Hamburg, Germany: People Appreciate Falun Dafa’s Guiding Principles at Event to Commemorate the April 25 Appeal

(Minghui.org) On April 25, 2026, Falun Dafa practitioners in Hamburg held an event at the Jungfernstieg in the center of the city to commemorate the 27th anniversary of the April 25 appeal by more than 10,000 Falun Dafa practitioners in China.

Colorful, informational banners attracted people’s attention as several practitioners demonstrated the Falun Dafa exercises accompanied by the tranquil exercise music. The table at the information booth was laid with flyers and the petition to call for an end to the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) persecution of Falun Gong. Passersby stopped to find out more.

An elderly couple came over to the information booth. The woman signed the petition to support the practitioners’ effort to end the persecution and said, “We often hear and read about such matters. This persecution has been going on for many years, and this is why we want to support you.” She said she and her husband had lived under communism during the communist era in East Germany, so she felt it was very important to provide spiritual support to those who are being suppressed. The couple said Dafa’s principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance are very important for the world today.

Falun Dafa practitioners held an event at Jungfernstieg to commemorate the 27th anniversary of the April 25 appeal.

Passerby talk to a practitioner.

It was Saturday, and many people hurried along the Jungfernstieg, a popular promenade adjacent to Binnenalster Lake. Some stopped to read the banners and watch the practitioners’ exercise demonstrations. Some people stopped to talk and said they wanted to learn more about the persecution.

Several Chinese tourists and businessmen paused to photograph the practitioners who were demonstrating the exercises. They smiled and read the information.

A Woman Prays for Practitioners

A elderly couple from Hamburg said that they often saw practitioners hold events at that location. The man said, “Please continue your efforts, because what you are doing here is extremely important.”

The woman said she’d been looking for a cultivation method that could improve a person’s ability to think. She believed that compassionate thoughts could do good things and could also have a positive effect on others.

The woman said a prayer for the practitioners and wished them success, “Whatever your belief, you must be strong. I hope that more people come and learn more about you.”

“Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance Are Very Important”

A woman in her 70s spoke with a practitioner who explained the practice, the positive effects of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance on people, why the CCP keeps persecuting Falun Dafa, and how terrible the CCP is. The woman said, “I’m really grateful to him for telling me about Falun Dafa. He not only suggested I practice, he also told me where I could go to learn it.”

She commented on the decline of public morality and the prevalence of social problems and how no one is taking responsibility for such problems and just pushing the blame on someone else. That made her start paying attention to herself and her own values, and she noted how important Falun Dafa’s principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance are.

The practitioner invited the woman to try the exercises and said she could learn and practice it for free at the Planten und Blomen in Hamburg. She smiled and said she would try to be there the next day.

Another couple from Hamburg told a practitioner distributing flyers that they were on the way to an appointment but they stopped because they were familiar with Falun Dafa. They used to work in Beijing and Shanghai and had lived in China for many years. They personally witnessed the rise of Falun Dafa in China and the CCP’s persecution of the practice.

A man from Pakistan, who lives in Hamburg, was very interested in Falun Dafa’s health benefits. He conversed with a practitioner about it for a very long time.

He said he’d recently injured his hips in an accident and had to have two hip implants. Now he suffered from regular back and shoulder pain, so he was seeking ways to alleviate it and said he wanted to try practicing Falun Dafa. “I believe that this will work,” he said. The practitioner invited him to the Planten und Blomen in Hamburg the next day and explained that the exercises were taught for free. “That sounds great,” the man said. “I will go there tomorrow.” He left with a big smile on his face.

Background: What Is the April 25 Appeal?

Falun Dafa (also known as Falun Gong) was first introduced to the public by Mr. Li Hongzhi in Changchun, China, in 1992. The spiritual discipline is now practiced in over 100 countries worldwide. Millions of people have embraced the teachings—which are based on the principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance as well as five gentle exercises—and experienced improved health and well-being.

On April 23 and 24, 1999, police officials in Tianjin, a city near Beijing, assaulted and arrested dozens of practitioners who’d gathered outside a magazine office to discuss errors in a recently-published article attacking Falun Dafa. As word spread of the arrests and more practitioners inquired with officials, they were told they had to take their appeals to Beijing.

The following day, April 25, some 10,000 Falun Dafa practitioners spontaneously gathered at the National Appeals office in Beijing, as they had been instructed by Tianjin officials. The gathering was peaceful and orderly. Several Falun Dafa representatives were called in to meet with the then premier, Zhu Rongji, and members of his staff. That evening, practitioners’ concerns were answered. The arrested practitioners in Tianjin were released and everyone went home.

Jiang Zemin, former head of the CCP, perceived the spiritual discipline’s growing popularity as a threat to the CCP’s atheistic ideology and issued an order to ban Falun Dafa on July 20, 1999.

Minghui.org has confirmed the deaths of thousands of practitioners due to the persecution over the years, although the actual number is suspected to be much higher. Countless more have been imprisoned and tortured for their faith.

There is concrete evidence that the CCP sanctions the harvesting of organs from detained practitioners, who are murdered to supply the organ transplant industry.