AFP: Falun Gong Calls on World to Stop Alleged Persecution in China

SINGAPORE, Oct 13, 2000 -- (Agence France Presse) China's banned Falun Gong spiritual movement on Friday accused Beijing of setting the stage for an intensified crackdown and urged the international community to intervene.

The group's appeal came days after China's state media accused the group of aiming to subvert the socialist system -- a move analysts feared could set the stage for authorities to invoke the draconian State Security Law to intensify its 14-month clampdown.

Falun Gong members in a news conference in Singapore, where they are registered as a legal organization, took aim at Chinese President Jiang Zemin.

"Why has (Jiang) now accused our non-political spiritual practice of seeking to overthrow China's government and its socialist system?" the group said in a statement released at the news conference.

"Why is he further politicizing a crisis that, as at its essence, is less about politics and more about constitutional rights of China's people and his own insecurity in power?" the group said.

"By accusing us of seeking to overthrow his rule, is he setting the stage for a new escalation in the use of state force against us?

"This is very serious. We are worried and appeal now to the international community to intervene to stop more viscous human rights crimes against us," it said.

At least 59 Falun Gong followers have reportedly died while in police custody and 50,000 are in detention in China, where their organization is illegal, according to the group.

The group presented a video tape showing members who displayed bruises allegedly due to beatings by police, as well as testimonies about how they had been maltreated.

On October 1, Chinese police rounded up close to 1,000 Falun Gong members who gathered at Beijing's Tiananmen Square on National Day.

An article in China's state-run media on Tuesday said: "The reactionary nature of the Falun Gong has been to create trouble aimed at subverting the socialist system."

It also accused the group of teaming up with "hostile foreign forces" to overthrow Chinese communism.

Analysts saw the anti-Falun Gong diatribe as the strongest sign yet that the government was preparing to use the State Security Law against the outlawed group.

China has mainly used the State Security Law to jail political dissidents while convicting Falun Gong followers of lesser crimes.

((c) 2000 Agence France Presse)