Five Falun Gong followers set themselves on fire in a mass suicide attempt in Beijing's Tiananmen Square yesterday which left one woman dead and the four others injured, China's state media reported.
The five, four women and a man, soaked themselves in gasoline and set themselves ablaze at two different spots in the vast square in central Beijing at around 2:40pm, said the official Xinhua news agency.
The report said all five were from Haifeng City in the central province of Henan.
The report blamed the Falun Gong's New York-based leader for the death, saying the five followers had been "misled by the heresy of Li Hongzhi (
A producer and cameraman for US television news network CNN also witnessed the protest, but police immediately confiscated their videotape and detained them for 90 minutes. Officers at the Tiananmen Square police station refused comment, referring all questions to Xinhua.
Followers have demonstrated in the square, China's symbolic heart, on previous public holidays. Last Lunar New Year, police unveiled violent tactics frequently used since, kicking and punching demonstrators.
In a sign of nervousness, police closed the square midday yesterday, during a New Year's reception in the adjacent Great Hall of the People. Police hustled away six sect members who distributed leaflets and tried to unfurl banners under the portrait of communist patriarch Mao Zedong (
Groups of women in quick succession then unrolled banners with the sect's bywords: "Truthfulness, compassion, forbearance."
"Falun Dafa is good," one middle-aged woman yelled, using another name for the group. She ran from police, but was tripped and sent sprawling by a security officer. Police bundled the protesters, still shouting slogans, into waiting vans.
The apparent suicide attempt came as the Chinese government was bracing for mass protests by the outlawed spiritual movement in the square to mark today's Lunar New Year festival.
China's state-controlled media, which earlier this month launched a major new propaganda offensive against the movement, has accused Falun Gong practitioners in the past of trying to commit suicide.
But the group insists suicide is against its principles and has denied the reports.
It was not immediately possible to confirm the Xinhua report about yesterday's events from independent sources.
Sophie Xiao, a Hong Kong-based Falun Gong spokeswoman, said the alleged incident could not be linked with the movement and that it may be a plot by the government to smear the group.
"I don't think it is related to us. I don't think it's Falun Gong members because the teacher always teaches us to use a peaceful approach to appeal to the government rather than in a radical way like taking life," she said, referring to the group founder Li Hongzhi.
"Taking a life is a sin. We don't even harm mosquitoes. Why should we harm ourselves?" she said.
There was heavy security on the square several hours after the event allegedly took place.
A crowd of around 400 people watched the daily lowering of the flag at 5.30pm. Witnesses said they had seen a Falun Gong practitioner detained an hour earlier but had not seen any attempted suicide.
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