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Falun Gong pans China's actions

Against the backdrop of a Falun Gong adherent being arrested in China, the chairman of the Falun Gong Research Organization in Taiwan, Chang Ching-hsi, left, and Legislator Shih Ming-te condemn China's persecution of the group yesterday. PHOTO: GEORGE TSORNG, TAIPEI TIMES

The Falun Gong Research Organi-zation in Taiwan yesterday condemned the Chinese government's human-rights violations of the meditation group's followers over the past two years.

Chang Ching-hsi (張清溪), chairman of the organization, said at a press conference that his group condemns Beijing's increasingly serious violations of Falun Gong followers' human rights and hopes to build more support for the movement in Taiwan.

Chang was accompanied at the press conference by DPP Legislator Shih Min-te (施明德) and Yang Sen-hong (楊憲宏), a member of President Chen Shui-bian's (陳水扁) advisory group on human rights.

"Falun Gong is just a spiritual movement and we are not interested in any political issues," Chang said. "I don't understand why the Chinese government marks it as a cult and violates the followers' human rights. I hope that the public and media in Taiwan will help us condemn such violations."

"We shouldn't give up safeguarding human rights for the sake of fake cross-strait peace."

Yang Sen-hong, human rights advisor to the president

Shih, who was a victim of human-rights violations by the KMT government in the 1960s through the 1980s and was imprisoned for more than 15 years, emphasized that human rights are universal values and are more important than the cross-strait issue.

"Taiwanese society has reacted coldly to the Falun Gong issue, since most people are afraid to hurt relations with the Chinese government. But we should not tolerate any human-rights violation, no matter how strong the [perpetrating] country is," Shih said.

Echoing Shih, Yang promised to take the issue to the president's advisory group.

"We shouldn't give up safeguarding human rights for the sake of fake cross-strait peace. I'll try to urge the advisory group to do something about the Chinese government's human-rights violations," Yang said.

Falun Gong is a mixture of Buddhism, Taoism and meditation and breathing exercises. The group claims 100 million followers worldwide, but has been stigmatized by the Chinese government as a cult and has been banned in China since 1999.

Human-rights groups say more than 200 Falun Gong adherents have died in custody after being tortured by Chinese police.

Chang said the media in Taiwan rarely pay attention to this issue, resulting in a lack of understanding about the Chinese government's human-rights violations among people in Taiwan.

"The Chinese-language media have been very cold toward this issue. They rarely cover these human-rights violation cases. For their sources, they always use the Xinhua news agency's reports, which have a strong bias against Falun Gong and are not reliable," Chang said.

China has tried hard to improve its human-rights image in support of Beijing's bid to host the 2008 Olympic Games.

In May, the Chinese government allowed a group of foreign journalists to visit labor camps where many Falun Gong followers were detained. The reporters were shown how well the Falun Gong followers were being treated at the camp.

On Wednesday, Chinese officials confirmed reports of a mass suicide by Falun Gong followers at another labor camp. Falun Gong adherents, however, claim that the inmates were tortured to death.
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