Below is the text of a question to and response by the Irish Foreign Minister, Dermot Ahern, to a question asked regarding the death of Chinese Falun Gong practitioner Gao Rongrong.

Question:
Mr. Cuffe asked the Minister for Foreign Affairs if his attention has been drawn to the recent shocking and tragic death of a person (details supplied); if the Irish Government can ask the Chinese Government to investigate this person’s death; and if he will make a statement on the matter.

Response:
Minister for Foreign Affairs (Mr. D. Ahern): I have learned with regret of the death of Ms Gao Rong Rong, a Falun Dafa practitioner, who, according to reports, died on 16 June 2005. I have asked my officials to request the EU Presidency to raise the case of Ms Gao Rong Rong and the circumstances of her death with the Chinese authorities at the next session of the EU-China human rights dialogue which is due to take place in September. The EU-China human rights dialogue, established in 1996, is the formal framework through which the EU raises its concerns about individual human rights cases, including those of Falun Dafa practitioners and more general issues, such as the protection of freedom of religion and expression, which have a particular impact on practitioners of Falun Dafa.

Details:

Ms. Gao Rongrong was arrested by authorities at 3am on March 6th, 2005 and transported to a brainwashing facility in Zhangshi Forced Labour Camp. After being forced to attend the brainwashing class, she was transferred to the infamous Masanjia labour camp.

There she was tortured and beaten with electric batons. On June 6th, Ms. Gao was transported to the university hospital in a coma. After examining an abnormality with her brain scan, doctors at the hospital concluded that she had been injected with harmful drugs.

Due to mistreatment, Gao Rongrong died on . Chinese officials forced her family to cremate her body immediately after her death.

Cambridge, which is well-known in the world because of Cambridge University, has the second largest number of Chinese people in UK. There are quite a lot of Falun Gong practitioners living in the city. In the beautiful Jesus Green Park, Falun Gong practitioners have their two-hour group practise every morning. They start at 5:30 in weekdays before work and 7:30 in weekends before promoting Falun Gong.



As practitioners promote Falun Dafa and expose the persecution year after year, more and more people have come to know that Falun Dafa is good; more and more new practitioners have joined.

A new practitioner in the pictures above bought an exercise instruction video a year ago and practised at home, so her movements are not accurate at all. Practitioners invited her to the morning practise and helped her to correct the movements. Practitioners also expect other people with similar situations to come as well.

The 610 Office¹in Luchuan County, Guangxi Province, has once again launched a persecution campaign against Dafa practitioners. The 610 Office staff secretly planned the persecution strategy beforehand and held a meeting together with the managers of the related work units to discuss specifically how to implement the torture. They listed the practitioners targeted for persecution. Their plan was to go to Guangdong Province to arrest practitioner Zhong Rongji at work. The targets also included county middle school teacher, Xie Guixin, county first middle school teacher, Zhang Cuiyan, a retired teacher from Wangzhang Elementary School, Ye Ruijuan, merchant Chen Jiangyong, and others.

The county 610 Office printed and distributed a "transformation"²form to all the related work places. They then forced every workplace to carry out forceful brainwashing by saying, "if practitioners are not transformed internally, your workplace have to pay 20,000 'yuan'³to the county 610 Office, which will then hire practitioners from Guangxi Province who have already accepted the brainwashing to work on transforming them." With these threats, the leader of each workplace was forced to approach the practitioners in their respective workplaces and try to get them to sign the form.

Practitioner Mr. Zhong Rongji was a teacher at Mapo Town 3rd Middle School in Luchuan County. He was once detained and tortured at Luchuan Detention Centre for appealing in Beijing. Later he was sent to a labour camp in Nanning City. While in detention, Mr. Zhong firmly believed in Dafa. Upon his release he persisted in cultivating Dafa. The lawless authorities in the county education bureau ordered the Mapo 3rd middle school not to employ him again. Later he got a job in Guangdong Province. This July, Liu Guichu from the county 610 Office led a group to arrest Mr. Zhong and bring him back to Luchuan County. In order to protest the torture, Zhong Rongji has been on a hunger strike for about two months. The county 610 Office not only refuses to release him, but also claims, "If he still refuses to be transformed, he will be expelled from his school and sentenced to three years in a labour camp."

On July 15th under the incitement of the county 610 Office, the assistant secretaries in the Wenquan town government along with deputy mayor led seven or eight thugs to break into practitioner Chen Jiangyong's home. For three days, they kept threatening him and demanding that he denounce Falun Gong. On the third day, July 17th, they illegally detained him for one day.

On July 23rd, eight people from the national security department in the County Public Security Bureau, and the leader of Wanzhang Elementary School, persecuted retired teacher Ye Ruijuan. They broke into her home and threatened her. They forced the leader of her workplace and her family to interrogate her from 8:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. They finally forced her son to sign a blank piece of paper.

On July 25th, some thugs from the county 610 Office directed the leaders from the county education bureau, county middle school, and county 1st middle school to brainwash practitioners Xie Guixin and Zhang Cuiyan. They forced them to fill out forms and write the "three guarantees."⁴The 610 office threatened the school officials, saying that if the practitioners were not transformed, their schools would need to pay 20,000 yuan. They intended to incite hatred toward Dafa within the schools. From 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. (7:00 p.m. for Zhang), the two teachers were isolated and restrained. However, the plot did not work.

The 610 Office now plans to escalate the torture.

Here is a list of people responsible for persecution Falun Gong practitioners in Luchuan County:

Lu Huankun, male, the assistant secretary of the county committee and director of the county People's Congress representative: 86-13807752838. (This man is in charge of persecuting Falun Gong practitioners. He often participates in secret planning of the persecution with the 610 Office. He himself assigns and pressures managers in related workplaces. He has criticised people during meetings for not doing enough to persecute practitioners. Under his threatening, many managers were forced to follow his orders.)

Liu Guichu, male, assistant director of the county 610 Office: 86-775-7227626. (This man holds a hostile attitude towards Falun Gong and its practitioners. Since the formation of the county 610 Office in 1999, he has been the most active staff member in the 610 Office and participated in every persecutory campaign since 1999.)

Fan Bili, female, assistant director of the county 610 Office: 86-775-7226086, 86-775-7226080, 86-13197655363 (mobile). (Since she took her position in the 610 Office, she has been actively participating in the persecution of practitioners)

Qiu Shuhua, male, assistant director of the division specialising in dealing with Falun Gong issues in the county public security bureau. He is also a member of the 610 Office: 86-775-7339568, 86-13807752251 (mobile). (This man is hostile toward Falun Gong and practitioners. He directs all movements arresting practitioners in the county. Meanwhile, he often leads his team to places outside the county to arrest practitioners. He also stole large sums of money extorted from practitioners and their families.)

He Leiguang, male, instructor of the national security division of the county public security bureau: 86-775-7332554, 86-13517552089 (mobile). (Being one of the main thugs carrying out the persecution of Falun Gong, this man has participated in numerous arrests and interrogations of practitioners. He also performed a lot of paperwork related to persecuting practitioners since 1999. Most of the materials regarding practitioners being sentenced or sent to labour camps are penned by him.)

Note

1. "The 610 office" is an agency specifically created to persecute Falun Gong, with absolute power over each level of administration in the Party and all other political and judiciary systems.

2. "Reform or Transform" Implementation of brainwashing and torture in order to force a practitioner to renounce Falun Gong. (Variations: "reform", "transform", "reformed", "reforming", "transformed", "transforming", and "transformation")

3. "Yuan" is the Chinese currency; 500 yuan is equal to the average monthly income of an urban worker in China.

4. "Three Statements": Practitioners are coerced under brainwashing and torture to write "Repentance Statement," "Guarantee Statement" or 'Dissociation Statement" as proof that they have given up their belief. In the statement, the practitioner is forced to admit remorse for practising Falun Gong, promise to give up Falun Gong, and never again associate with other practitioners or go to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.ca/mh/articles/2005/9/2/109617.html

Falun Dafa practitioner Ms. Li Zhifen, who lived in Zhucheng City, Shandong Province, was unjustly arrested and sent to the Shandong Second Women's Forced Labour Camp on August 31st 2005. After being persecuted for 13 days, Ms. Li became paralysed and could no longer eat or talk.

On the night of August 2nd Ms. Li and three other practitioners were explaining the truth of Falun Dafa with their own experience when police officer Sun tracked them and reported them to the police station. Ms. Li and the others were consequently arrested and detained at the criminal detention centre. The next day, their homes were illegally ransacked. At the detention centre, each of the four practitioners was force-fed. Afterwards some of them vomited blood, excreted blood, suffered from dizziness, or suffered generalised pain.

On August 30th Ms. Li was going in a taxi to the local primary school to pick up her child when police officer Zhou Zhong arrested her. She was handcuffed and detained at the city's Security Detention Centre. On the morning of August 31st official Xu Guangrong and police officer Zhou Zhong arrested Ms. Li and several other practitioners. Ms. Li and the others were sent to Shandong Second Women's Forced Labour Camp, located in Wang Village, Zibo City, for three years of re-education through forced labour.

At Shandong Second Women's Forced Labour Camp, Ms. Li was detained in the Fourth Division. As soon as she arrived, she was forced to sit on a 20-centimetre-wide stool and not permitted to move. She refused to cooperate with the authorities. On the third day, the deputy leader of the Fourth Division refused to let her sleep.

At 2 p.m. on the fourth day, September 11th Ms. Li was persecuted so badly that symptoms of a stroke appeared and she fell into a coma. The police pinched an acupuncture point to awaken her. Upon regaining consciousness, Ms. Li's could no longer move the right side of her body. She could not eat, drink, or swallow medicine. Police officers Sun still did not allow her to sleep on a bed. He threw away her blankets and said to her, "Don't you dare tell people about this. We did not persecute you."

That night Ms. Li was sent to the forced labour camp hospital for treatment. Nonetheless, after only one day, Ms. Li was returned from the hospital and the torture continued. She was monitored by several guards and not allowed to sleep. The police also drew boundaries as to where she could sit and where her feet could lie. She was not allowed to move outside those boundaries.

The police then realised that they could no longer handle her situation, so they ordered her family to take her home. When the family went to pick her up, personnel at the forced labour camp charged the family 1500 yuan¹for her medical costs.

Wang Village Forced Labour Camp

Second Division: 86-533-6689411
Fourth Division: 86-533-8872994

Note

1. "Yuan" is the Chinese currency; 500 yuan is equal to the average monthly income of an urban worker in China.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.ca/mh/articles/2005/9/19/110727.html

I was sent to a forced labour camp because I was addicted to drugs. I was assigned to the Second Division and designated as one of the "clampdown personnel," who were prison inmates assigned to oversee the activities of Falun Gong practitioners. Through the performance of my duties, I became acquainted with various reprehensible and deceitful methods employed to isolate and monitor people.

In that filthy place, we served our prison terms in an environment of fear, anxiety and dread. Simple careless mistakes drew rebukes and dark looks. More severe cases led to a loss of points and tougher conditions for us all. These methods were used on us to systematically tighten the supervision and management of our responsibilities, which were to "clampdown" on Falun Gong practitioners by order of the division leader.

In our hearts, we went against our consciences by collaborating with prison officials to persecute Falun Gong practitioners.

Our performances were rated, and the division leader set the standards. Sometimes, in order to gain the approval of the division leader and obtain leniency and privileges for ourselves, we were driven to extremes, finding excuses to beat and insult the innocent practitioners. The prison supervisor favoured inmates who frequently beat and scolded the practitioners. These thugs routinely violated prison regulations, and the supervisor usually turned a blind eye, treating the situation as though it never happened. In addition, they expressed their approval with warm smiles. In this unfair setting, it wasn't unusual for us to sympathise with the victims.

The policy toward those who were "transformed"¹was to maintain continuous monitoring and surveillance to prevent "relapses and resistance." For those who refused to be transformed, the most basic human needs were denied, and manipulative punishment tools were designed to break their spirits. Hunger, cold, exhaustion, physical pain, filth and humiliation were used. To those who showed resilience and resistance, beatings, rebukes, insults and urine suppression methods were routinely applied. I will summarise and describe a few of the methods of torture used to "reform" people. Most of the "clampdown personnel" in our division have beaten and insulted Falun Gong practitioners, in breach of re-education centre rules and regulations.

Hunger (starvation): Those to be reformed were fed only a thin vegetable broth and half a steamed bun a day. In addition, mental and physical pressure were used to torment practitioners. This method can cause a person to lose two to three pounds a day. Practitioners were required to make a formal request for a meal. Specifically, they were to report to the division leader, state their name and station, and request a meal, in much the same way that a military recruit might be required to. Anyone who failed to follow this rule wasn't fed. This resulted in many practitioners implementing hunger strikes in protest. Those who went on hunger strikes were then force fed. If the person were lucky, a doctor conducted the force-feeding If the supervisor was in a foul mood, several "clampdown" prisoners would force the victim down, tie her to her bed, pry her mouth open, and then pour food down her throat. Oftentimes a victim's face would be full of tears because of the agony she suffered while being subjected to this barbaric treatment.

Freezing: Because those to be reformed had to make reports on everything, when the weather turned cold, they needed to file a report requesting additional warm clothing. At this time, the "clampdown personnel" were secretly instructed to ignore the requests and respond, "The supervisor on duty is unavailable to grant the request." Actually, the supervisor was always on duty in the outer corridor. The victims were left to freeze and shiver in the cold, silently enduring the mistreatment, sometimes becoming ill due to exposure.

Exhaustion (sleep deprivation): The victims were roused from sleep early in the morning at 5 a.m. There was no fixed "lights out" time, because the victim's bedtime depended on her transformation performance for the day. (A practitioner might be kept up as late a 3 a.m. before being allowed to sleep.)

Physical pain: Practitioners had to endure the sitting punishment every day. The victims were required to sit on a 60-70 cm wide stool with both legs and feet together. Both hands and arms were to be placed on the lap. The back was to be kept straight. Eyes were to be kept looking forward, and the victims were not allowed to move. Any movement was to be reported, so several "clampdown" inmates supervised the sitting punishment. Should the victim fail to fulfil the requirements they would be beaten. This punishment would eventually cause the victim's buttocks to develop weeping, festering sores. The agony they suffered was unimaginable. The victims sometimes requested to be allowed to stand, but they were always told, "Standing is corporal punishment." So the victim was forced to continue sitting. This would go on from early in the morning until late at night, until bedtime. Continuously, for 18 or 19 hours every day, with the exception of using toilet facilities, they were not allowed to break contact with the stool. In reality, sitting on the stool for extended periods of time is a far worse form of corporal punishment than being forced to stand.

Filth: Falun Gong practitioners were prohibited from washing their clothes, bathing, or washing their hair for long periods of time. Living in these conditions for so long, practitioners' hair turned wild and matted, as if it was stuck together with glue. The stench from the cells was unbearable. Oftentimes the victims were denied the use of toilet paper and given the excuse that the supervisor was not present.

Demoralisation and humiliation: Normally, we were not allowed to show any sympathy for the victims. Insults, rebukes, scolding, and readings of propaganda materials that defamed Falun Gong were continuously employed in an effort to weaken the victim's resolve. The victims were compelled to listen. If they refused, inhuman torture methods, among them not allowing the victim to urinate, were used as a reforming tool with approval and praise of the division leader.

Beating and scolding: With the excuse that a victim had violated a prison regulation (such as failing to maintain the required posture during punishment) they were beaten, scolded and insulted, and told to "stop being stubborn and accept reform." The prison officials used ruthless drug addict inmates and criminals to punish and torture the victims. In so doing, the victims were prevented from lodging complaints directly against the division leader.

We were also in a precarious position. We couldn't trust anyone, with the exception of surreptitiously complaining to the victims. All benefits granted for successful transformations were awarded to the division leader. Any problems or complaints were attributed to us.

Note: In the victims' cells, the glass of the doors and windows were covered with white paper. A small opening was left, which was covered with blue tint. The guards and supervisors could look through the tint and see the practitioners inside, while those inside couldn't identify them. We frequently saw the supervisor passing by, peering through the windows, checking on the practitioners inside.

The above is my personal account of what I saw and experienced while I was at the forced labour camp. I have put it in writing to let everyone in the world know and see clearly how the Chinese Communist Party's so-called "re-education through labour" camp system persecutes innocent Falun Gong practitioners.

Note

1. "Reform or Transform" Implementation of brainwashing and torture in order to force a practitioner to renounce Falun Gong. (Variations: "reform", "transform", "reformed", "reforming", "transformed", "transforming", and "transformation")

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2005/9/11/110194.html

Mr. Zhou Xiangyang, 32, of Tianjin City, was an engineer in the 3rd Surveillance and Design Division of the Railway Department. At the beginning of 2000, he was sent to the Shuangkou Forced Labour Camp in Tianjin for one and a half years. Then his term was extended for another year for no apparent reason and he was transferred to the Ji County Yushan Forced Labour Camp. When the additional one-year term ended, he was sent to the Jianxin Forced Labour Camp. Later on he was released due to the poor state of his health. On May 31st 2003, he was arrested again, put in the Hexi District Jail, and sentenced to nine years in prison. He was sent to Gangbei Prison on August 9th 2004.

Below is a description of two incidents of prison policeman Wei Wei in Tianjin City torturing Mr. Zhou Xiangyang:

Prison policeman Wei Wei, around 27 years old was a resident of Ji County, Tianjin City, Between 1999 and 2000, he was a policeman in the Shuangkou Forced Labour Camp in Tianjin. He was later transferred to the Yushan Forced Labour Camp in Ji County.

In the autumn of 2000, Wei Wei brought Zhou to a secret room in the Shuangkou Forced Labour Camp in order to beat him to force him to give up Falun Gong. Wei punched Mr. Zhou, knocked him to the ground, and asked him, "Do you still want to practise?" Mr. Zhou slowly stood up and then stared at Wei but did not answer. Wei yelled, "Nobody in this camp is not afraid of me," and began to punch and kick Zhou again. He knocked Zhou, whose face was all bleeding, to the ground, and asked him again, "Do you still want to practise?"

Zhou picked himself up slowly again and did not answer. Seeing that Mr. Zhou was undaunted, Wei madly slapped his face, until it was distorted, and knocked him to the ground again. After a short while, Mr. Zhou slowly got up again. Wei slapped him again. Mr. Zhou fell, but rose again. Wei screamed like mad, "I am going to beat you to death today!"

Wei picked up a big wooden baton and beat Mr. Zhou. This time, Mr. Zhou was knocked unconscious and fell to the ground. After a while he started to twitch. The twitches lasted for a while. He gradually regained consciousness, and struggled to stand up.

This time, Wei yelled, "Wait. You win, but please let me leave first before you stand up." He then took off in a hurry.

In the autumn of 2001, after being detained in the Shuangkou Forced Labour Camp in Tianjin City for one and a half years, Mr. Zhou was taken to the Ji County Yushan Forced Labour Camp in Tianjin for a one-year extension. He was put in Team I where prison guard Wei Wei was a policeman. The director of the team Li Zhang directed Wei to torture Zhou with electric batons to force him to give up Falun Gong.

Wei ordered the inmates to hold Zhou to the ground in the team warehouse, with his face up. Several inmates then held his hands, arms, feet and legs firm, while Wei used the electric baton to shock Zhou's mouth until his lips became swollen. Mr. Zhou said slowly, "You beat me up when we were at Shuangkou Forced Labour Camp. Now you torture me again. You will receive due retribution for what you do." Wei said, "Whatever Director Li said goes. If we beat you to death, we'll just say that you committed suicide and bury you in the back of the hills."

Wei then turned Zhou's body face down, and shocked the back of his head, causing blisters to form and his scalp to burn. As the electric shocks continued, suddenly the electric baton burned out, while Mr. Zhou lost consciousness at the same time.

After the torture, Mr. Zhou declared that he was going on a hunger strike in protest. Once in the dinning hall, when everyone was seated, Wei said, "Did I tell you to sit? Stand up all of you, except for Zhou Xiangyang. I admire people who are not afraid to die." Wei then asked Zhou, "Tell me the truth, don't you want to eat when you see others enjoying their meals?" Mr. Zhou said, "I am not telling you anything."

Mr. Zhou was force-fed every day. In August 2002, when he was transferred to the Jianxin Forced Labour Camp in Tianjin, he was a mere skeleton. He told people, "I will not commit suicide, but I am using a hunger strike to protest their persecution."

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2005/8/29/109375.html

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Over the past six years, Chinese and overseas practitioners have exposed the persecution of Falun Gong, and many Westerners have learnt the facts. However, some Westerners have the impression that the persecution has nearly stopped. These people have been deceived by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The CCP uses the practise of "inner pressure, outer peace," designed to oppress dissenters secretly under a veil of serenity.

The CCP has in fact escalated the persecution of Falun Gong and painstakingly spread deception. On September 7th, 2005, eighty practitioners were arrested in Hegang City, Heilongjiang Province. Arrests continue as we speak. Practitioners in other areas are also arrested daily.

After the former head of the CCP, Jiang Zemin stepped down, his die-hard followers, Zeng Qinghong and Luo Gan, have maintained the persecution. Hu Jintao makes saving the CCP his top priority. He has not evaluated Falun Gong correctly.

According to Clearwisdom.net, 209 practitioners were persecuted to death in March 2005, 350 in April, 429 and 230 in May and June respectively. Since the onslaught of this persecution that was officially launched on July 20th, 1999, 2742 deaths of Falun Gong practitioner have been verified. These cases occurred in over 30 provinces and autonomous districts.

Chinese farmers will lose their land if they practise Falun Gong. Workers will be fired if they practise Falun Gong. During the Chinese Industrial Commerce Bank's personnel rearrangement, the policy mandated that "Falun Gong practitioners will be the first to lose their jobs." The promotion of a government official is predicated on his not practising Falun Gong. A Chinese citizen who wants to obtain a passport must not practise Falun Gong.

The Sichuan Province Chinese Youth Travel Agency website on "Chinese Citizen's application to travel in Hong Kong and Macao" states that applicants must obtain proof that they are not Falun Gong practitioners from police or employer. The CCP wants to confine Mainland practitioners in China, so they cannot expose the CCP's atrocities in the persecution.

Falun Gong practitioners simply will not relinquish their belief in the principles of "Truthfulness, Compassion, Forbearance." They have no political agenda. Their very yearning for goodness scares the CCP, which claims that China's human rights situation is now the best ever. However, the "best" by CCP standards only means that citizens have the right to survive. Basic human rights are in fact not protected in China.

In the past six years, tens of millions of innocent people have been hurt in the oppression of Falun Gong. Hundreds of thousands have been sentenced to labour camps or prisons. Many sentence terms exceed 20 years.

On September 9th, 2005, Canadian Prime Minister Paul Martin discussed the importance of human rights with Chinese President Hu. Prime Minister Martin specifically mentioned the Falun Gong issue.

Western society is partly founded on human rights and freedom of belief. I hope you will call on the Chinese government to protect Falun Gong practitioners' basic human rights and to bring the persecutors to justice.

Best regards,

A Mainland China Falun Gong Practitioner

September 19th, 2005

This is a true story from Baishan City in China. A Falun Gong practitioner was arrested and taken to the city detention centre and detained in a cell where the cell leader was a criminal condemned to death. (This criminal killed a person, chopped up the corpse and was then sentenced to execution. Because he had several cases still pending, he had now been held in the jail for four years). The criminal tortured this practitioner under the supervision of other policemen. However this practitioner had a compassionate heart and took the effort and time to talk to them about Falun Gong and the persecution so that they could learn the truth, but he was tortured till he vomited blood and was sent to a hospital for emergency rescue.

Despite being subjected to so much persecution the detention centre did not stop its torture of this practitioner. The next day the police sent him to a cell for sick people, where the leader was another criminal on death row. This criminal asked him several questions, after which he understood instantly that the Chinese Communist Party had lied, and that Falun Dafa had been wronged. Seeing this practitioner firm and non-resentful character towards his captors even though he was on the verge of death, he was very touched. He told the practitioner frankly: "Three days before you came, I was told they would send a Falun Gong person here. They asked me to treat you viciously if you were not already dead. Now I realise that Falun Gong teaches people to be good and is a righteous Law. I can tell you I have done all kinds of bad things, but I will not take part in persecuting Falun Gong. I would not be where I am today if I had known about Falun Gong earlier. If I have a chance, I will learn Falun Gong so that I too can be a good person."

Upon seeing that this practitioner was not persecuted by his inmate guard but instead treated with respect, the other criminals listened to him clarify the truth and talk about the meaning of life. Many people said they wanted to learn Falun Gong if they were released. The police were frightened by this situation and moved the practitioner to a different cell.

Because the first inmate head followed the instructions of the police and persecuted practitioners, the police sent another practitioner to this cell. Surprisingly, one day this person asked suddenly: "What are the facts of the Tiananmen Square self-immolation?" The practitioner told him that the Falun Dafa books clearly state that practitioners cannot take lives, and to kill others and to kill oneself are both sinful. Real practitioners would not do such things. It was a frame-up. The practitioners continued to point out fallacies in the set-up: "People with a little common sense should also realise that a burned patient cannot be wrapped with cloth, since that would cause infection in the wound area. How could it be possible that the patient was wrapped tightly as shown on TV? The little girl, Liu Siying, was burned at the throat and her trachea was cut up, how could she receive the interview of the reporter? The organiser Wang Jindong's cotton clothes were burned while the plastic bottle filled with gas that was between his legs was intact. Think about it, and you will know the truth!" The guard took a hard look at this and said: "I have known for a long time that the Chinese Communist Party is good at lying, but I was still cheated this time! I know you are good people; I support your going on a hunger strike. If everyone is like you, China will have hope." This big turnaround surprised everyone. This was another example of the power of righteous thoughts and righteous actions.

Commentary

September 30th, 2005

Almost overnight, the Internet has emerged as the single most important forum the Chinese people have to criticise government policies and participate in politics. This is the good news. The bad news is that China's leaders have also noticed this phenomenon, and are doing everything in their power to reverse it. The really awful news is that Western Internet companies are only too happy to help the government.

On September 25th, two powerful Chinese government agencies, the State Council Information Office and the Ministry of Information Industry, jointly issued an important legal document: Rules on the Administration of Internet News Information Services. Particularly aimed at online forums, Web logs and even SMS wireless services, these new regulations represent the latest wave of forceful measures that the Chinese government has undertaken in a desperate attempt to regain control over the Internet.

The regulations are not entirely new. Since 1994, China's government has issued at least 38 laws and regulations aiming to control the Internet. The latest batch restates those laws, but also adds some important new expansions.

Significantly, the new rules include two additional categories of forbidden content left out of previously released regulations. One is the ban against "inciting illegal assemblies, associations, marches, demonstrations, or gatherings that disturb social order," and the other targets "conducting activities in the name of an illegal civil organisation." This is an apparent attempt to eliminate netizens' capacity to organise online. The massive anti-Japanese protests in some major Chinese cities this spring demonstrated the medium's potential for spontaneous organisation.

The most obvious feature of the new regulations is that they focus on "Internet news." The following statement from the official news agency Xinhua makes the intention clear: "The state bans the spreading of any news with content that is against national security and public interest." The regulation defines "Internet news" as, "current events news information, and includes reporting and commentary relating to politics, economics, military affairs, foreign affairs, and social and public affairs, as well as reporting and commentary relating to fast-breaking social events."

Ever since the Internet entered China, this flexible and pervasive new medium has been adopted by information-starved Chinese users to circumvent the Communist Party's traditional information-control mechanisms. Journalists have learned how to evade government guidelines by distributing and collecting information online. Ordinary Internet users can also write about events they witness and broadcast their reports online, making the suppression of important breaking news almost impossible.

Online discussions of current events, especially through Internet bulletin board systems (BBS) and Web logs, or "blogs," are having real agenda-setting power. The Chinese government has used enormous financial resources to set up government-sponsored Web sites at all levels of government, from national to regional and provincial. About 10% of all sites in Chinese cyberspace are directly set up and run by the government. Over 150 news sites have been directly established by the central and local government.

The problem is that these official sites have signally failed to gain the trust of the 100 million mostly young, urban and educated netizens. On the contrary, people simply go to any number of independent Web sites, including BBS and blogs, to read what they think is interesting. Popular BBS such as Tianya community and Xicihutong and individual bloggers enjoy far more online popularity, and therefore real influence, among netizens, than official Web sites such as Xinhua.com.

This is where the newly promulgated rules come in. The rules encourage self-censorship, particularly at smaller, unofficial news Web sites. The Chinese government mandates that all online forum- and weblogs-hosting companies, and even wireless text messaging services, bear responsibility for any information distributed through their sites or their services.

Authorities use licensing regulations and financial penalties to punish any companies that fail to comply. This regulation also applies to international Internet companies such as Yahoo and Microsoft, among others. Eager to expand their Chinese market share, many of these companies are more than keen to collaborate with these censorship mechanisms.

All major Internet Service Providers and Internet Content Providers in China have to hire people who do nothing but watch online information on their Web sites, and are ready to delete content considered "sensitive." In addition to human censors, all Web site-hosting services have also installed keywords filtering software. Posts on politically sensitive topics, such as Falun Gong, human rights, democracy, and Taiwan independence are routinely filtered. A list obtained by the Berkeley China Internet Project last year found that over 1,000 words, including "dictatorship," "truth," and "riot police" are automatically banned in China's online forums.

This regulation is backed up by real policing power. Since 2000, China's police force has established Internet departments in more than 700 cities and provinces. The Chinese net police monitor Web sites and email for "heretical teachings or feudal superstitions" and information "harmful to the dignity or interests of the state." They also have access to software which enables them to detect "subversive" key words in emails and downloads as well as to trace messages back to the computers from which they were sent.

In a recent case that shocked many around the world, Chinese journalist Shi Tao was sentenced to 10 years in prison for sending an email about news censorship in China to an overseas pro-democracy Web site. The catch here was that the net police traced the email back to the sender not through their state-of-the-art surveillance software technology, but thanks to the willing collaboration of Yahoo. It is instructive that the California company turned the information over even though it was stored in Hong Kong, outside the jurisdiction of the mainland police.

But Chinese authorities do not only rely on the threat of police action or imprisonment, but also adopt more subtle approaches to "guide opinion" online. Propaganda agents work undercover online pretending to be ordinary netizens, monitoring Internet debate as well as "guiding" online discussions.

Ironically, while government agents hide their identity online, Chinese authorities have ordered that all users of blog-hosting services and other individual Web sites register their identity, even at Internet cafes. All of these control mechanisms have a clear goal: to hold individuals directly responsible for what appears on their Web sites.

The problem for the authorities is that these measures are running up against the networked, decentralised and ephemeral nature of this new medium. The leaders are trying to halt a power shift in which Internet surfers get to choose which site to visit, what information to believe and distribute, and whose opinion to listen to. What's important online is credibility. The real opinion leaders and influential voices are coming from Chinese BBS and the blogosphere, not the official media.

These grassroots media activities will continue to take place despite the new regulations. New-generation technologies such as peer-to-peer file sharing and voice over IP phones (Skype is a brilliant example), will provide new communication platforms that can make it easier for users to bypass the censors' control. The capacity of the government to implement these new regulations effectively, therefore, is very questionable. The many-to-many and emergent nature of the Internet empowers information users far more then censors.

In the short-term, the new rules may have a chilling effect on Chinese cyberspace. In the long term, however, the Chinese censors are fighting a losing battle. The deeper problem here is that the Chinese Communist Party itself is morally bankrupt and intellectually exhausted. More regulations will not make official propaganda any more attractive or credible to Chinese netizens. Undercover commentators, self-censorship by Web site hosts, and occasional harsh police action against political activists will not help China's leaders gain legitimacy and trust either. Those in the West that helped trying to suppress speech may come to regret their decisions.

Mr. Xiao is the director of the China Internet Project at the Graduate School of Journalism of the University of California at Berkeley, and editor-in-chief of the China Digital Times.

Practitioners gathered in front of the Chinese Embassy in Bangkok to call for an immediate end to the Chinese Communist Party's persecution of Falun Gong on the morning of October 1st, 2005.

Peaceful appeal in front of the Chinese Embassy

Since Jiang Zemin's faction officially started suppressing Falun Gong on July 20th, 1999, practitioners have been deprived of their freedoms of belief, expression and all rights ensured by the constitution. More than 2700 practitioners have died from the persecution. Countless practitioners have been imprisoned, tortured, and forced to leave home and become destitute due to the persecution. And the persecution continues today.

The persecution of "Truthfulness-Compassion-Tolerance" is an attack on humanity's true nature. It tramples justice and human dignity. We call on all people to reach out and help. We call on world society to pay attention to the persecution that has been going on in China and help stop the killing.

On October 1st, 2005, Falun Dafa practitioners took part in the "Loop in Motion" Art Festival Parade in University City, St. Louis. Their beautifully decorated float and the elegant exercise demonstration on the float were warmly received by the spectators.

Originally, practitioners did not plan to participate in the parade. But because the organisers were deeply impressed by the beauty of Falun Dafa in previous parades, they took their initiative to contact practitioners and asked them to attend.

Practitioners' hand-made banner reads, "Falun Dafa"	Lovely young practitioners

Beautifully decorated float and elegant Falun Gong exercise demonstration are warmly received

People express appreciation to practitioners

“In the Labour Camp” by Robert Counts (Oil on canvas, 34”w x 22”h, 2005)

This painting was created to draw attention to the overall situation of the persecution against those who practise Falun Gong in China. In this painting I tried to depict the scene based in a forced labour camp, because in western society many people who shop regularly may find that everything is made in China these days. Who are those people that make those products and what kind of treatment do they receive?

In fact, the evilness and brutality suggested in this painting towards Falun Dafa practitioners cannot even compare the real life methods of torture that happen on a daily bases to them. In the last 56 years or so of Communist rule in China the Party has used the most unfathomable approaches in maintaining its power and keeping their people in fear. Since the persecution of Falun Dafa began in 1999 and especially after not obtaining their goal of "eliminating Falun Gong in three months", the Chinese Communist Party has used every conceivable torture method, both mental and physical, to destroy a practice that once flourished in China.

Unfortunately, even though documentation points to this persecution as being nearly, if not the, worst in history, the worlds people are unaware. This is mostly due to the huge amount of propaganda distributed en-masse by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and the vested interests that people all over the world have in China, making medias unwilling to report. It is hoped that this painting will help people realise the truth of the situation in China.

About the Artist

I graduated with a BFA in Illustration from the Massachusetts College of Art in 2002. Since graduating I have trained with a classical painter in Maine with teachings passed down from the Renaissance period. After training for a period of time and drawing steadily, I decided to create this piece to let more people know about the persecution and tried to explain it from an angle that hasn't been hit on too often in people’s efforts to raise awareness about the persecution in China.

Though the painting is rendered after having spent a long time on it, it is still a painting done with a limited degree of expertise. To be honest, this is one of my first true oil paintings after my training, so it s a bit immature. True artists go through hours and hours thorough years and years of extensive training to achieve perfection in their work.