October 1, 2002

[Practitioners] of Falun Gong marked National Day with a demonstration in Wanchai calling on the mainland authorities to stop their persecution of the movement. The practitioners also voiced their opposition to the SAR special administrative region government's plans to introduce anti-subversion legislation here. Sharon Xu is a spokeswoman for Falun Gong.

Xu: "People are celebrating the day that the People's Republic of China was founded, and we hope, we want people to know there are a lot of people suffering. As some people are celebrating here, we want to remind people that we need help in order to safeguard the real interests and ensure peace and harmony in China. We need to stand up to those acts of dictatorship and we have to fulfill our responsibility to our future generations in Hong Kong."