Thursday, January 24, 2002

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áA 61-year-old Mississauga woman was taken into custody by Chinese authorities in Beijing yesterday after making an appeal for the Falun Gong spiritual movement in Tiananmen Square.

Connie Chipkar, herself a practitioner of the banned spiritual movement, stood in the middle of Tiananmen Square wearing a blue sash that read, "Falun Gong", and "SOS," her son Joel told a press conference yesterday.

She was attempting "to appeal to the hearts of the Chinese people" and "to tell them that their president is lying to them," Joel said.

She was arrested almost immediately and whisked away in a police van.

[...]

Chipkar said his mother Connie suffered from depression for 20 years after the youngest of her four sons died of cancer. Four years ago, she found peace when she began practising Falun Gong.

Zenon Dolnyckyj, detained in Beijing last November for a similar protest, told the reporters, "I'm very concerned about her safety."

http://www.canoe.ca/TorontoNews/ts.ts-01-24-0032.html