Falun Gong’s 12-year Peaceful Resistance to the CCP’s Persecution

Twelve years after the Chinese Communist Party launched a brutal campaign to eradicate them, Falun Gong practitioners are lighting up hope. Last Friday ahead of the anniversary of the persecution that began on July 20, 1999, two thousand practitioners took part in a candle light vigil in Washington, D.C.

For one woman who experienced abuse first hand, the vigil is a tribute to those who’ve died in the persecution.

[Zhang Lianying, Falun Gong Practitioner]:
“My husband and I know more than twenty practitioners—some are good friends, others are neighbors. Some were beaten to death just four days after being arrested. We came overseas so that we can tell more people, asking them to stand up and stop the persecution in China.”

Falun Gong is a meditation practice with five sets of gentle exercises and teachings based on the principles of truth, compassion and tolerance. It was first taught to the public in China in 1992 and became widely popular. On July 20, 1999, the then leader of the Chinese Communist Party, Jiang Zemin, launched a nationwide campaign to eradicate Falun Gong.

[Erping Zhang, Spokesperson of the Falun Dafa Information Center]:
“When Jiang Zemin waged the persecution in 1999, he started the campaign short of legal grounds. In fact this persecution itself is against China’s constitution which has a clause of freedom of religion and freedom of conscience.”

In Taiwan, local residents braved the rain on Sunday evening to remember the thousands who’ve died, persecuted by the Chinese regime for their beliefs.

[Chan-Hsing Wang, Taiwanese Attorney]:
“I believe good people should be treated as such, and not like the inhumane ways they’re treated in China, where [the regime] takes away their rights and freedoms.”

International rights groups and organizations like Amnesty International and the United Nations have widely documented the Chinese regime’s atrocities against Falun Gong. These include arbitrary detention, extensive torture, forced labor, rape and psychiatric abuse of tens of thousands of adherents.

Falun Gong’s non-violent methods have been central to resisting the persecution. Last week a new bi-partisan resolution was introduced in the U.S. Senate to call for an end to the persecution. Last year, a similar resolution was passed in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Foto: NTD