MPs Call For End to Falun Gong Persecution`

He might be calling for political support through a loudspeaker on Parliament Square, amid speeches from MPs, but Dr Liu is adamant that he has no political agenda. 

He says his purpose is simply to help save innocent lives in China and to restore the basic freedom of belief to 100 million people. 

Liu is the chairman of the Falun Dafa Association in the UK. He spoke at a rally in Westminster on July 12 to mark 13 years of persecution in China of Falun Dafa—a spiritual meditation discipline that follows in the footsteps of traditional Buddhist and Daoist self-cultivation. 

Falun Dafa, also known as Falun Gong, spread throughout China in the 1990s, gaining great popularity, according to its practitioners, because of its health benefits and its central tenets of truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance.

On July 20, 1999, then-head of the Chinese Communist Party Jiang Zemin initiated a systematic campaign of persecution against the practice, which by then was practised by 100 million people in China. 

Since that time, Falun Gong practitioners have appealed to politicians and governments around the world for support to end the persecution. 

Liu says that Falun Gong was intentionally mislabelled by the Chinese communist regime as having a political goal to create a kind of smokescreen. The purpose, he says, is to cover up that the Chinese Communist Party is targeting an innocent spiritual practice.

“We have no political agenda beyond ending the persecution,” he said at the rally on July 12. 

“Why are we standing in Westminster appealing for help from politicians? Because we want the persecution to stop and we believe politicians can bring some international pressure to bear on the situation. 

“Why are we so outspoken about the CCP and its vile nature and history? Because we have no choice but to expose it for what it is. If we want people to understand the nature of the persecution, and to see through the lies, we have to put it squarely in the context of the Chinese Communist Party’s history of bloodshed and lies.”

Liu said that, prior to their sudden change in attitude, the Chinese authorities had praised the health benefits and moral teachings of Falun Gong. 

“Falun Gong is a spiritual cultivation practice belonging to the Chinese tradition of cultivating mind and body that stretches back as long as Chinese history. It was clearly recognised as such by the Chinese Communist Party itself in official investigations prior to the persecution.”

Also speaking at the rally on Thursday was MP Julian Huppert, who tabled an Early Day Motion in Parliament, signed by 23 MPs, that calls for the release from detention and imprisonment of all Falun Gong practitioners.

Huppert said: “Tens of thousands of innocent Falun gong practitioners have been detained, arrested, or convicted. Many have been the victim of brutal treatment and torture; the number of deaths that have been reported is disturbing.

“The vast majority of practitioners have not been held in connection with any sort of disruptive or illegal action, and their only crime is their peaceful practice of Falun Gong in accordance with their fundamental human right to freedom of conscience.”

The Falun Gong website Minghui International lists 3,571 documented deaths from persecution in China. Other Falun Gong websites claim there are over 70,000 recorded cases of torture in custody. 

Some investigations into the persecution have estimated several hundred thousand Falun Gong practitioners are incarcerated at any given time. Other investigations estimate that tens of thousands of Falun Gong practitioners have been used for organ harvesting—their organs removed while still alive to be sold on the lucrative organ donor market.

Liu says that to carry out the persecution there is a chain of command with officials at each level guilty of crimes against humanity.

“Prison guards are promoted or punished according to their success in ‘transforming’ Falun Gong practitioners, and given bonuses for dreaming up new torture methods. Inmates are released early for beating Falun Gong prisoners. Labour camp officials [are] promoted or demoted according to whether they meet ‘transformation quotas’. 

“At the top are officials who have shaken hands with heads of government overseas and become key players in international commerce.”

There are numerous officials throughout the CCP with blood on their hands, accumulated over 13 years of persecution, according to Liu. “This is one of the reasons that they fight so hard to hide the truth about Falun Gong and the persecution – because they fear facing punishment for their crimes—and why they never backed down from their goal of ‘eradicating’ Falun Gong.”

Ed Miles of Christian Solidarity Worldwide said: “We believe that not only is it a fundamental legal and political right that people should be free to choose their beliefs, but there is also a clear moral obligation upon all states to allow people to freely make decisions on such deeply personal issues.”

According to the European Friends of Falun Gong, the large numbers of people currently renouncing the Chinese Communist Party (highlighted by this newspaper) will only increase if the persecution continues. 

“Their continued persecution of Falun Gong will only serve to increase this mass exodus, and the Party will eventually be forced to cave in to the power of their real enemies, truth and freedom. The CCP is an apple which is rapidly rotting from within,” said a statement by European Friends of Falun Gong.

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