August 5: Falun Gong News Bulletin
* FDIC: Eleven Years of Persecution and Peaceful Activism * The Epoch Times: Congressmen Call for End to 11-Year Persecution of Falun Gong * The Washington Times: Media mum on Falun Gong – as persecution escalates * FDIC: Elderly Falun Gong Practitioner Killed in Beijing Labor Camp * FDIC: Urgent Appeal: Father of Washington DC Resident Faces Trial in China for Defending Falun Gong * Tibetan Review: Rights lawyers’ licenses not renewed * The Epoch Times: Uyghur Organ Harvesting Witness Faces Deportation to China
Amnesty International: 2010 Annual Report (excerpts)
NEW YORK – Eleven years ago this week, the Chinese Communist Party launched a campaign to eradicate Falun Gong—a peaceful and popular spiritual practice embraced by tens of millions of Chinese citizens. But the practitioners of Falun Gong are not the only victims, and the lives destroyed and lost are not the only costs.
Eleven Years of Persecution and Peaceful Activism
NEW YORK – Eleven years ago this week, the Chinese Communist Party launched a campaign to eradicate Falun Gong—a peaceful and popular spiritual practice embraced by tens of millions of Chinese citizens. But the practitioners of Falun Gong are not the only victims, and the lives destroyed and lost are not the only costs.
Elderly Falun Gong Practitioner Killed in Beijing Labor Camp
A 64-year-old woman has died from torture-related injuries while being held in a Beijing labor camp, the Falun Dafa Information Center has learned.
64-year-old Falun Gong Practitioner Dies from Torture in Beijing Labor Camp
A 64-year-old woman has died from torture-related injuries while being held in a Beijing labor camp, the Falun Dafa Information Center has learned.
Developments in Hong Kong and Macau
Although technically part of the People’s Republic of China, unlike in the Mainland, Falun Gong is not banned in Hong Kong and Macau and practitioners are generally allowed to practice freely. The treatment of Falun Gong practitioners in these territories has thus emerged as a critical test for the “one country, two systems” arrangement under which the two former European colonies were returned to Chinese sovereignty in 1997 and 1999 respectively. Though not experiencing the harsh repression of their counterparts on the Mainland, since 1999, adherents based in these territories or traveling to them have encountered various degrees of harassment, surveillance, and travel restrictions. Several Hong Kong residents have also been detained and imprisoned on the Mainland.
International Concerns and Evidence of Forced Organ Removal from Falun Gong Prisoners of Conscience
In March 2006, allegations first surfaced of Falun Gong prisoners of conscience being deliberately killed in custody so that their organs could be used in transplant operations. Since then, a series of independent studies and analyses have uncovered evidence affirming the credibility of the allegations, although no doctor has yet to come forth and admit being directly involved in such procedures.
Selected Excerpts from United Nations Reports
United Nations (U.N.) Special Rapporteurs and Working Groups first began conveying communications and urgent appeals about Falun Gong adherents to the Chinese authorities in 2000. Since then, they have issued urgent appeals for dozens of adherents, transmitted hundreds of cases of concern to the Chinese government, and determined in formal opinions that Falun Gong adherents were detained arbitrarily. This section includes a selection of key excerpts from their reports and appeals.
Falun Gong In the News
Throughout 2009, a range of American and international media outlets reported on Falun Gong, with article topics ranging from accounts of human rights abuses suffered by practitioners in China to editorials calling for increased support of technologies designed by Falun Gong engineers for circumventing internet censorship. The following are selected excerpts from such reports, listed in chronological order
Urgent Appeal: Father of Washington DC Resident Faces Trial in China for Defending Falun Gong
WASHINGTON DC-The father of 26-year-old Washington DC resident Pang Jin is at risk of being sent to a prison camp because of his attempts to help his wife, a Falun Gong practitioner, avoid abduction and torture at the hands of Chinese police, the Falun Dafa Information Center has recently learned.