August 24, 2001

LOS ANGELES - About 30 local Falun Gong practitioners held a demonstration and press conference today [on August 24, 2001], in front of the Chinese Consulate to call for urgent support to rescue Falun Gong practitioners held captive in the Masanjia Labor Camp in China. The press conference marked the start of a seven-day hunger strike by three local female Falun Gong practitioners and a continuous 268-hour vigil, representing the 268 practitioners who have died from the persecution.

Two sisters, Xiuhua Zhang, 44, and Renee Zhang, 37, and 62-year old Shu Qing Ying, will remain in front of the consulate during their hunger strike, using sleeping bags at night. The three will only drink water for seven days.

"Today, I am going to start a one-week hunger strike, consuming only water, to support my 130 fellow practitioners detained in the Masanjia labor camp in the northeastern province of Liaoning. They have been on hunger strike for over three weeks. I am extremely concerned with their lives," Xiuhua Zhang read in a statement.

According to a security officer familiar with the camp's affairs, on July 31, 2001, about 130 Falun Gong practitioners, mostly women, began a collective hunger strike to protest being illegally held after their prison terms had expired. It is very common for detention facilities to not release Falun Gong practitioners until they renounce the practice, despite their arbitrary sentences ending. Masanjia is infamous for its cruel torture, including throwing women into male cells for days on end.

Local practitioners will take turns to keep a round the clock vigil that will last about 11 days.

Similar hunger strikes are happening at many Chinese Consulates and Embassies, including Houston, New York, D.C., Toronto, Ottawa, Berlin, Chicago, and Canberra, Australia. Ten practitioners in front of the Chinese Embassy in Washington D.C. are on day eight of their water fast, and some are very weak. They will fast as long as they are able to.

While hunger strikes may seem extreme, practitioners' lives are in constant danger if they don't renounce the practice.

"In order to force them to betray their faith, the guards in the labor camp keep torturing them using all brutal means, such as electric shocks, beatings, hanging by handcuffs, confinement in small cells, sleep deprivation, slave labor, rape, burns, etc.," Zhang said.

In addition, the food can be moldy, full of worms and even poisoned with lethal or mind altering drugs to make them more suggestible. Many practitioners have died due to being poisoned. The food cannot be trusted. Over 1,000 practitioners have been sent to mental institutions where they are fed a deluge of intentionally harmful medicines, the effects of which range from damaging the central nervous system, to wasting their muscles, to altering their minds.

The guards use the hunger strikes as another way of torturing practitioners.

"The hunger striking practitioners are often brutally force-fed. The guards often force feed them with high density salt water, and sometimes, they insert the nose tube into the trachea or lungs. The brutal force-feeding has caused many deaths," Zhang said.