BEIJING - Two members of the outlawed Falun Gong spiritual movement died from mistreatment in jail and a third plunged to his death while being interrogated by police, a rights group said yesterday.
The deaths bring to 30 the number of Falun Gong members who have died in custody or after police mistreatment since China banned the group in July 1999, the Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy said.
One of the three reported to have died, 64-year-old Liu Yufeng, was detained July 18 while practicing Falun Gong meditation exercises near his home in eastern China's Shandong province, the Hong Kong-based center reported.
When Liu's family saw him in prison four days later, his body was covered in wounds and burn marks from an electric baton and three of his ribs were broken, the center said. He died a few hours after returning home.
Another sect member, Li Faming, 52, was picked up Aug. 10 on suspicion of distributing Falun Gong pamphlets in western Gansu province, the center said. Witnesses reported seeing him fall from his apartment window while three policemen searched his home, the center said.
Police ruled that Li ''committed suicide for fear of punishment,'' the report said.
Meanwhile, Zhang Tieyan, 29, died from respiratory problems caused by her imprisonment in a hot, airless cell with more than a dozen other people. Zhang had been arrested in April for refusing to renounce Falun Gong, the center said.
Falun Gong has attracted millions of followers with its philosophy of exercise, meditation, and beliefs drawn from Buddhism, Taoism, and the unorthodox ideas of its founder, Li Hongzhi, a former government clerk. While followers say Falun Gong promotes health and morality, China's officially atheistic communist government banned it as a cult and blamed it for leading 1,600 adherents to their deaths.
Despite the crackdown, followers have continued to publicly protest the ban.
In a letter to China's president, Jiang Zemin, printed in yesterday's New York Times, US Falun Gong members protested against what they called the illegal arrest, imprisonment, and torture of the group's practitioners and asked for a meeting with Jiang, who is in New York to attend the UN summit.
BEIJING (AP) - Authorities in northern China have confiscated assets worth millions of dollars from a banned meditation group, including schools, businesses and a sanatorium they plan to convert into a prison, a rights group said Friday.
Shaanxi province's government appropriated 123 Zhong Gong properties and land worth $36.5 million, the Hong Kong-based Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy said.
Nationwide, China has closed 3,000 Zhong Gong businesses since cracking down on the group, throwing 100,000 employees out of work, the center said.
Chinese leaders launched a crackdown on Zhong Gong shortly after banning the better-known Falun Gong sect in July 1999. Both groups attracted millions of followers, including government and military officials, with blends of exercise and meditation.
At Zhong Gong's Taibaishan Sanatorium in Shaanxi, 2,000 adherents were forcibly dispersed in November and the facility's buildings and land valued at $18 million were confiscated, the center said.
Shaanxi now plans to convert the sanatorium into its largest prison, the center said.
A Shaanxi official, who gave just his surname, Zhang, confirmed that the sanatorium was a Zhong Gong base but would not comment on the prison report.
In the crackdown on the group, some 600 Zhong Gong organizers have reportedly been detained and at least one leader sentenced to two years in prison. The group's founder, Zhang Hongbao, escaped to Guam, a U.S. territory, in July, where he is seeking asylum.
China has asked for his extradition, accusing him of leaving the country illegally and other crimes.
NEW YORK, Sept 8 (Reuters) - Chinese President Jiang Zemin defended his country's record on human rights and religious freedom on Friday at his main public appearance during this week's U.N. Millennium Summit.
At a luncheon speech to American businessmen and policy makers, Jiang said his government respected Tibet's cultural traditions and had cracked down on the Falun Gong spiritual movement because it was a cult which broke up families.
The organisers had said Jiang would answer questions from the audience but the Chinese president declined to do so, saying he was short of time after an unexpectedly long meeting with U.S. President Bill Clinton.
In their first meeting in a year, and one of the last before Clinton leaves office in January, Clinton brought up allegations that China represses religion. They also discussed Taiwan, a constant thorn in Sino-American relations.
At the lunch, Jiang said China protected religious freedom and ``normal religious activities.'' State agencies should not discriminate against believers, he added.
He added: ``But Falun Gong is by no means a religion. It is a cult. It has been outlawed by the Chinese government according to law. It has broken up, runied and displaced many families. All governments ... would oppose cults like this.''
The U.S. government's ambassador at large for religious freedom, Robert Seiple, said this week that the motive for the crackdown on Falun Gong was basically to control society.
``The China government is concerned about things they don't understand, things they can't control and things that have an external influence. They will talk about it in terms of stability but it's basically control,'' he told reporters.
RENEGADE PROVINCE
On Tibet, Jiang put the Chinese argument that intervention by Beijing in the 1950s saved millions of serfs from oppression by the Buddhist theocracy. He did not mention the Dalai Lama, the exiled Buddhist leader popular in the United States.
``The people in China's Tibet carried out democratic reform... The languages, religions and customs of ethnic minorities in China, including the Tibetans, are protected and respected,'' he added.
Jiang broke no new ground on Taiwan, which Beijing considers to be a renegade province, but he did not repeat the Chinese threats of earlier this year that it could resort to force if the island state drags its feet on reunification.
``We are most sincere in striving for a peaceful reunification. We will do all we can to this end,'' he said.
But some people were trying to separate Taiwan from China and this was the root cause of tension, he said. ``We can never allow such attempts,'' he added.
If the new Taiwanese government of President Chen Shui-bian recognised the 'one China' principle, the Beijing government would be happy to sit down and talk about anything, he said.
China said that this week that President Chen, who has favoured independence, was showing what it called a ``very dangerous'' drift toward separatism.
Jiand said China would meet its trad commitments when it joins the World Trade organisation (WTO) but opening markets should be a ``two-way street.''
``The United States should create an environment of fair competition and eliminate all the unreasonable technical barriers to the U.S. market,'' he added, without elaboration.
China enjoys a vast surplus in its trade with the United States.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - In a frank but friendly exchange, President Clinton and Chinese President Jiang Zemin on Friday aired differences over religious repression in China and Tibet, China's relations with Taiwan and a U.S. missile defense system, U.S. officials said.
During the 1-1/2 hour meeting at a luxury hotel in New York, the two leaders discussed U.S. concerns about human rights practices in China but Clinton said the issue should not hold up approval of permanent normal trade relations between the two countries.
In their first meeting in a year and one of the last before Clinton leaves office in January, the president raised the issue of China's repression of religion within China as well as in Tibet.
This prompted Jiang into a commentary about the history of religion in China and how Christianity is a relatively new phenomenon in his country, brought into China by Western incursions over the last 200 years, and compared this to the longer histories of Buddhism and Islam.
Clinton, according to a senior U.S. official at the meeting, stressed ``his belief that religious freedom is good'' for China but Jiang disagreed that religion is restricted in his country.
The United States on Tuesday accused China of trying to stem a surge in religious activity by harassing, detaining and physically abusing believers.
The criticism of Beijing's treatment of Tibetan Buddhists, Falun Gong spiritual practitioners and members of unregistered groups came in the second annual report on religious freedom written by the State Department by order of the U.S. Congress.
At a luncheon speech later to American businessmen and policy makers, Jiang said his government respected Tibet's cultural traditions and had cracked down on the Falun Gong spiritual movement because it was a cult that broke up families.
Jiang said China protected religious freedom and ``normal religious activities'' and that state agencies should not discriminate against believers.
``But Falun Gong is by no means a religion,'' he said. ``It is a cult. It has been outlawed by the Chinese government according to law. It has broken up, ruined and displaced many families. All governments ... would oppose cults like this.''
At their meeting, Clinton urged Jiang to engage in a peaceful dialogue with Taiwan, which Beijing considers a breakaway province that must eventually be reunified with the mainland, by force if necessary.
China said this week new Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian was showing a ``very dangerous'' drift toward separatism.
``Our feeling is that we would like this relationship not to kind of remain where each side is warily watching the other, but rather would like to see a dialogue begin to move the relationship forward,'' said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.
There was no sign of movement from the Chinese on this issue.
Indeed, officials said, the entire meeting ``wasn't designed to reach specific decisions,'' but was more of a broad discussion.
``They know each other well enough, they kind of do this back and forth, and stress that they're good friends, and smile at the end. So the tone was good, but this was not a lot of fluff. This was quite substantive all the way through,'' one said.
Clinton discussed with Jiang his decision a week ago not to take steps to deploy a national missile defense but would leave it up to his successor. Despite his decision, he told Jiang that the threat of missile attack from so-called ``rogue states'' was real and must be confronted.
China bitterly opposed the missile defense plan as a destabilizing one.
Clinton told Jiang he would urge his successor, be it Vice President Al Gore or Republican George W. Bush, to engage in a ''serious dialogue'' with the Chinese and urged Jiang to be reciprocal.
Jiang agreed it was a serious issue, the U.S. official said.
The China trade bill cleared key hurdles in the U.S. Senate on Thursday, putting it on track for expected final passage next week after months of delay.
Once approved by the Senate and signed into law by Clinton, the bill would end the annual ritual of reviewing Beijing's trade status and guarantee Chinese goods the same low-tariff access to the U.S. market as products from nearly every other nation.
``I believe the legislation will pass,'' Clinton said during a picture-taking session as he began a meeting with Jiang. ``I am pleased with the progress it is making in the Senate, but of course we still have some work to do.''
NEW YORK (Reuters) - President Clinton meets Chinese President Jiang Zemin for the first time in a year on Friday and is expected to renew U.S. appeals for China and Taiwan to open a peaceful dialogue.
Clinton and Jiang, both in town for the U.N. Millennium Summit, are also expected to discuss efforts by South Korea and North Korea toward reunification in the wake of an unprecedented summit in June in Pyongyang between South Korean President Kim Dae-jung and North Korean leader Kim Jong-il.
Continuing U.S. concerns about human rights practices in China also figure to be high on the agenda.
The United States on Tuesday accused China of trying to stem a surge in religious activity by harassing, detaining and physically abusing believers.
The criticism of Beijing's treatment of Tibetan Buddhists, Falun Gong spiritual practitioners and members of unregistered groups came in the second annual report on religious freedom written by the State Department by order of the U.S. Congress.
The report cited a crackdown on the Falun Gong -- including thousands of detentions and what it called credible estimates that at least 24 practitioners had died in custody -- as having a spillover effect on non-registered faiths.
The Chinese-American relationship was clouded by NATO's bombing in May 1999 of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade during the allied air war against Yugoslavia.
But U.S. officials believe the storm has passed.
``They continue to question our account (that the bombing was accidental) but I think it's clear that we have moved past that incident in our relationship,'' said a U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity.
``The fact is our cooperation with China on a wide variety of issues has never been better,'' the official said.
The meeting comes at a sensitive period in China-Taiwan political relations.
China said this week new Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian was showing a ``very dangerous'' drift toward separatism. Beijing considers Taiwan a breakaway province that must eventually be reunified with the mainland, by force if necessary.
Zhang Mingqing, spokesman of the cabinet's Taiwan Affairs Office, said China saw recent remarks by Chen as moving away from acceptance of the ``one China'' terms Beijing has set as a precondition for better relations and talks.
``Viewing his first 100 days, we think he is not moving toward accepting the one China principle and is instead moving in the direction of Taiwan separatism,'' Zhang told a news conference without mentioning Chen by name.
Despite the rhetoric, U.S. officials do not see the China-Taiwan relationship as collapsing.
``Notwithstanding there are always going to be comments made for domestic consideration on both sides, the reaction on both sides to this election has been relatively muted, and both sides are trying to sort through how to deal with their new relationship,'' one official said.
``We will continue to encourage both sides to engage in a cross-Strait dialogue to peacefully discuss and resolve their differences,'' the official said.
One irritant in U.S.-Chinese relations was eased last week when Clinton announced he would not take steps to deploy a national missile defense, but instead would leave it up to his successor. China bitterly opposes the plan as destabilizing.
HONG KONG, Sept 8 (Reuters) - A Hong Kong-based human rights group said on Friday that Chinese authorities have confiscated assets, including property, belonging to the banned Zhong Gong meditation group.
The Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy urged the U.S. Senate to express concern on ``this serious infringement of private enterprise and personal property rights'' before voting on granting China Permanent Normal Trade Relations.
The human rights watchdog said in a statement the Chinese police had confiscated assets at Zhong Gong's 123 offices in central China's Shaanxi province.
It did not specify whether the offices themselves had been confiscated or items in them. The offices included technical schools, travel agencies, meditation centres, gymnasiums and trading centres, it said.
The group did not say what was the total value of the assets seized, but said it included Zhong Gong's largest meditation centre, a 33,000 square metre (39,600 square yard) building on 55,160 square metres (66,192 square yards) of land worth more than 150 million yuan (US$18 million).
Zhong Gong bears similarities to the Falun Gong spiritual movement which China banned and declared an ``evil cult'' after its members staged a bold protest in April 1999 in Beijing.
Both movements incorporate traditional meditation exercises known as ``Qigong,'' but have also published philosophical or quasi-religious doctrines that the Communist Party views as a threat to its authority.
NEW YORK, Sept. 6 (Kyodo) - About 2,000 members of the Chinese spiritual practice group Falun Gong demonstrated in front of the United Nations Wednesday demanding that their sect, which has been banned in China, be officially recognized and its members released from prison.
The rally was the largest of several protests that the group has staged at the U.N. and in front of the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel where Chinese President Jiang Zemin is staying while he participates in the three-day U.N. Millennium Summit.
According to a Falun Gong representative in New York, 10,000 group members have been arrested in China and about 50 have died from mistreatment while in prison.
Falun Gong also ran a one-page advertisement in the New York Times on Wednesday with an open letter demanding a meeting with Jiang and demanding that China stop ''these uncivilized and inhumane practices.''
WASHINGTON (AP) - To dramatize the plight of Falun Gong members in China, the Clinton administration is citing the case of a 60-year old woman who died following torture inflicted by authorities because of her activities in the spiritual sect.
Robert Seiple, ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom, told reporters Tuesday that after the woman's death, her daughter was asked to pick up the body.
``Her body was totally covered with bruises,'' Seiple said. ``She had dried blood in the ears, the eyes, the nose. She had all of her teeth broken. We have one credible report that she was made to run outside in the snow with her shoes off until she dropped.''
The recounting of that anecdote, replete with gory detail, may make it difficult for the critics to accuse the administration of sugarcoating China's human rights record as it seeks votes from Congress on extending permanent normal trade relations to China.
That is one of the administration's highest priorities during the final few weeks of the legislative session. Approval would facilitate China's entry into the World Trade Organization, which sets rules for global commerce.
Some in Congress do not believe China is entitled to normal trade ties without conditions, and they cite continued repression as a key reason.
The House already has approved the legislation. Administration officials are confident they have the votes in the Senate as well, and Senate action could come within two weeks.
Approval would do away with the annual process whereby China is given normal tariff rates only after annual congressional reviews of China's human rights performance.
President Clinton believes the legislation will bring enormous benefit to the U.S. economy by lowering existing barriers in China to U.S. trade and investment.
The occasion for Seiple's remarks was the release Tuesday of the annual State Department report on the status of international freedom worldwide.
The congressionally mandated report, covering 194 countries and territories, said government respect for religious freedom in China deteriorated over the past year as persecution of several religious minorities increased.
While finding that government supervision of religious activity was minimal in some regions, the study said Chinese officials in other regions ``imposed tight regulations, closed houses of worship and actively persecuted members of some unregistered religious groups.''
The report said persecuted groups in China ``were subject to ``harassment, extortion, prolonged detention, physical abuse and incarceration in prison or in 'reeducation through labor''' camps.
``There were credible reports of religious detainees being beaten and tortured,'' the report said.
Many analysts believe China has come a long way from the days when various Communist Party campaigns, including the 1966-76 Cultural Revolution, claimed the lives of millions.
By that standard, China is a far more benign place than it was. But that matters little to China's many U.S. critics, who believe that China's record is abysmal not only on human rights but on other issues as well.
Sen. Jesse Helms, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, gave a speech Tuesday on the Senate floor in which he cited a whole host of reasons for not granting permanent trade status to China. They included threats to Taiwan, alleged Chinese adventurism in the South China Sea and ``reckless proliferation of weapons among its fellow criminal regimes around the world.''
``The fact is, the United States has had normal trade relations with China for the past 20 years,'' Helms, R-N.C. ``Yet Communist China's behavior has not improved one iota - it has worsened dramatically on every one of these fronts during those two decades of normal trade.''
Helms didn't even mention human rights on his list of grievances. He said he would have more to say on the subject at a later time.
In the meantime, Clinton will meet with Chinese President Jiang Zemin at the U.N. Millennium Summit this week in New York. There will be no shortage of issues to talk about.
BEIJING (AP) - Two members of the outlawed Falun Gong spiritual movement died from mistreatment in jail and a third plunged to his death while being interrogated by police, a rights group said Wednesday.
The deaths bring to 30 the number of Falun Gong members who have died in custody or following police mistreatment since China banned the group in July 1999, the Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy said.
One of the three reported to have died, 64-year-old Liu Yufeng, was detained July 18 while practicing Falun Gong meditation exercises near his home in eastern China's Shandong province, the Hong Kong-based center reported.
When Liu's family saw him in prison four days later, his body was covered in wounds and burn marks from an electric baton and three of his ribs were broken, the center said. He died a few hours after returning home.
Another sect follower, Li Faming, 52, was picked up Aug. 10 on suspicion of distributing Falun Gong pamphlets in western Gansu province, the center said. Witnesses reported seeing him fall from his apartment window while three policemen searched his home, the center said.
Police ruled that Li ``committed suicide for fear of punishment,'' the report said.
Meanwhile, Zhang Tieyan, 29, died from respiratory problems caused by her imprisonment in a hot, airless cell with more than a dozen other people. Zhang had been arrested in April for refusing to renounce Falun Gong, the center said.
Falun Gong has attracted millions of followers with its philosophy of exercise, meditation and beliefs drawn from Buddhism, Taoism and the unorthodox ideas of its founder Li Hongzhi, a former government clerk. While followers say Falun Gong promotes health and morality, China's officially atheistic communist government banned it as a cult and blamed it for leading 1,600 adherents to their deaths.
Despite the crackdown, followers have continued to publicly protest the ban. While the government has mostly refused comment on individual cases, it denies abusing Falun Gong members.
In a grassy area off Pavonia Avenue in Jersey City, a group of about 10 people sit, taking soft breaths and peacefully moving their arms in harmony with one another. They are practicing a discipline known as Falun Gong - a set of five exercises that have been banned in China, where it originated.
Falun Gong - also called Falun Dafa - translates as "law wheel great law" in Mandarin Chinese and is based on Buddhism. It resembles yoga and tai chi.
Chinese authorities have branded Falun Gong a cult, making it illegal to carry out the system of meditation there. Adherents have reportedly been sent to labor camps, mental institutions and prison for practicing the rituals, which many say have improved their health and spiritual well-being.
"In Eastern culture, body and mind are united as a whole," said Fenny Li, a 29-year-old Chinese immigrant from West Orange who has been a Falun Gong practitioner for two years.
"It (Falun Gong) is very relaxing and gives many health benefits," she said, adding that special music accompanies the rituals. "We do it in our spare time and many times people see us in local parks and are interested in what we do."
Master Li Hongzhi, a Chinese student of qigong (pronounced cheegong), which encompasses other systems of meditation and martial arts, introduced Falun Gong to China in 1992, and his writings and his teachings have become popular worldwide, with a small following in Hudson County.
"Seventy million people practice Falun Gong. The Chinese government doesn't want 70 million people doing anything. . .they're afraid people may rise up against them," said Jonathan Jaffe, spokesman for Friends of Falun Gong, a loosely organized group of followers, including nearly 30 people from Hudson County.
Jaffe said thousands of Falun Gong supporters plan to protest their Chinese counterparts' plight by rallying at the upcoming United Nations People's Summit, scheduled for today, tomorrow and Thursday at the United Nations on First Avenue in New York City. Chinese President Jiang Zemin is scheduled to attend the summit.
"We're planning dawn-to-dusk protests. We're going to follow Zemin to the Met (Metropolitan Museum of Art), the Chinese Mission and his hotel. . .Forty-six practitioners have been murdered and these atrocities are continuing," said Jaffe, adding that 10,000 Chinese Falun Gong adherents have reportedly been detained in labor camps without trial.
"The (Chinese) government spews crazy lies, saying it's a cult that sucks people in, but it doesn't cost anything. People just gather and do these exercises," he said. "It has nothing to do with religion."
Mai He, a 29-year-old Falun Gong supporter and graduate student in pathology at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey, has been practicing Falun Gong for almost four years, frequently gathering with other residents of his Kearny apartment building in the morning to meditate outside a nearby elementary school.
"I tried the exercise and I can feel the flow of energy," he said.
"Why does the (Chinese) government send mentally healthy people to hospitals for their personal beliefs?" he asked. "The people who do this are peaceful, but the government doesn't trust its people."
A spokesman for the Chinese Mission to the United Nations could not be reached for comment.
HONG KONG (AP) - About 150 Falun Gong members staged a silent march in Hong Kong on Saturday to protest mainland China's crackdown on the meditation sect.
Carrying banners, they gathered at a downtown park before marching about a mile to the Central Liaison Office, Beijing's representative office in Hong Kong.
They also held up portraits of sect members they say have been killed by Chinese authorities during the crackdown. The only sound during the march came from meditation music played on tape recorders.
Falun Gong has attracted millions of followers, most of them in China, with its combination of slow-motion exercises and philosophy drawn from Taoism, Buddhism and the often unorthodox ideas of founder Li Hongzhi.
Beijing banned Falun Gong as an evil cult last year, but the sect remains legal in Hong Kong. Followers insist it promotes health and good citizenship.
Sharon Xu, a spokeswoman for the group in Hong Kong, said the Chinese government was believed to be intensifying its persecution of the sect ahead of China's National Day on Oct. 1.
HONG KONG, Sept 1 (Reuters) - The United States has postponed the hearing on the political asylum application made by the Chinese leader of the Zhong Gong meditation group which is banned in China, a Hong Kong human rights group said on Friday.
The hearing on Zhang Hongbao's pursuit for political asylum, scheduled to start at a court in the U.S.-administered island of Guam on Friday morning, was put off for two weeks at the request of the U.S. immigration authority, the Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy said in a statement.
It was the seventh time the authority had requested postponing the hearing under pressure from China, the Hong Kong group said.
The authority said it was asking for a postponement of the Friday hearing as it had not completed the translation of the relevant documents, according to the human rights group.
Zhang fled China to Guam in February.
Zhong Gong bears similarities to the Falun Gong spiritual movement which China publicly banned and declared an ``evil cult'' after its members staged a bold protest in April 1999 in Beijing.
Both movements incorporate traditional meditation exercises known as ``Qigong,'' but also have philosophical or quasi-religious doctrines that the Communist Party views as a threat to its authority.
What Is Falun Gong? See "Falun Gong 101", by Massimo Introvigne
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