Media Report from Belgium: “Falun Gong Practitioners Demonstrate Exercises in Antwerp”

This is a report on a Falun Dafa activity, written by a major Belgian newspaper:

Antwerp - Matthias Slaats, a citizen of Gent, was once arrested in China because he protested against the persecution of Falun Gong in 2002. Today he came to Antwerp with other Falun Gong practitioners to demonstrate the Falun Gong exercises in Meir and Van Wesenbekestraat.

He said, “In China, there have been more and more Falun Gong practitioners detained and persecuted to death. In Belgium, however, people have a good understanding of the situation. As a matter of fact, when I was detained in Beijing, we received letters of support from the Belgian Premier, and from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. In addition, we had constructive talks with the Belgian representative who attended the Human Rights Meeting in Geneva. City Mayors have also approved our applications to demonstrate the exercises in their city.”

Falun Gong is a series of mediation exercises based on the principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance. These exercises have been handed down from generation to generation, but it was not until 1992 that Falun Gong was introduced to the general public. In the first seven years since being introduced to the public, Falun Gong was the recipient of many awards. After that, the Chinese government started to persecute Falun Gong practitioners whose numbers at the time exceeded over one hundred million. At present, there are between fifty and one hundred practitioners in Belgium. Matthias commented, “In places where we have been before, people have had a good impression of us. They were anxious to know more about Falun Gong and asked a lot of questions.”

Picture Below: Demonstrating the exercises in Van Wesenbekestraat and Meir.