The Evening Post (Wellington, New Zealand): Falun Gong faithful rally for their rights

New Zealand practitioners of Chinese spiritual movement Falun Gong have been tortured for their beliefs, a Wellington conference has been told.

Chinese New Zealander Steven Zhu told last Thursday's conference at the Duxton Hotel that he was imprisoned for a month while visiting Beijing in 1999.

"The only reason was because I was a practitioner of Falun Gong."

He said prison guards put needles in his shins and ankles and ran electric currents through them "because I was refusing to eat and I was practising (Falun Gong) in jail".

Chinese New Zealander Janet Gao was also imprisoned for a month after police entered her Beijing hotel room while she was doing Falun Gong exercises.

Falun Gong is a series of [...] meditation exercises that were banned in China in [1999]. It has an estimated following of more than 70 million people.

Amnesty International New Zealand executive director Ced Simpson said thousands of Chinese people had been persecuted since the ban and at least 254 people had died while imprisoned by the Chinese Government for following their spiritual beliefs.

People at the conference said they wanted China to lift the ban on Falun Gong and end the persecution of the movement's followers. Protesters held a demonstration outside the Chinese Embassy in Wellington on Thursday, Friday and Saturday to protest China's actions.