A top Taiwanese member of Falun Gong was repatriated yesterday after being denied entry to Hong Kong ahead of a protest in the run-up to the 10th anniversary of the city's return to Chinese rule.
Theresa Chu (
An officer at the Hong Kong airport immigration department said that Chu, who had visited the territory last week with a valid travel document, was repatriated yesterday morning.
Chu said an immigration official took her to a room for questioning over the purpose of her visit to Hong Kong, and who she intended to meet during her stay.
Chu said she replied that she had come to witness the celebrations of the 10th anniversary of Hong Kong's handover to China.
However, Chu said the immigration official would not let her enter despite the willingness of local Falun Gong practitioners to vouch for her good behavior during her stay, claiming that her stay would not not serve the public interest.
Chu said that the official took away her travel documents and ordered officers with the riot squad to remove her shoes in preparation to forcefully carry her onboard a Taiwan-bound Dragonair flight on Sunday night.
Asking that she be treated with due respect, Chu promised to board by herself, but the plane took off before she arrived at the boarding gate, Chu said.
She was therefore kept in an office awaiting expulsion on the next flight.
Kan Hung-cheung (
He said that more than 100 Taiwanese members of Falun Gong, outlawed in China as a dangerous sect, have also been denied entry to the territory for a series of protests planned in the run-up to the anniversary of the handover on Sunday.
It was not the first time Chu has had difficulties getting into Hong Kong. In 2003, she and more than 80 other Falun Gong practitioners were denied entry on arrival to attend the group's activities.
She is one of the plaintiffs in a joint application involving practitioners from Taiwan and Hong Kong for a judicial review of refused entries.
China outlawed the Falun Gong, which combines meditation with Buddhist-inspired teachings, as an "evil cult" in mid-1999 and practitioners have subsequently faced often brutal repression.
There are an estimated 300,000 Falun Gong followers in Taiwan.
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