sent articles to  Minghui web site.  His wife (also a Dafa disciple) attempted to bring him some clothes, but was rejected on grounds that "it could not be delivered to whoever practices Falun Gong".

• In mid February, a Dafa practitioner in the detention center in the city of Jiamusi wrote a cultivation experience article and tried to share with other practitioners.  After being spotted by a supervising officer, the practitioner shred the article.  The supervisor was extremely irritated and gave several slaps to the practitioner.  Then he took out a leather belt and slashed other practitioners, resulting in multiple injuries to their faces and bodies.  He then chained two practitioners together to a ring tied to the ground.  One of the practitioners could not even handle his normal life.
• In late February, one practitioner was beaten for going on a hunger strike. Another practitioner was beaten also because he tried to offer some explanation in the other’s behalf. The whippings of the leather belt and the practitioners’ screams could be heard all across the cells.  Later on, the practitioners were forced to stand on their hands, or would be tortured.  It was said that they even injected doses to practitioners (tranquilizer).
• In early March, the practitioners went on a hunger strike again. The supervising staff tortured them and fed them with highly salty water forcibly.  They used bamboo planks to open the practitioners’ mouths, resulting in serious bleeding and other injuries.  They also used various methods to torture the practitioners, including chaining their feet with iron devices of 48 Jin (equal to 24 kilos).
• On Feb. 13, 2000, after two Falun Gong practitioners returned to the Jiamusi Labor Camp from their labor obligations, they were stripped of their upper clothes and forced to stand in the open accepting physical torture and abuse from the policemen on duty, for accusations of practicing Falun Gong.  A policeman from the 3rd Sub-Brigade of the 1st Brigade was seen beating and cursing the two practitioners who were forced to push their heads against the wall and bow to 90 degrees.  The policeman tried to force the practitioners to denounce the practice during the abuses.  In a temperature of minus 20 Celsius degrees, he poured cold water on the practitioners’ body.

• Chen Yu-lan, 52, had a partial dislocation of the ring-shaped cords in her cervical vertebra in 1985. As a result, she was unable to handle normal life by herself.  Since then, she had spent 50,000 to 60,000 Renminbi Yuan on treatment, but achieved no significant recovery.  Fortunately, in 1998 Ms. Chen attained Falun Dafa.  Through studying the Fa, doing the Falun Gong exercises and improving xinxing (moral nature), she made steady progress in her health and ended up perfectly well without any medication.  She could not understand why the government labeled such a beneficial Dafa as an evil cult and believed the government’s decision was unjustified.  She then made a Falun Dafa banner and went to the Tiananmen Square to tell the public that: "Falun Dafa Is Good."  She was arrested and detained on December 21, last year and was later sentenced to a year’s labor reformation.  She is now serving her term with the 2nd sub-division under the Female Brigade of the Tiantanhe Labor Camp in Daxing County.
• On March 22, a large-scaled photograph exhibition, entitled "Uphold Science and Civilization, Combat Superstition and Ignorance", which was sponsored by the Central Office of Civilization and China National Association of Science was held at the West Hall of Beijing Military museum.  The exhibition displays some pictures and other contents that attack Falun Dafa.  TV news programs have reported the event in the past few days and today.  The event is also covered by "Beijing Youth Daily" today.  The media are using this opportunity to attack Falun Dafa.  Some practitioners, after learning about the exhibition, planned to talk with the Museum and persuade them to stop the attacks against Falun Dafa.

Tribune de Geneve, Mercredi 22 mars 2000-03-22

Chinese diplomats strike back at Falun Gong, and make fools of themselves...

The mission hosted a parody of a press conference yesterday

Qiao Zonghuai is not happy.  Irritated by the large peaceful gathering and press conference organized Monday morning by the peaceful spiritual movement Falun Gong, the permanent Chinese representative to the UN invited the media to a meeting yesterday morning in the building of the Mission at Petit-Lancy.  This provided the occasion for the ambassador to orchestrate a shockingly naïve masquerade.

Systematically ignoring the accusations of police brutality brought forward, notably by Amnesty International, Qiao Zonghuai affirmed that Falun Gong is responsible for the deaths of some 1400 Chinese practitioners and the psychological distress of many others.  According to the ambassador posted in Geneva, the founder of the spiritual movement, Li Hongzhi, has done nothing but concoct and spread a series of lies and fallacies (apocalyptic predictions, medical abstinence, etc.).

"Falun Gong is not a religious group, but actually a dangerous sect, that puts in peril both the society and citizens of China", he concluded. Adding that in international law, the freedom of religion, of speech and of association is subject to a condition: that of not disrupting national security, public order, and the health and liberty of others.  In sum: the crackdown on the practice of Falun Gong conforms to human rights.  In addition, in announcing the presentation of a resolution against China to the UN human rights committee, the United States is only obeying internal political directives connected to the presidential elections.

To complete the demonstration, the diplomat subsequently showed a video that was as shocking as unbelievable.  Before opening for questions...from pre-prepared, ‘remote-controlled’ Chinese, who came en masse to participate in the press conference.  In sum: all the methods were visibly used to prevent questions from the international community related to the deterioration of human rights in the People’s Republic.  This deterioration also clearly includes the gross demonization of Falun Gong.

Albright Set to Assail China on Human Rights in Brief Geneva Stop

GENEVA, Mar 23, 2000 -- (Agence France Presse) US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright arrived here Thursday after a 12-hour flight from India to deliver a 15-minute speech blasting China for human rights abuses and lobby for a resolution condemning Beijing at the UN Human Rights Commission.

Albright’s brief presence at the commission’s annual meeting later Thursday, after which she is to rejoin President Bill Clinton on his tour of South Asia, is believed to be the first time a US Secretary of State has addressed the body.

In her speech, Albright is expected to note a "sharp deterioration" in Beijing’s rights record over the past year.  Areas of concern expected to be raised include: continued repression of political dissent, crackdowns on religious groups, including the Falun Gong spiritual movement, restrictions on freedom of expression and the situation in Tibet.

"Other people could give the speech but I thought in order to really make clear the importance to us (of human rights) that I should make it," Albright told AFP en route to Geneva from New Delhi.

The Secretary’s address—which will also highlight abuses in Cuba, Chechnya, Myanmar and Serbia—comes as US officials have expressed cautious hope that a resolution on China could succeed this year.

Beijing has managed to defeat all such previous resolutions and since 1995 has stymied attempts to get them even debated.  Chinese officials have vowed to smash this year’s US-sponsored effort, which Washington announced in January well before its release of a highly critical report on the human rights situation in China.

"They always fight it," Albright said dismissively of China’s vehement opposition to the resolution that is expected to be formally introduced to the commission in mid-April.

"They would do better to fight their problems on human rights."

Changes in the composition of the 53-member UN commission, combined with heavy and earlier-than-usual lobbying, have led US officials to believe that this year they may be able to at least defeat the Chinese effort to kill the resolution with a "no-action motion" before it reaches the floor.

"We have the best chance since 1995 to defeat the (Chinese) no-action motion," Assistant Secretary of State for Human Rights, Democracy and Labor Harold Koh told reporters in Washington on Monday.

Success on this front would be a great victory for the Clinton administration, which faces a tough battle in Congress for passage of a bill granting China permanent normal trading status (NTR).

Some conservative lawmakers say the bill, part of the package to bring China into the World Trade Organization, panders to Beijing and ignores human rights conditions there.

Clinton, Albright and other US officials maintain that their support of NTR is not inconsistent with the promotion of human rights and have pledged to continue public condemnations of Chinese abuses.

Albright acknowledged her strenuous itinerary this week was in part designed to assuage congressional concerns about the administration’s commitment to promoting human rights in China as it pushes for permanent NTR.

"I think that’s fair," she said, noting that her 15-hour stay in Geneva backed up previous pledges to lawmakers on the subject.
"When I have been up on the Hill talking about this, I’ve said that we would not step back on speaking out on human rights. And we’re obviously not."

In addition to her remarks, Albright is to meet with UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Mary Robinson and Swiss Foreign Minister Joseph Deiss.
(© 2000 Agence France Presse)

US Dismisses Chinese Threat Over UN Rights Resolution

NEW DELHI, Mar 22, 2000 -- (Agence France Presse) The United States on Tuesday dismissed a warning from China not to proceed with a resolution condemning the communist country’s human rights record at the UN Commission on Human Rights this week.

"Nobody expects the Chinese to be pleased about this," said a senior State Department official travelling with Secretary of State Madeleine Albright as she accompanies President Bill Clinton on his historic visit here.

"But Secretary Albright is going to travel from India to Geneva to speak to the UN human rights commission and our priorities at the commission this year include a country-specific resolution on China," the official told AFP.

"The United States is sponsoring one and we’re working to gain support from other countries," the official said, adding that no amount of Chinese protests or threats would alter that course.

Earlier Tuesday in Beijing, Chinese Foreign Minister Tang Jiaxuan pointedly told visiting US ambassador to the United Nations, Richard Holbrooke, that China would "fight to the finish" against the United States on the human rights issue.

"If the US side is bent on confrontation, China will oblige it and fight to the finish, and this practice of the US side to go against the tide of history cannot attain the support of the vast majority of member nations of the United Nations," Tang was quoted by Xinhua news agency as saying.

Past anti-China resolutions have failed at the commission in the face of aggressive lobbying from Beijing.  Albright is to break off from Clinton’s South Asia tour late Wednesday to travel to Geneva where she will present the resolution on China to the UN rights commission the following day.

She will then rejoin Clinton in India and accompany him on a brief visit to Pakistan and told US lawmakers last week that the reason for her rigorous itinerary was to show the importance Washington places on pushing Beijing to improve human rights conditions.
"The whole purpose of this is to encourage China to follow through on its own stated commitment to the international standards for human rights," the senior US official said. "That’s what this is about."

Earlier this year in its annual human rights report, Washington noted "a marked deterioration" in the rights situation in China, referring in part to increased crackdowns on pro-democracy advocates and repressive measures against the Falungong spiritual movement.
(© 2000 Agence France Presse)

China Rejects US Claims On Human Rights (AFP: 3/24/00)

GENEVA, Mar 24, 2000 -- (Agence France Presse) China vigorously rejected accusations of human rights violations presented by the United States to the UN Commission on Human Rights here Thursday.

"Today the US secretary of state Madame Albright has made some groundless and slanderous charges against China’s human rights situation," ambassador Qiao Zonghuai told the commission.

Earlier Madeleine Albright said she hoped to obtain a condemnation of Beijing’s human rights situation.

"The Chinese delegation strongly opposes and rejects this," Qiao said, highlighting that China "has all along been committed to the promotion and protection of human rights".
(© 2000 Agence France Presse)

BBC: China fury over human rights

Thursday, 23 March, 2000, 22:47 GMT

US is concerned over treatment of Falun Gong

China has reacted angrily to moves by the United States to condemn its human rights record at the United Nations Commission on Human Rights.

The Chinese ambassador to the UN Geneva headquarters, Qiao Zonghuai, said American Secretary of State, Madeleine Albright, had made groundless and slanderous charges against China.

Earlier Mrs Albright said that China’s human rights record had markedly deteriorated over the past year, making reference to them detention of thousands of members of the spiritual movement, Falun Gong.

But Mr Qiao said the US had succumbed to domestic political pressure to criticize China and was guilty of double standards by suppressing cults at home, while criticizing China’s treatment of a movement it sees as an evil cult.

The Chinese authorities have escaped censure on human rights at the annual UN meeting since their forcible suppression of the pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen Square in 1989.

Earlier, Mrs Albright said the international community owed it to the Chinese people not to "shy away from the whole truth".
"Thousands of members of the Falun Gong movement were detained.  Authorities continued to limit the abilities of Christians, Muslims and Buddhists."

• Madeleine Albright

AP: Amnesty: 21,000 Arrested in China

Thursday March 23 5:23 AM ET

BEIJING (AP) - Even before they began rounding up Falun Gong practitioners, Chinese authorities arrested 21,000 people in a campaign against superstitious activities, Amnesty International said Thursday.

Amnesty said the two-year campaign has since been extended not only to the Falun Gong, which was banned last July, but to other offshoots of Qigong, the practice of traditional meditation and breathing exercises millions of Chinese use in an attempt to promote health.

The London-based group said 600 followers of Zhong Gong, a variant of Qigong, have been detained since October, when the Chinese legislature tightened laws against cults, and that 25 Zhong Gong leaders have been formally arrested.

A spokeswoman for the State Council, China’s cabinet, had no immediate response to Amnesty’s report.  The report did not give details of the arrests.  China’s communist leaders have long sought to suppress quasi-religious sects, fortune telling, idol worship and other beliefs they deem superstitious. These traditions nevertheless continue in rural China.

Chinese authorities say Falun Gong is a cult that was responsible for 1,400 deaths and that threatened social stability and Communist Party rule. Thousands of followers have been detained in the crackdown, and key leaders received jail terms of up to 18 years.

The group attracted millions of followers with its blend of Buddhist- and Taoist-based ideas and theories of founder Li Hongzhi, who know lives in New York. Practitioners say Falun Gong promotes health and moral living.
 

Part 1. Before July 20th

Part 2. From July 20th to August

Part 3. From September to October

Part 4. From November to December

Part 5. From January, 2000 to February

Part 6. From March up to present
 
 

(... the situation is still developing. Due to the severe blockage of communications networks (telephone/fax/email/web sites), we have no news from the villages and many more other cities where there are significant numbers of Falun Dafa practitioners. All we know is that the Central government has ordered that the whole country forbid the practice of Falun Dafa. People who dare to continue to practice Falun Dafa will be dishonorably dismissed from the Communist Party, from school and from their jobs. All this because Falun Dafa is a traditional, high-level Qigong practice that focuses on Truth, Benevolence and Forbearance and offers people better physical and mental health and has attracted millions of people all over the world are learning and practicing it now.)