"Swiss Falun Gong Protesters Arrested"

by Verna Yu (Associated Press," March 14, 2002)

HONG KONG - Police arrested 16 Falun Gong protesters, including four Swiss, a scuffle outside the Chinese government liaison office Thursday.
The group, which also included 12 Hong Kong people, had demanded that the Swiss be permitted to travel to Beijing, where authorities have recently rounded up Falun Gong protesters and deported some foreigners.
Hong Kong police broke up the demonstration after four hours when the Falun Gong members ignored an order to move away from the office's front door.
Police Superintendent Michael Chiu said the protesters were arrested for obstruction following a complaint from the Chinese government office.
He did not know whether charges would be filed or if the Swiss would be deported. Chinese authorities earlier denied the four visas.
When police moved in, the local Falun Gong followers tried to protect the Swiss, yelling and shoving as officers removed them. Other police kept reporters away.
From inside a police van, Swiss protester Erich Bachmann shouted that the Hong Kong police were supporting China President "Jiang Zemin's persecution."
Chiu denied claims that officers had assaulted the protesters.
He said some Falun Gong followers had recently entered the office and Chinese government workers inside had safety fears. Falun Gong has insisted all its actions are peaceful.
China has outlawed Falun Gong as an "evil cult." Although it maintains it is simply a spiritual and meditation group.
Falun Gong remains legal in Hong Kong where it carries out frequent protests against Beijing's attempts to eradicate the group in China.
It claims hundreds of followers have died in the custody of mainland police.
China disputes charges of any abuse. Independent verification is impossible to obtain.

"Falun Gong sues China in U.S."

("Washington Post, March 13, 2002)

BEIJING - The Chinese government and the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement have taken their 2-year-old battle to the United States, using American courts and city halls - including San Francisco's - as part of their struggle.
In recent months, Falun Gong activists have sued four senior Chinese officials including the Beijing mayor, who was served a summons at San Francisco International Airport, for allegedly ordering the torture, death and violation of human rights of Falun Gong practitioners in China.
The plaintiffs relied in part on an obscure U.S. law from 1789, originally used to combat piracy, to seek redress for human rights violations committed in China.
The practice has so irritated the Chinese government that it recently asked the Bush administration to help stop the suits. The Chinese have placed the issue on the agenda of law enforcement talks that began yesterday in Washington.
Chinese diplomats in the United States have written hundreds of letters to mayors nationwide urging them to cancel local Falun Gong commemorations or rescind proclamations in favor of the spiritual group.
San Francisco, Baltimore, Seattle, Los Angeles, Decatur, Ill., and Westland, Mich., among others, have rescinded proclamations issued on behalf of Falun Gong. Earlier this year, Utah reneged on a decision to declare Jan. 8 Falun Gong Day after meeting with Chinese government officials.
Falun Gong is a Buddhist-like practice that combines exercise and meditation with a cosmology involving aliens and flying humans. Practitioners say their goal is self-improvement.
China banned the group in July 1999 after 10,000 practitioners surrounded the Communist Party headquarters in Beijing; officials later passed legislation imposing strict penalties for membership in an "evil cult."
Activists claim that Chinese security forces have killed hundreds of followers during the campaign to crush the group. At least 10,000 more have been incarcerated in labor camps and jails.
The first suit against a Chinese official was filed against Zhao Zhifei, head of public security in Hubei province. Zhao was in the Manhattan Plaza Hotel in New York last July 17 when a process server approached and handed him a court summons.
The case was filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York under the Alien Tort Claims Act of 1789 - which was intended for use in prosecuting pirates for crimes committed outside the United States - and the Torture Victims Protection Act. Human rights activists started using the tort claims act in rights cases in the 1980s.
The plaintiff, Peng Liang, claims that his mother and brother were killed for their beliefs. Peng, in China at the time, was arrested in August with four other Falun Gong practitioners, said Terri Marsh, a Falun Gong practitioner from Washington who represented him.
Zhao did not contest the charges; the plaintiffs won by default. No damages were awarded.
A Falun Gong activist next sued Zhou Yongkang, the top Communist Party official from Sichuan province, who was served as he stepped from a limousine in Chicago on Aug. 27. The plaintiff was He Haiying, whose sister, a teacher in China, allegedly was tortured while in the custody of authorities in Sichuan.
She disappeared last June and hasn't been seen since; her family believes she was executed. This case has yet to go to court.

"Fight Over Banned Chinese Group Moves to U.S."

by John Pomfret ("Washington Post," March 12, 2002)

BEIJING - The Chinese government and the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement have taken their two-year-old battle to the United States, using American courts and city halls as part of their struggle at home.
In recent months, Falun Gong activists have sued four senior Chinese officials, including the mayor of Beijing, for allegedly ordering the violation of human rights, torture and death of Falun Gong practitioners in China. The plaintiffs, who served the officials with papers during visits to the United States, relied in part on an obscure U.S. law from 1789, originally used to combat piracy, to seek redress for human rights violations committed in China.
The practice has so irritated the Chinese government that it recently asked the Bush administration to help stop the suits. U.S. officials responded they were powerless to do so, an argument Chinese legal experts reject. The Chinese have placed the issue on the agenda of law enforcement talks that begin Tuesday in Washington.
For their part, Chinese diplomats in the United States have written hundreds of letters to mayors around the country urging them to cancel local Falun Gong commemorations or to rescind proclamations in favor of the spiritual group. Falun Gong practitioners in the United States claim that on several occasions Chinese officials have threatened them or their relatives in China, although independent corroboration was impossible.
Baltimore, Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Decatur, Ill., and Westland, Mich., among others, have rescinded proclamations issued on behalf of Falun Gong. Earlier this year, Utah reneged on a decision to declare Jan. 8 Falun Gong Day after a meeting with Chinese government representatives.
Chinese officials failed to stop Salt Lake City officials from allowing Falun Gong practitioners to exercise in a public park during the Winter Olympics. Chinese officials have also used their connections in Chinatowns across the United States to attempt to ban Falun Gong adherents from marching in parades or participating in other organized activities.
The movement of the battle over Falun Gong to the United States marks an important escalation in China's struggle with the group, whose leader, Li Hongzhi, has lived in the United States since 1995. China has issued an international warrant for his arrest and has asked Interpol, the international police coordination agency, to help capture him. Interpol has declined to help.
Falun Gong is a Buddhist-like practice that combines exercise and meditation with a cosmology involving aliens and flying humans. Falun practitioners say their goal is self-improvement. China banned the group in July 1999 after 10,000 practitioners surrounded the Communist Party headquarters here. The government subsequently passed legislation imposing strict penalties for membership in an "evil cult."
China's president, Jiang Zemin, particularly detests the organization, according to Chinese sources. In addition, the Communist Party leadership traditionally has worried about any group capable of organizing people outside the party.
Falun Gong activists claim that Chinese security forces have killed hundreds of Falun Gong followers during the campaign to crush the group. At least 10,000 more have been incarcerated in labor camps and jails.
In recent months, Falun Gong activists in China have changed tactics.
Foreign Falun Gong adherents, rather than Chinese citizens, have begun demonstrating on behalf of the group, mostly in Beijing's Tiananmen Square.
China expelled more than 50 foreigners who protested in the capital during Chinese New Year last month and at the National People's Congress, China's legislature, whose yearly session began last week.
At the same time, Chinese Falun Gong activists have turned to technology to wage their struggle in China, distributing thousands of DVDs around major cities. The discs, advertised as "a great show," contain pro-Falun Gong documentaries. Earlier this month, Falun Gong followers tapped into a cable network in Changchun, Li Hongzhi's home town and a hotbed of Falun Gong activity, and broadcast a pro-Falun Gong video for about 45 minutes.
The first suit against a Chinese official was filed against Zhao Zhifei, head of public security in Hubei province. Zhao was in the Manhattan Plaza Hotel in New York last July 17 when a process server approached and handed him a court summons.
Zhao was taken aback, witnesses said, and asked if he was being arrested and whether he could leave the country.
The case was filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York under the Alien Tort Claims Act of 1789 - which was intended for use in prosecuting pirates for crimes committed outside the United States - and the Torture Victims Protection Act. Human rights activists started using the tort claims act in rights cases in the 1980s.
The plaintiff, Peng Liang, claimed that his mother and brother were killed for their beliefs. Peng, who was in China at the time, was arrested in August with four other Falun Gong practitioners, said Terri Marsh, a Falun Gong practitioner from Washington who represented him.
"We were trying to get him out of China, but we didn't succeed in time," Marsh said. "They arrested him, and he has disappeared." Because Zhao did not contest the charges, the plaintiffs won by default. No damages were awarded.
A Falun Gong activist next sued Zhou Yongkang, the top Communist Party official from Sichuan province, who was served as he stepped from a limousine in Chicago on Aug. 27. The plaintiff in this case was He Haiying, whose sister, an elementary school teacher in China, was allegedly tortured while in the custody of authorities in Sichuan.
She disappeared last June and has not been seen since; her family believes she was executed. This case has yet to go to court.
Subsequent cases, both filed on February 7, involved Beijing's mayor, Liu Qi, who was served at San Francisco International Airport on his way to Salt Lake City as the head of China's delegation to the Winter Olympics, and Xia Deren, deputy governor of Liaoning province.
The identity of the plaintiffs, some of whom are in China, was not disclosed.

"Embassy: China Expels 10 Australians"

by John Leicester (Associated Press, March 8, 2002)

BEIJING - China deported 10 Australians on Friday who were detained in a protest against its crackdown on the Falun Gong spiritual movement, the government and the Australian Embassy said.
The Australians, detained Thursday near the building where China's legislature is holding its annual session, "picked quarrels, stirred trouble and preached the evil cult of 'Falun Gong'," China's Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
Officials "admonished, warned and educated" the Australians before expelling them Friday morning, the ministry said. It said their protest violated Chinese laws but that they were treated humanely in detention.
An Australian Embassy spokesman said the 10 were put on a flight to Singapore. He spoke on condition of anonymity.
In Singapore, two Australians who were expelled said they were beaten. Eight others said they were unharmed.
Olympian Jan Becker, who swam for Australia during the 1964 Tokyo Games and was one of the expelled, questioned the wisdom of allowing Beijing to host the 2008 Olympics because of the crackdown on Falun Gong.
"The Olympic committee didn't put enough pressure on Beijing to improve human rights issues beforehand," she said. "Would they guarantee my safety and others if they go and practice Falun Gong?"
The protest Thursday lasted only a few seconds.
Demonstrators held up a banner and shouted "Falun Dafa is good!" in Chinese, using another of Falun Gong's names, before police grabbed them.
It was the fifth protest since November on or near Tiananmen Square in central Beijing by foreign members of Falun Gong, which China banned in 1999 as an "evil cult."
The protest occurred despite heightened security in Beijing to prevent demonstrations during the 11-day meeting of the National People's Congress, which is being held in the Great Hall of the People next to Tiananmen Square.
A statement released by Falun Gong in New York said the detained protesters wanted to appeal for "Falun Gong practitioners persecuted in China." In the Australian city of Melbourne, about 20 Falun Gong followers protested outside China's consulate there against the detentions in Beijing.
Falun Gong spokeswoman Kati Vereshaka said security guards surrounded a group of five practitioners who walked onto the consulate grounds holding a banner on which was written "China stop killing." The protesters left peacefully about an hour later.
Tiananmen Square was once the site of almost daily demonstrations by Chinese Falun Gong protesters. But a relentless, often brutal crackdown has scared away or driven underground Chinese followers who once numbered in the millions.
Thousands of members have been detained, and Falun Gong supporters abroad contend that more than 350 have been killed. Chinese authorities deny abusing anyone, though they say some members have died in hunger strikes, from refusing medical help or in suicides.

"Australian Falungong supporters arrested after China NPC protest"

by Peter Walker (AFP, March 7, 2002)

BEIJING - Up to seven Australian followers of the banned Falungong spiritual group were arrested Thursday after a brief protest on Tiananmen Square, timed to coincide with the annual session of China's parliament.
At least four demonstrators were seen briefly raising a banner on the square Thursday morning before plain clothes and uniformed police wrestled it from them and bundled them into a van.
Later, a Falungong spokeswoman in Australia said seven Australians were arrested in all.
The demonstration took place directly in front of a famous portrait of Mao Zedong which marks the spot where he declared the People's Republic and is regarded as the spiritual heart of the communist regime.
It was also just 200 metres away from where deputies from all over China are meeting for the annual session of the National People's Congress.
"Basically they went to appeal on behalf of Chinese Falungong practitioners who are being persecuted and tortured," Falungong spokeswoman Catherine Vereshaka said.
The organisation named five of the demonstrators as a couple, Michael and Candice Molnar, both 29, David Bryceson, 38, from Melbourne, David Rubacek from Sydney and a 39-year-old named Greg March.
The Australian embassy in Beijing said it was waiting for information.
"We have heard reports about supposedly Australian demonstrators being arrested," a spokesman said.
"We have made enquiries with the authorities but they have so far just confirmed that foreigners were arrested."
China's foreign ministry also said it had no information, but warned overseas Falungong adherents against demonstrating.
"If a foreigner clearly knows Falungong has been identified as an evil cult in China and they still come to China to commit illegal Falungong activities, and create trouble, then of course they've violated China's laws," said spokesman Kong Quan.
Police appeared not to expect a protest under the huge portrait, on Tiananmen Gate at the entrance to the former royal palace, or at the Forbidden City to the north of the square.
After the police pulled down the banner, the demonstrators chanted for a few minutes before the police van was brought and they were taken away.
Groups of seemingly bemused Chinese passers-by watched the protest while police tried to usher them off.
The Buddhist-based Falungong, outlawed as a supposedly harmful cult in mid-1999, has repeatedly demonstrated on Tiananmen Square against its repression by the Chinese government.
Since an incident just over a year ago, when five Chinese people who Beijing said were Falungong followers set themselves on fire on the square, the bulk of the protests have been by foreigners.
Last month an estimated 59 western followers demonstrated.
Human rights groups estimate that hundreds of Falungong followers have been sentenced to jail terms and tens of thousands sent to labour camps under the ban. The movement says as many as 300 followers have died from brutality in police detention.
On Monday the US State Department's annual global human rights report contained scathing criticism of China's crackdown on the group, saying "scores" of Falungong adherents died in police custody during 2001.
The report also cited "reliable" sources saying local officials from a city in the eastern province of Shandong "were responsible for beating to death Falungong adherents at the rate of about one per month."

BEIJING - Defiant members of the banned Falun Gong spiritual group hijacked state television in a northeastern Chinese city to show a film protesting a government crackdown on their faith, locals said on Thursday.
Reports of the television protest, one of Falun Gong's most audacious, emerged as China detained seven foreign adherents on Tiananmen Square for protesting Beijing's campaign against the group it calls an evil cult.
State television broadcasts in Changchun were interrupted on Tuesday evening by footage of Falun Gong's U.S.-based leader Li Hongzhi and a film accusing the government of staging a self-immolation of alleged adherents in Tiananmen Square last year, locals said.
"There was a brief blackout and then there was Li Hongzhi speaking, banners saying Falun Dafa is good,' and there was a news analysis about the Tiananmen Square self-immolation incident which indicated that it was planted by the government," a television viewer in Changchun told Reuters.
The footage lasted about 50 minutes before normal state television programming resumed, he said.
It was one of the most daring protests by Falun Gong, whose once regular demonstrations in Tiananmen Square have petered out in the last year since the government arrested group leaders and sent thousands of followers to "re-education" camps.
However, foreign adherents have kept up their campaign with a string of protests on the square - the latest coming on Thursday right in front of the building where the National People's Congress, China's parliament, was holding its annual meeting.
Police whisked away the foreigners, at least three of whom were Australian, after the latest of several protests in recent months by foreigners who were swiftly expelled from the country.
Police investigate
Police in Changchun had arrested a local man in connection with the television incident, the Changchun Evening newspaper said, without offering more details.
Changchun residents said they believed the incident was the work of underground Falun Gong practitioners still active in the city, but it was unclear how they managed to penetrate the local cable TV network.
Changchun, a city of 1.3 million people, is Li Hongzhi's home town and thousands of people there remain faithful to the self-styled spiritual leader, they said.
Officials at the city's police department and state-owned Changchun Cable Television Corporation, the city's biggest cable broadcaster, declined to comment on the incident.
But a city government official told Reuters a police circular sent to city hall said high-ranking officials and investigators from the Ministry of Public Security in Beijing had been sent to Changchun to investigate the incident.
The television protest was the group's latest effort to fight back against a fierce state media campaign to discredit the group, focusing on the self-immolations in which a 12-year-old girl and her mother died.
Falun Gong denies they were true adherents and accuses the government of setting up the incident.
Foreigners detained
The foreign demonstrators were detained on Tuesday at a police station where they sat in a circle and meditated, a witness said.
"I heard this one man telling the Chinese police about their rights of protest and expression according to the Chinese constitution," he said.
"I saw the banners that belonged to them spread out on a table. They were banners for Falun Gong -- some were purple and yellow." Kati Vereshaka, a spokeswoman in Australia for the Falun Gong which is also known as Falun Dafa, identified three of the detained protesters as her cousin Mihai Molnar, his wife, Candice, and Greg March, all from Melbourne.
Vereshaka said she had asked the Australian Foreign Ministry and the Australian embassy in Beijing to intervene.
"They are now trying to get in contact," she said. "Hopefully, they will be released soon because they have done nothing illegal," Vereshaka told Reuters.
"They went there to appeal on behalf of the Chinese Falun Gong practitioners. All they did was unfurl a banner saying Falun Dafa is good in Chinese characters." There was no immediate comment from the Australian embassy or from the Chinese government.
China expelled 53 Westerners last month and 35 foreign Falun Gong members in November for similar protests.
China branded Falun Gong an evil cult in 1999 after thousands of followers shocked the government with a mass protest demanding official recognition of their faith around the Beijing leadership compound near Tiananmen Square.
Falun Gong says more than 1,600 followers have since died as a result of abuse in police custody or detention centers.
The government says only a handful have died, mostly from suicide or natural causes. It blames Falun Gong for the deaths of at least 1,900 people by suicide or refusing medical treatment.

"China Detains More Foreign Falun Gong Protesters"

by Tamora Vidaillet (Reuters, March 7, 2002)

BEIJING - China detained seven foreign members of the banned Falun Gong spiritual movement Thursday for protesting in Tiananmen Square over Beijing's campaign against the group it denounces as an evil cult.
Police whisked away the foreigners, at least three of whom were Australian, after they staged a brief protest on the square next to where the National People's Congress, China's parliament, was meeting in central Beijing.
The seven were taken away in a police van in the first known such protest - but the latest of several in recent months by foreigners who were swiftly expelled from the country - during the NPC's annual two-week session.
At least three onlookers taking pictures were also taken for questioning at a nearby police station, one witness said.
The demonstrators were detained in a holding room at the police station where they sat in a circle and meditated, he said.
"I heard this one man telling the Chinese police about their rights of protest and expression according to the Chinese constitution," the witness said.
"I saw the banners that belonged to them spread out on a table. They were banners for Falun Gong - some were purple and yellow."
Call for intervention
Kati Vereshaka, a spokeswoman in Australia for the Falun Gong which is also known as Falun Dafa, identified three of the detained protesters as her cousin Mihai Molnar and his wife Candice, both 29, and 39-year-old Greg March, all from Melbourne.
Vereshaka said she had asked the Australian Foreign Ministry and the Australian embassy in Beijing to intervene.
"They are now trying to get in contact," she said. "Hopefully they will be released soon because they have done nothing illegal," Vereshaka told Reuters.
"They went there to appeal on behalf of the Chinese Falun Gong practitioners. All they did was unfurl a banner saying Falun Dafa is good in Chinese characters." An Australian embassy spokesman in Beijing said diplomats had been in contact with the Chinese authorities but had not yet received confirmation that Australian citizens were involved in the protest. "Until we can confirm that they were Australians, we can't take the next steps," he said.
There was no immediate comment on the protest from the Chinese government.
The U.S.-based Falun Dafa Information center said in a statement the protesters had made a peaceful appeal to China to end "state terrorism against Falun Gong." "We are voicing the hearts of the thousands of practitioners who are illegally detained and tortured in labor camps and mental institutions throughout China to have their freedom restored," it said.
Latest in a string
China branded Falun Gong an evil cult in 1999 after thousands of followers shocked the government with a mass protest for recognition around the Beijing leadership compound near Tiananmen Square, the center of 1988 pro-democracy demonstrations.
It was the latest in a string of demonstrations by foreign members of Falun Gong, who have taken up the cause as protests by Chinese members dwindled in the face of an intense security and propaganda campaign over the past two years.
China expelled 53 Westerners last month after they unfurled yellow banners and shouted slogans in a protest to highlight China's campaign against the movement ahead of a visit to Beijing by President Bush .
In November, it expelled 35 foreign Falun Gong members after they protested on the square and a Canadian woman for a Falun Gong protest there last month.
Once-frequent protests by Chinese members of Falun Gong have all but dried up in the past year.
Their cause was dealt a blow on the eve of Lunar New Year celebrations a year ago when five alleged Falun Gong members set themselves ablaze in the square.
A 12-year-old girl and her mother died of their injuries. Falun Gong denied any involvement.
Falun Gong says more than 1,600 followers have died as a result of abuse in police custody or detention center.
The government says only a handful have died and those were from suicide or natural causes. It blames Falun Gong for the deaths of at least 1,900 people through suicide or refusing medical treatment.

"China Did Not Ask Indonesia to Ban Falun Gong"

("Tempo Interactive," March 6, 2002)

Jakarta: National Police spokesman High Commissioner Prasetyo said on Tuesday (5/3) that China has never asked National Police to ban the Falun Gong movement in Indonesia nor to arrest and of the movement's followers.
Prasetyo went on to explain that the National Police have not take any special action against the Falun Gong movement in Indonesia.
So far, based on National Police observations, the Falun Gong movement and its members have never violated any Indonesian law.
"If they are deemed guilty of having broken any laws, then it must be Chinese laws, not Indonesian ones," he said.
According to Prasetyo, the police will take action against the Falun Gong movement if it is proved to have violated any Indonesian law, such as forming a new sect.
Regarding the recently banned Falun Gong rally, Prasetyo said it was merely a small incident.
"The rally was not in accordance with the scheduled program," he said. At the time, according to Prasetyo, Falun Gong followers had said they would be going sports activities but when they gathered, they displayed banners criticizing certain groups.
As previously reported by TEMPO News Room, on Sunday (3/3) the police suddenly forbade Falun Gong parade at the Hotel Indonesia roundabout.
The program that was to have been held on Sunday evening at the Le Meridien Hotel was also cancelled.
Prasetyo explained that there are still a few members of the Falun Gong movement in Indonesia but there is no need to worry because their numbers are very small and "the National Police keeps monitoring the group members," he said.

BEIJING - Warning of challenges from China's new World Trade Organization membership, Premier Zhu Rongji called Tuesday for tighter oversight of its fast-growing economy to make its markets healthy and ready for global competition.
In a wide-ranging keynote speech to the opening session of the annual meeting of China's legislature, the National People's Congress, Zhu said that the "success or failure of China's modernization" hinged on regulating its often-chaotic economy, which mixes communist central planning and market forces.
He called for crackdowns on tax fraud, smuggling, insider trading and counterfeiting of goods, and complained that local governments were ignoring orders to open markets to outside companies and products.
"Thoroughly rectifying and regulating the order of the market economy is urgently needed to ... ensure sound economic growth," Zhu said in an address that was broadcast live on national television and over the Internet.
Zhu, 73, also railed against corruption, saying officials squander money even as they fail to pay wages on time.
"Deception, extravagance and waste are serious problems," he said.
The National People's Congress is a largely powerless body that usually approves unchanged ruling Communist Party decisions. But its annual sessions allow party leaders to present policies and plans. Local representatives also have limited opportunities to voice concerns to party leaders.
A key worry this year is that China's entry to the WTO will hurt companies and farmers as they face richer, better equipped foreign rivals. China has promised to open its markets as part of its entry into the rule-making body for global trade.
Communist leaders acknowledge that millions will suffer at first but argue that longer term, WTO membership will create jobs, spur investment and force state companies that have resisted reform to shape up or go bankrupt.
"China's accession to the WTO benefits its reform and opening up and its economic development as a whole. But in the short term, less competitive industries and enterprises face significant challenges. We are facing new difficulties," Zhu said to nearly 5,000 delegates packed into Beijing's cavernous Great Hall of the People, next to Tiananmen Square.
The normally busy square was cleared for the opening of the 11-day meeting and heavily guarded to prevent any protests.
As limousines pulled away from the Great Hall after the opening session, a middle-aged man wearing a blue Mao suit and cloth cap ran into traffic, knelt on the street, held up a white cloth banner and began shouting. Police rushed after him, grabbed his banner and marched him onto the sidewalk and out of sight.
Police also detained at least six other people in front of Tiananmen Gate on the square's north end.
It was not clear why they were detained. But the square is a site of frequent protests by members of the Falun Gong spiritual movement, which Communist leaders have banned as a cult. The legislative session also attracts petitioners hoping to bring complaints to delegates' attention.
Zhu, who is expected to retire next March, is popular with many ordinary Chinese for his straightforward manner but is said to have upset many bureaucrats by taking them to task, sometimes personally, for incompetence and corruption.
Zhu said the government would continue to spur economic growth - which it measured at 7.3 percent in 2001 - by continued heavy spending on public building programs financed by dlrs 18.1 billion worth of treasury bonds this year.
But despite the borrowing plans, Zhu said China's national debt "is still within safe limits."
He said modernization of China's military, the world's largest, would continue and that "all possible means" must be adopted to raise living standards for long-suffering farmers.
Zhu showed no softening in his government's line toward Taiwan, the self-governing island that Beijing claims as part of its territory. He said Taiwan must concede it is a part of China for talks between the rivals to resume.
Zhu also called for crackdowns on organized crime, terrorists, religious extremists, ethnic separatists, the Falun Gong spiritual movement "and other cults."
Following the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States, human rights groups have accused China of using the international campaign against terrorism as an excuse to target peaceful opponents of Chinese rule in the predominantly Muslim western region of Xinjiang.

Around 50 members of the Falungong movement held a peaceful six-hour protest outside the Chinese Embassy in Jakarta on Monday to express their opposition to the total ban imposed by the authorities in China on the movement.
The protest took place in Jakarta just one day after the police here disbanded a parade by around 700 Falungong members from 10 countries.
Wearing yellow Falungong T-shirts, the protesters sat cross-legged on the sidewalk across from the embassy as police personnel looked on.
"Oppression and torture against Falungong practitioners are violations of human rights, be aware," read one poster carried by the protesters.
The group dispersed peacefully in the afternoon.
On Saturday Falungong members had held a one-day conference in Jakarta.
Meanwhile, City Police Spokesman Anton Bachrul Alam defended on Monday a last minute ban imposed on Falungong members to hold a parade from the National Monument (Monas) to the Hotel Indonesia traffic circle on Sunday.
"Police received credible information that this movement is not merely about exercise practice. It could most likely have been politically motivated," Anton told reporters without elaborating.
The Chinese embassy confirmed on Monday that it had approached police and government officials about Sunday's planned march by what it called an "evil cult".
In a statement sent to The Jakarta Post on Monday, the Chinese Embassy maintained that Falungong was not a sports organization but an evil cult that promoted being "anti-religion, anti-society and anti-science."
It also called the Falungong movement an anti-China activity organized and planned by forces in the United States and Taiwan, and that the movement was taking advantage of Indonesia's ignorance of Falungong's "evil cult nature" in order to expand its activities in the country.
"If Falungong is allowed to develop as it pleases and to conduct activities of various kinds publicly, it will damage not only the China-Indonesia relations, but also Indonesia's unity, social order and stability," read the statement.
The Indonesian police, Anton said, would take all necessary steps to maintain strong bilateral relations between Indonesia and other foreign countries, including the Republic of China.
Founded by Chinese martial arts master Li Hongzhi in 1992, the official name of the Falungong movement is Falun Dafa, which means Great Law of the Dharma Wheel.
As the Falungong organization grew in popularity and gained support from a large number of members in China, authorities there outlawed the Falungong in July 1999, saying its group exercises and mystical Buddhist and Taoist teachings were the biggest threat to communist rule since the 1989 Tiananmen Square democracy protests.
The movement claims it has some 100 million followers, while the Chinese government says the number is only 30 million.
Beijing was worried that as Falungong developed into more of a political movement, it could bring together an alliance of dissident networks around China. Some Communist Party members also reportedly joined Falungong.
The word Falungong, stands for: fa, meaning law or principle; lun, which means wheel; and gong, which denotes the cultivation of energy. The Dharma Wheel was reportedly described by Li as a microcosm of the universe, that he says he installs telekinetically into the abdomens of all his followers, where it spins constantly, absorbing and releasing power.
Falungong believers have stated that they can often feel the wheel turning in their stomachs, adding that their use of meditation and martial arts exercises can radically improve health.
Li had earlier written that he can personally heal disease and that the Falungong emblem exists in the bellies of his followers, who can see through the celestial eyes in their foreheads.
He has also stated that his followers could stop speeding cars using the powers of his teachings.
Benefits of Falungong, according to Li, include the reversal of the aging process, being healed of chronic illness and supernatural abilities, such as seeing through matter with the third eye. Since Li's teachings reportedly lead to better health, as well as supernatural powers, medicine is only for those who are non-believers.
He forbids followers to seek medical attention, claiming that they can be restored to health by reading his books.
Many critics of Falungong point out that Li's aversion to modern medicine has led to the death and insanity of many Falungong followers.

Freedom of speech has not come easily for Shenli Lin.
After two years of imprisonment in Chinese labour camps for espousing his spiritual beliefs, the 48-year-old Falun Dafa practitioner was finally released after pressure from Amnesty International, the Canadian government and a determined Canadian wife.
"I feel so happy to be free and in a democratic environment where I can say whatever I want to say without fear of being jailed," Lin said yesterday in Mandarin, which was translated as he spoke at a Toronto news conference a month after his release and several days after his arrival in Canada.
"After I left the Chinese labour camp, which is filled with inhumane treatment, I'm very lucky to have come to this free land," said Lin, whose wife, Jinyu Li, 43, a naturalized Canadian from Montreal, sat next to him.
Lin said he is now going to begin a campaign to get his younger brother, also a Falun Dafa practitioner, out of a labour camp in China.
Lin was arrested and taken into custody in December, 1999, after he and his wife petitioned the government to end its persecution of the Falun Dafa, also known as Falun Gong. His wife was deported to Canada within 48 hours.
On arrival back in Canada, Li continuously pleaded her husband's case - staging a vigil outside the Chinese embassy in Ottawa.
Lin is believed to have been detained "for no other reason than his peaceful efforts to exercise his spiritual beliefs," said Alex Neves, secretary general for Amnesty International Canada, which had been campaigning to secure Lin's release.
During his two years in labour camp, Lin said he was beaten for his beliefs and underwent unsuccessful attempts by officials to brainwash him.
Since Lin's arrest, the Canadian government had regularly been in touch with Chinese authorities to remind them that he was married to a Canadian citizen, said Reynald Doiron, a spokesperson for the foreign affairs department.