AMNESTY / Yinghua Chen arrested by Chinese government for practising Falun Gong, a regime based on exercise and meditation.

Falun Gong meant little to 30-year-old Yinghua Chen before the Chinese government crackdown of 1999.

After that, the attraction was like that of a moth to a flame. "She felt the government was wrong to crack down so after that time she began taking it seriously, and started the practise," said her 35-year-old brother, Yingyee Chen, a research technician at the Pacific Biological Station in Nanaimo.

Falun Gong is a mental and physical self-improvement regime based on a series of exercises and meditation.

Large groups of its followers performed their smooth, graceful exercises in Chinese parks and squares in the early 1990s, until then-president Jiang Zemin started systematically jailing, torturing and even killing its practitioners.

Yinghua was arrested in August for distributing computer discs with information on Falun Gong.

Though she has been spared the more brutal torture others have experienced, when she went on a hunger strike her jailers chained her to her bed, then left a feeding tube inside her for too long, causing infection.

As with all such cases, the government wants practitioners to sign a form, denouncing the practise of Falun Gong.

"Now I realize if you are a true believer you will be very happy, even if you are persecuted very seriously," Yingyee said.

A reprieve of sorts came on Monday (Oct. 13), when Yinghua was released, thin and malnourished, into house arrest.

"She is fine," Yingyee said. "She told me she is recovering very fast. Also, she is practicing Falun Gong, so that helps. She's very weak, but mentally she's very strong. She is very determined to stay fighting the authorities."

Her release is only temporary. She knows she could get a knock on her door at any time, and be back in the hands of her interrogators.

Canadian Falun Gong practitioners have taken up the cause, with a cross-country march to raise awareness of the plight of Yinghua and others like her.
They demonstrated at Nanaimo City Hall Tuesday.

Nanaimo MP James Lunney wants the Canadian government to pressure the Chinese government to ease up on practitioners at the upcoming Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation conference.

"We also know about 20,000 Christians who are imprisoned in China, and freedom from religious persecution is a basic human right," Lunney said.

More information is available online at www.fofg.org or www.faluninfo.net.