October 17, 2001

Falun Gong Practitioners are being Persecuted by the Thousands

Wuerzburg/Germany (Wolf)

The International Association for Human Rights (IGFM in German) considers China the holder of the "world championship in executions and torture." But one has to accept the decision of the International Olympic Committee to stage the Olympic games in Beijing in 2008, so said IGFM-press representative Martin Lessenthin recently during a press conference in Wuerzburg.

Human rights abuses however, seem to continue, even after the location of the games had been announced. Especially hard hit are Tibetans, the Turkic tribes of the Uighurs, Mongols and Manchurian peoples. Falun Gong practitioners are also persecuted, as are Christians.

Falun Gong is a movement based on thousands of years of Chinese traditions. Practitioners declare themselves to follow a Buddhist cultivation way to strive for "Truthfulness, Compassion and Forbearance." Mr. Man-Yang Ng, leader of the German Falun Gong Association declared in Wuerzburg that Falun Gong is neither a religion nor a sect. Falun Gong knows no rituals, prayers, or temples. The system teaches that a human being will never be fully healthy unless that person has virtue.

Wide-ranging Persecution Campaign

Around 70-100 million Chinese citizens practise Falun Gong in the PRC. The ruling Chinese party saw a threat in those numbers and outlawed the movement in July 1999.

For the Mainland Chinese this means that they are prohibited from doing their exercises, which are similar to those of the Tai Chi that Germans are familiar with. Even the possession of literature and music relating to Falun Gong is prohibited. The government's wide-ranging persecution campaign had the following results: approximately 100,000 practitioners have been arrested; 20,000 are enslaved in re-education-through-labour camps; 301 have died as a result of torture; over 1,000 are kept captive in psychiatric treatment centres.

Source: http://www.clearharmony.net/articles/1470.html