Indiana House Resolution No. 54: Calling on China to Immediately Cease and Desist from Its Campaign to Persecute, Intimidate, Imprison, and Torture Falun Gong Practitioners

(Clearwisdom.net) The Indiana General Assembly passed House Resolution No. 54 by voice vote on April 21, 2011, during the First Regular Session of the 117^th General Assembly to recognize and call attention to the Falun Gong of China. It was resolved that the Indiana House of Representatives expresses sympathy to Falun Gong practitioners and their family members who have suffered persecution, intimidation, imprisonment, torture, and even death for the past decade solely because of adherence to their personal beliefs; and that the Indiana House of Representatives calls upon the Government of the People's Republic of China to immediately cease and desist from its campaign to persecute, intimidate, imprison, and torture Falun Gong practitioners, to immediately abolish the 6-10 office, an extrajudicial security apparatus given the mandate to `eradicate' Falun Gong, and to immediately release Falun Gong practitioners, detained solely for their beliefs, from prisons and re-education through labor (RTL) camps, including those practitioners who are the relatives of United States citizens and permanent residents.

State of Indiana

Indiana General Assembly

House Resolution No. 54

Introduced by Representative

Vernon G. Smith

Adopted by voice vote on April 21, 2011, during the First Regular Session of the 117^th General Assembly.

A HOUSE RESOLUTION

to recognize and call attention to the Falun Gong of China.

Whereas, Falun Gong is a traditional Chinese spiritual discipline founded by Li Hongzhi in 1992, which consists of spiritual, religious, and moral teachings for daily life, meditation, and exercise, based upon the principles of truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance;

Whereas, according to the 2008 Annual Report of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, “tens of millions of Chinese citizens practiced Falun Gong in the 1990s and adherents to the spiritual movement inside of China are estimated to still number in the hundreds of thousands despite the government's ongoing crackdown,” and other estimates published in Western press place the number of Falun Gong adherents currently in China at the tens of millions;

Whereas, in 1996, Falun Gong books were banned in China and state media began a campaign criticizing Falun Gong;

Whereas, in 1999, Chinese police began disrupting Falun Gong morning exercises in public parks and began searching the homes of Falun Gong practitioners;

Whereas, on April 25, 1999, over 10,000 Falun Gong practitioners gathered outside the State Council Office of Petitions in Beijing, next to the Communist Party leadership compound, to request that arrested Falun Gong practitioners be released, the ban on publication of Falun Gong books be lifted, and that Falun Gong practitioners be allowed to resume their activities without government interference;

Whereas, on the same day, immediately after then-Premier Zhu Rongji met with Falun Gong representatives in his office and agreed to the release of arrested practitioners, Communist Party Chairman Jiang Zemin criticized Zhu's actions and ordered a crackdown on Falun Gong;

Whereas, in June 1999, Jiang Zemin ordered the creation of the 6-10 office, an extrajudicial security apparatus, given the mandate to `eradicate' Falun Gong;

Whereas, on July 22, 1999, Chinese state media began a major propaganda campaign to ban Falun Gong for `disturbing social order' and warning Chinese citizens that the practice of Falun Gong was forbidden;

Whereas, in October 1999, Party Chairman Jiang Zemin, according to western press articles, `ordered that Falun Gong be branded as a `cult', and then demanded that a law be passed banning cults'; and

Whereas, Chinese authorities have devoted extensive time and resources over the past decade worldwide to distributing false propaganda claiming that Falun Gong is a suicidal and militant `evil cult' rather than a spiritual movement which draws upon traditional Chinese concepts of meditation and exercise:

Therefore, be it resolved by the House of Representatives of the General Assembly of the State of Indiana:

Section 1. That the Indiana House of Representatives expresses sympathy to Falun Gong practitioners and their family members who have suffered persecution, intimidation, imprisonment, torture, and even death for the past decade solely because of adherence to their personal beliefs.

Section 2. That the Indiana House of Representatives calls upon the Government of the People's Republic of China to immediately cease and desist from its campaign to persecute, intimidate, imprison, and torture Falun Gong practitioners, to immediately abolish the 6-10 office, an extrajudicial security apparatus given the mandate to `eradicate' Falun Gong, and to immediately release Falun Gong practitioners, detained solely for their beliefs, from prisons and re-education through labor (RTL) camps, including those practitioners who are the relatives of United States citizens and permanent residents.

Vernon G. Smith Brian C. Bosma M. Caroline Spotts

State Representative Speaker of the House Clerk of the House