The CCP’s Seven Plots Against Falun Gong

(Minghui.org) April 25 marks the 26th anniversary of Falun Gong practitioners’ peaceful appeal in Beijing in 1999. A look back at recent history reveals that the event was one of several frame-ups set up by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in order to target Falun Gong.

The CCP is known for “setting up” individuals or groups in order to persecute them. For example, during the Hundred Flowers Campaign between 1956 and 1957, Mao Zedong encouraged everyone to voice their opinions freely. After promising not to retaliate against those who pointed out the Party’s flaws, he used what people said as “evidence” to attack them during the CCP’s Anti-Rightist Campaign between 1957 and 1959. Approximately 550,000 people were labeled “rightists,” and they and their family members were attacked.

When Falun Gong was first taught to the public in 1992, people were drawn in by the practice’s remarkable effects in improving health and morality. But the CCP’s core values of class struggle, brutality, and deception contradicted Falun Gong’s traditional values of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance. Between 1996 and 1998, the regime tried multiple times to collect evidence of wrongdoing by Falun Gong practitioners but was unsuccessful each time.

So, the CCP resorted to a series of plots to drive its campaign to defame and eradicate Falun Gong.

1. Peaceful Appeal of 1999 Labeled a “Siege”

He Zuoxiu, a pro-CCP scholar with close ties to the Political and Legal Affairs Committee (PLAC), published an article in a youth magazine on April 11 in which he made false accusations against Falun Gong. When practitioners went to the publisher in Tianjin on April 18 and clarified the facts, the publisher initially agreed to make corrections but went back on its word the next day.

When practitioners returned to petition the magazine office on April 23 and 24, the Tianjin Municipal Public Security Bureau dispatched more than 300 riot officers to disperse the practitioners. Forty-five practitioners were arrested, and some were beaten bloody by police. When practitioners asked that those arrested be released, the police said, “This matter cannot be resolved in Tianjin. You have to go to the central government [in Beijing].” So, practitioners went to the State Council’s Central Appeal Office the next day (April 25) to follow up on the incident.

Several reasons led me to conclude that the CCP deliberately manipulated practitioners into holding the large appeal on April 25:

a) The Tianjin incident was the first time that so many Falun Gong practitioners were arrested at once. The obvious intent was to escalate the situation.

b) The police in Tianjin who arrested Falun Gong practitioners told them the only way to resolve the issue was to go to Beijing. That is, only when top leaders in Beijing gave the order would the Tianjin police release the detained practitioners. This implies the arrests were directed by officials in Beijing.

c) The recollections of those who participated in the April 25 appeal show that the on-site personnel who led practitioners to line up along the wall of Zhongnanhai (the central government compound) were police officers.

d) Falun Gong practitioners did not direct the scene, but the police, He Zuoxiu, and Jiang Zemin (then top leader of the CCP) were very active that day.

e) Then PLAC head Luo Gan previously launched two investigations into Falun Gong but found no evidence of wrongdoing. This outcome would not help him achieve his political ambitions, as he needed a major target to attack so as to demonstrate his value. He Zuoxiu and Luo Gan were brothers-in-law, and these close ties provided them with convenient conditions for collusion. Luo Gan set up the scheme because he had long held a negative attitude toward Falun Gong and he desired to encourage Jiang Zemin to suppress the group. The Central Appeal Office happened to be located near Zhongnanhai, and its proximity was used by CCP officials to push the narrative that practitioners “besieged” the central government compound.

f) Eyewitnesses reported that the authorities intended to frame practitioners.

The appeal on April 25, 1999, was completely peaceful and rational. Practitioners only wanted to go to the Central Appeal Office and report the injustice they were suffering at the hands of officials. They did not display banners or chant slogans—they just sat or stood silently in the areas where the police directed them.

When the practitioners who were held in Tianjin were released that evening, practitioners in Beijing left quietly. They even cleaned up the area before they left: Even though around 10,000 people were there for hours, not a single piece of paper was left. They even collected the cigarette butts the police threw on the ground and put them into trash cans.

There was no “siege” or even a hint of violence. The CCP’s plot to instigate practitioners to “attack” the government failed.

2. Establishment of the 610 Office

On June 7, 1999, Jiang Zemin established the Central Leading Group for Handling the Falun Gong Issue. Three days later, it set up the “610 Office,” which was named after the date of its founding. Over the years, the organization underwent numerous changes, but it kept its overreaching power, status of being above the law, cruelty, and ability to cross national boundaries.

The 610 Office manages all matters related to the persecution of Falun Gong and is the mastermind behind the CCP’s campaigns in the persecution. It uses ten kinds of political trickery: blacklists, conversion rates (forcing practitioners to give up their belief, often through torture), the guarantee system (collective responsibility system), secret policies, secret instructions, secret channels (for transferring detained practitioners to and between brainwashing centers), secret transactions (payments and benefits for people who report, arrest, convert), lies, scams, and sensitive dates (major political events and anniversaries related to the persecution).

Practitioners are routinely arrested before the CCP’s “sensitive dates.” In the 26-year-long persecution, the CCP arrested practitioners not only during major holidays (such as New Year’s Day, Lunar New Year, May Day, Mid-Autumn Festival, and National Day) but also during the National People’s Congress (NPC) and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) that occur every March. The persecution of practitioners by CCP officials includes harassment, kidnapping, detention, arrest and other illegal activities.

3. Denunciations

Days after the persecution started, People’s Liberation Army Daily published an editorial on July 23, 1999 titled “Unequivocally Launch a Struggle to Expose and Criticize Falun Gong.” The article repeated the defamatory content published in the People’s Daily on July 20 and showed the military’s tough stance and attitude. The denunciation campaign quickly spread across the country.

Why do they want to “expose and criticize” Falun Gong? Falun Gong allows people to cultivate their mind and body, and it benefits the country, society, and individuals. Despite two undercover investigations by the government, no problems were found. Because there was no evidence to show that Falun Gong was bad, Jiang Zemin, Luo Gan, and other top officials had no justification to suppress Falun Gong. They were also concerned about international sanctions after the Tiananmen Square Massacre, so they dared not risk the world finding out and criticizing their human rights abuses. Therefore, they launched the denunciation campaign to look for flaws and fabricate evidence.

Looking back, at least three facts are clear about the campaign. First, “exposing and criticizing” is a brainwashing method used by the CCP. This tactic proved successful during the Cultural Revolution and other political campaigns, so it was easy for Jiang, Luo, and the 610 Office to use this method.

Second, “exposing and criticizing” Falun Gong practitioners was a means to alienate and divide them. It also served as a delay tactic for the 610 Office to fish in troubled waters and take the opportunity to create more lies. Before the persecution began, nearly 100 million people practiced Falun Gong (one-tenth of China’s population). They came from all walks of life and all levels of society, but there was no name list or organization. The CCP adopted the methods of “exposing and criticizing,” dividing, spreading rumors, and defamation to turn public opinion against Falun Gong step by step. This strategy helped the CCP achieve its goal of intimidating practitioners and brainwashing the entire nation.

After the peaceful appeal on April 25, 1999, Jiang and Luo again conducted a nationwide survey of Falun Gong, mobilizing a large number of public security (police) personnel to investigate and collect intelligence, but they still found nothing. At the same time, they were also actively preparing to set up a new scheme when the opportunity arose.

Third, officials tried to advance the persecution step by step, starting with a denunciation campaign and fabricating charges. Aside from Jiang, the other six members of the Politburo Standing Committee did not approve of the persecution of Falun Gong. Although they remained silent under Jiang’s coercion, they disagreed in private. It was less risky for Jiang and his followers to gradually escalate the persecution in this way.

In fact, the CCP’s public security personnel had gone under cover in the Falun Gong community for many years, and the agents hadn’t found any problems. Many undercover agents even started practicing Falun Gong. Why? Because the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance are indeed good.

4. Escalation Through Foreign Media

On October 25, 1999, CCTV broadcast Jiang Zemin’s interview with a reporter from Le Figaro during his visit to France, claiming without any basis that “Falun Gong is a cult.” After watching the program, hundreds of Falun Gong practitioners went to Tiananmen Square in protest, and they were arrested.

The following day, China’s major media outlets published what Jiang said on the front page with the headline “Falun Gong is a cult.” The outside world generally believed that this represented the Chinese government’s characterization of Falun Gong. Nearly a thousand Falun Gong practitioners were arrested at Tiananmen Square or the Central Appeal Office. The next day, People’s Daily published a special commentary article with the same headline. About 600 practitioners were then arrested for unfurling Falun Gong banners at Tiananmen Square.

This scheme seeks to provide a legal cover for brainwashing and persecution. Jiang did not label Falun Gong this way in China; instead, he first made this statement to foreign media, trying to sway public opinion abroad and using overseas media to justify the persecution in China. From the beginning, the 610 Office tried to put a veil of legality over the persecution and mislead people all over the world into believing that the suppression is legitimate.

5. Wrongful Convictions

The CCP invested a quarter of its national economic output into the persecution of Falun Gong every year, using financial benefits to incentivize officials and the public to participate in the persecution.

Organizationally and ideologically, the 610 Office manipulated public security, procuratorial, and judicial organs to carry out the persecution and make it routine, persistent, professional, and global. Its campaign led to the criminal persecution of Falun Gong practitioners, including arrests, prosecutions, trials, false convictions, and other processes.

On November 13, 1999, CCP officials held the first illegal judicial trial of Falun Gong practitioners. Four Hainan Falun Gong practitioners were “tried” by the Haikou Intermediate Court and sentenced to prison terms ranging from 2 to 12 years. This marked the beginning of a 26-year history of wrongfully sentencing Falun Gong practitioners. According to conservative estimates, at least 20,000 Falun Gong practitioners have been illegally tried to date.

The 610 Office often manipulates the trials of Falun Gong practitioners and instructs courts to issue heavy sentences in their cases. Public security, procuratorial and judicial departments at all levels sometimes tricked family members into dismissing their lawyers, prevented lawyers from reading case files, or sentenced practitioners in secret trials. In many cases, everything from the charges to the sentences are determined by the 610 Office and the Political and Legal Affairs Committee.

During these trials, judges even openly shouted, “The law doesn’t apply to Falun Gong.” The popular catchphrases CCP judges use when trying Falun Gong cases include, “Why are you talking to me about the law? I’m talking to you about politics,” “The Party doesn’t allow a defense,” “What officials say is the law,” “The court is under the leadership of the CCP, and we must listen to the Party,” “Falun Gong issues don’t need to go through legal procedures,” and “Don’t talk to me about conscience.”

6. “Transformation” of Practitioners

This is the most vicious of the seven frame-ups. Falun Gong practitioners follow the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance, but CCP officials try to “transform” practitioners (force them to give up their belief) by confining practitioners in brainwashing centers. The scale can be large or small, venues can be set up anywhere, the forms of “transformation” are ever-changing, the means are both soft and hard, and torture is used as needed. The threats are vicious. One example is, “If you don’t transform, you will be cremated!”

To achieve its goal, the CCP uses every torture method imaginable, including beatings, electric shocks, branding with irons, rape, force-feeding, confinement in straitjackets, locking practitioners in metal cages, tying them in excruciating positions and to various structures, having dogs attack and bite them, and so on. As many as 130 physical torture methods have been documented in the persecution. Numerous means of psychological torture are also used.

7. The Self-Immolation Hoax

On January 23, 2001, Chinese New Year’s Eve, a so-called “self-immolation” incident took place at Tiananmen Square, where five people set themselves on fire. Two hours after the incident, Xinhua News Agency published an article in English at an unprecedented speed, claiming that “the self-immolators were five Falun Gong practitioners.”

However, when Voice of America reporters called the Beijing Public Security Bureau and the Ministry of Public Security to verify the story, they were told that these departments were unaware. Apparently, the CCP’s propaganda outlet got ahead of the police investigation. The accusation against Falun Gong was released so quickly that it could not have been a sudden incident and could only have been a planned event. CCTV followed up with multiple programs attacking Falun Gong and broadcast them nonstop, forcing people all over China to watch them repeatedly.

Numerous points of evidence showed that the incident was staged by the CCP to slander Falun Gong. Three days before the event, Luo Gan hosted a national “severe crackdown” meeting, instructing local officials to arrest more people and impose severe sentences on “hostile forces” at home and abroad, including Falun Gong practitioners.

The next morning, Luo went to visit the Special Police Brigade of the Criminal Investigation Corps of the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau, the Sixth Brigade of the Beijing Armed Police Corps, and the Domestic Security Corps of the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau. According to Xinhua News Agency, Luo fully affirmed the police and armed police’s suppression of Falun Gong practitioners in Tiananmen Square, and he told them to continue fighting and to carry out the next step of severe suppression. Two days later, the “self-immolation” took place.

In January 2002, New Tang Dynasty Television produced a film called False Fire, in which a slow-motion replay of the CCTV footage clearly showed that Liu Chunling (one of the people who died on the spot) was actually struck with a heavy object held by a policeman in a military coat rather than burned to death as alleged.

Meanwhile, Wang Jindong, who was burned black, had a Sprite bottle between his legs that was allegedly filled with gasoline he used to burn himself, but the bottle was intact after the fire was put out. A microphone could be seen on the ground in front of Wang, presumably to amplify the slogans he shouted in an attempt to distort Falun Gong teachings and provoke hatred.

Although 12-year-old Liu Siying was “severely burned,” reporters were able to stop her while she was being carried into an ambulance and record her heart-wrenching cries for her mother.

On February 4, 2001, the Washington Post published an investigative report on its front page, “Human Fire Ignites Chinese Mystery.” Reporter Philip Pan went to conduct an on-site investigation in Kaifeng, the hometown of Liu Chunling, who died in the self-immolation. Liu’s neighbors said that no one had seen her practicing Falun Gong.

From the peaceful appeal in April 1999 to the fake “self-immolation” in January 2001, the CCP staged seven major scams in a short period of 22 months. These well-planned acts of manipulation put the CCP’s brutal and deceptive nature on full display.