A significant number of Chinese practitioners in our country are claiming asylum. Practitioners, either those claiming asylum or those who are not, have different ideas and attitudes about this issue. During this Fa-rectification period, I think we should discard all notions that we have developed in our personal cultivation, and think of this asylum issue from the perspective of Fa-rectification and saving sentient beings.
In that Minghui article I just mentioned, the author writes, “Political Asylum is a protection given according to international human rights covenants, which is not confined by national borders. It holds the respect for the value of man as a priority, manifests a spirit of international humanitarianism. Although it has the word ‘political’ in it, it is obvious that it is by no means equivalent to ‘politics’ by its usual meaning, and it is not a ‘luxury’ treatment at all. It is just a guarantee of the most modest right of existence. In other words, it is a right that man should have. ‘Special residency permit’ is also like this. This shows that Dafa practitioners are perfectly eligible for such rights, and we should enjoy the rights in an open and dignified manner. This is not politics, but rights that we deserve. When we ask for support from politicians in the international stage, and clarify the facts to them, we are not playing ‘politics’ or ‘liaise with foreign powers’. Claiming our rights is not anything ‘political’ either.”
Let’s also look at the definition of refugees in the “International Refugee Law”. The refugee is “any person who has a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group, or political opinion, and who is outside the country of his/her nationality”.
The persecution of Falun Gong by Jiang’s evil political gang is unprecedented. This fact alone indicates that all overseas practitioners holding Chinese passports have a legitimate right and qualification to claim asylum in a dignified manner in any country that is signatory to the international human rights covenants, so that they could avoid having to go home to suffer persecution.
On 16 January 2003, Minghui Net reported that 5 Falun Gong practitioners claiming asylum in Japan was told by the Immigration Bureau in Tokyo that their claim for asylum was not successful, but they were advised to apply for “residency status”. During their talk with relevant officials, they were told that Falun Gong practitoiners’ danger of being persecuted could not be proved and recognised, so their asylum claim could not be ratified. However, the Japanese authorities allowed them to change their visa status and apply for “residency status”. This was unprecedented in Japan, and showed that the Japanese government was willing to provide humanitarian support to Falun Gong practitioners who are suffering persecution. Japanese Falun Gong practitioners expressed thanks to the Japanese government for their effort, but also expressed regrets for their failure to fully realise the human rights violations by Jiang Zemin’s government of Falun Gong practitioners.
I think the Japanese government understands very well the persecution in China, but does not want to offend Jiang’s regime because of Falun Gong. Of course, Japanese practitioners need to continue clarifying the truth to the Japanese government. Because, if a foreign government grants refugee status to a Dafa practitioner, that means this country recognises the persecution in China as a very severe breach of human rights covenants, and it is a blow to Jiang’s regime, which has been boasting that “the Chinese people are enjoying the best human rights situation in history”. In other words, every successful asylum claim is a blow to the evil.
In our country, while rescuing practitioners already in prison is something every one of us is willing to do, helping fellow practitioners who are facing imminent danger seems to be something controversial in the community of practitioners. Some practitioners think that the motives of some of those who are claiming asylum are not entirely pure, and that they are doing so for selfishness, in order that they can stay in this country permanently, that they are trying to use Dafa to gain a wonderful life overseas for themselves, because “they are not yet in a situation where they have absolutely no way out”. There is a tendancy to think that those practitioners whose asylum claim have been refused or whose cases have been delayed for a long time must have suffered all these tribulations because their motives were not pure, that all their sufferings have been caused by their own attachments, and that their problems can be solved only when they themselves improve on the Fa, etc., etc.
It is true that many everyday people are claiming asylum on the fake grounds of being Falun Gong practitioners in order to achieve their own personal goals. Everyone will have to be responsible for what he or she does. I do not want to talk about everyday people here in this article.
We know our fellow practitioners best. They, like everybody else, are clarifying the facts and saving sentient beings overseas. Most of those practitioners who have applied for asylum here did so because they had no choice, and some others did so because of other reasons. These practitioners are in great hardship. Before their refugee status are granted, they are not allowed to work and have to rely on the meagre benefits from the government. Because of some new regulations put in place, some practitioners cannot apply for even this small amount of support. Also, before they get their refugee status, they are not allowed to go abroad, so are not able to go to other countries to do things for Dafa. Some of these practitioners have been shouldering a lot of costs for our Dafa work, but now their financial situation is in even greater difficulties. This is a serious interference to our Dafa work. We should realise that this is also persecution. We cannot refuse to help them just because they have this attachment or that. We should support them. Just as Master said, “The next person's things are your things, and your things are his things.” (Teaching the Fa at the Washington, D.C. Fa Conference) We are one body. The number of overseas practitioners is already quite small. Master once said, “overseas students should try not to go to Mainland China, because you are needed in exposing the evil” (Teaching the Fa at the Great Lakes Fa Conference in North America). And the above-mentioned practitioners are playing an extremely important in Dafa work in our country. Are we really waiting for them to be deported to China? Are we going to come to our senses only after they get arrested in China, and start a rescue project then? Also, why do practitioners have to become impoverished and without any way out to be recognised by other practitioners as having a justifiable reason to claim asylum? On the human level, even the United Nations is not that fastidious. Isn’t the above line of thinking complying with the principles of the old forces? As fellow practitioners, we should do our best to help them solve their status problems. They deserve to have a relatively good environment to do Dafa work. And what they ask for is only a legal status in this country.
In the everyday people’s society, Dafa disciples deserve to have beautiful and blissful lives, either in terms of moral qualities or living conditions. If they enjoy health, financial well-being, and harmonious family lives, they would be in a better situation to validate the Fa. However, the old forces don’t understand Fa-rectification cultivation, and do not understand what is happening in the cosmos. All that they know are principles of personal cultivation. Using “testing Dafa” as an excuse, they want to “destroy their [Falun Gong practitioners'] reputation, remove their sources of economic support, and annihilate their bodies”, in order to damage the image of Dafa, and prevent sentient beings from being saved. Their persecution is intended to make it hard for us to devote our whole heart and mind to the work of rectifying the Fa and saving sentient beings. They are wasting our precious time which could be otherwise well utilised to save sentient beings, and they are persecuting the beings who could otherwise have had opportunities of salvation.
Now let us look at this issue from another perspective. If those practitioners do have an intention to stay in this country permanently, and if they want to stay out of their personal attachments, they need to eliminate those attachments and cannot go to any extremes. However, if a Dafa disciple wants to stay somewhere, the understanding side of the sentient beings there are very happy, and they have been longing for Dafa disciples to bring the Fa to them, because that is an opportunity for them to be saved. For instance, why do we care so much about establishing Falun Dafa Associations in different countries? It is because setting up a legal organisation can provide local practitioners with a legally protected cultivation environment, and also it shows that Dafa has established a foothold in that country, which has profound meanings for the future of that country. In the same line of logic, if this country accepts Dafa practitioners, aren’t they establishing a good foundation for their own future? It is only that some of our practitioners haven’t really realised the heavy responsibilities on their shoulders. But we can always improve together through our group study and experience-sharing.
I think practitioners should not accuse other practitioners of trying to take advantage of Dafa. Aren’t these accusations made out of human thinking? The “attachments” of fellow practitioners are by no means their fundamental qualities, and even those practitioners themselves should not recognise them and should eliminate them throught cultivation or with righteous thoughts. We should not regard the attachments as part of our fellow practitioners themselves. Aren’t these “attachments”, whether yours or mine, being used as excuses by the evil to persecute Dafa and Dafa disciples and being used as tools by the old forces to do damage to our “whole body”? In fact, many Chinese practitioners do not want to be said to be trying to take advantage of Dafa, and have been doing everything they can to keep their legal status in ways other than claiming asylum, in so doing wasting a lot of time and efforts on this and enduring a lot of unnecessary hardships, which are very hard to understand for practitioners not in similar situations. Dafa disciples in Fa-rectification period are doing everything to safeguard Dafa. Even if some practitioners did have some impure motives when they applied for asylum, they have been constantly improving and have become real Fa-rectification disciples. Their attachments or impure thoughts can by no means regarded as justifiable reasons for the old forces to persecute them.
Some practitioners support those who are claiming asylum, but they haven’t understood this from the Fa. I heard a practitioner offering the following advice to another practitioner, “You need to think whether you will be able to sustain the sufferings of that magnitude. If you can’t, you could drop down into tribulations. If you think you have cultivated to that level where you can sustain it, then you can go back.” I think this is a seriously midguiding remark, especially for those whose understanding of the Fa is not yet deep. Because we do not recognise this persecution at all. Are we doing Fa-rectification cultivation just to sustain sufferings and tribulations? Master said, “When Dafa is persecuted, the first thing Dafa disciples should think of is saving sentient beings and how to validate Dafa.” (Touring North America to Teach the Fa) This is what is really required of us according to the Fa. We have not come to this human world to suffer and to eliminate our karma, and we have not come here to cultivate ourselves or to improve ourselves, either. Instead, we have come to the human world to help Master rectify the Fa and save sentient beings. In compliance with the principles of the old cosmos, the old forces want us to establish our mighty virtue through being persecuted. But Master requires us to establish our mighty virtue through breaking through the old forces’ arrangements and saving sentient beings. We definitely cannot think the old forces and the evil has any helpful role to play in the Fa-rectification and our improvement! If we think that way, our minds are still stagnating in the stage of personal cultivation, and we woud be as good as having acknowledged the arrangements made by the old forces.
I think we should look at this issue from a righteous perspective. Practitioners are not claiming asylum in order to hide away and escape persecution. Those evil forces which are persecuting us count as nothing and they don’t deserve to test Dafa and Dafa disciples. On the contrary, claiming asylum is resisting the evil, and plays a role of safeguarding Dafa in the period of Fa-rectification. When I saw that some practitioners in another country equated claiming asylum to writing the so-called “Guarantee Statement”, I found it ridiculous, because is simply absurd.
Some practitioners think that the people and public opinion in the country are hostile to asylum seekers, and that we should not become a “burden” and “trouble” for the government and the tax-payers, so as not to create a negative image for Falun Gong among the people. It is true that, in our country, there are almost daily discussions on radio, TV and in newspapers on the issue of asylum, and it has truly become a very sensitive issue. However, in those discussions, though people are very annoyed by the fact that many bogus asylum-seekers are entering the country every year, they almost always try to make it clear that they are happy to accept genuine ones who can prove that they would face real danger of persecution if they have to go back. Master told us that everything in this world has come for Dafa. Therefore, the government and the media should support us. So we should not be finding reasons for them to justify their failure to support us.
I think we, as Dafa disciples, should have such a righteous thought: Wherever Dafa goes, Dafa should be welcomed. We should put ourselves in a proactive position in Fa-rectification. “Who is really the gallant lead in this gigantic play? I made this trip just for the sake of sentient beings.” (Descending to the Earthly World) “Dafa disciples are now sentient beings' only, sole hope for salvation.” (Righteous Thoughts) Having come to today’s historic stage in the Fa-rectification, we should be clearly aware of our mission of playing the main roles in this great drama. Isn’t this a good way to clarify the facts to the government, the public and the media in our country? When we explain to them why Falun Gong practitioners need help so as to guarantee their personal safety, we are also telling them what has been happening in China.
This is also giving a good opportunity to the government of our countries to show their support for Dafa. If they can give help to practitioners in difficulties, they are creating a wonderful future for themselves. However, if they send a Dafa particle into the hands of evil, they would be doing the worst thing to Dafa, and it will be very difficult to make up the losses. Things that happened in Germany, Iceland, Cambodia and Burma have brought huge losses to Dafa. In democratic countries, the governments are elected by people and therefore represent the people. If a government cannot understand the benefits Dafa has brought to the human race, fails to stand up against Jiang Zemin’s persecution of Falun Gong and his deprivation of the basic human rights of practitioners, and even commits wrong-doings under threat from Jiang’s regime, this government has completely lost its righteousness and justice. People have elected them so that they can express their kind ideas and opinions on their behalf. But if they cannot represent their people in a righteous manner, where will they belong when this drama ends? And what about the people who elected them?
And, talking about how a nation or a country chooses to reposition themselves in Fa-rectification, doesn’t it depend on how we clarify the facts to them? Of course, we should be clear in mind that they should support Dafa in the first place. But if we encounter difficulties, that means we haven’t clarified the facts clearly and widely enough. So long as we clarify the truth clearly, they should support Dafa. So what remains for us to do is to clarify the facts about Dafa and the persecution to them.
If the government thinks what is happening in China is too far away for them to offer any material support, they are in a perfect position to offer help to practitioners who are currently living in the country.
Now, in our country, quite a few Chinese practitioners have had their asylum claims refused by the Immigration Bureau. If we fail to act promptly, they could be sent back to China at any time. In the recent Minghui article which Master commented upon, it is said that “whether Dafa practitioners participate or not, each individual practitioner's every thought is playing an important, decisive role.” “For projects that we cannot participate in, we should still look at them with righteous thoughts, so as to prevent the negating of our strength.”
Their cases were not handled properly, partly because they don’t speak the language and don’t understand the legal procedures in this country. They need help, especially from practitioners who are citizens of this country. Apart from sending forth righteous thoughts to support them, we could write letters to our Members of Parliament regarding these practitioners’ asylum claims, asking the MPs to write to the Immigration Bureau. We can explain to the immigration authorities why, as a citizen of this country, I think our government should grant these people refugee status and allow them to stay indefinitely in this country. We can also explain the situation in China and overseas, so that the government can truly realise how evil Jiang’s regime really is.
Almost all practitioners who had their applications refused by the immigration authorities found one sentence in the refusal letters: “you do not have a well-founded fear of being persecuted if you go back.” This indicates that we need to clarify the facts to the government in more depths. I think every practitioner can give good reasons why Chinese practitioners have a well-founded reason to believe that they could be persecuted should they be sent back to China. At the same time, we can write personal references for those practitioners to the minister or other people in charge of immigration issues.
We cannot regard this as merely practitioners’ personal issue any more, and we cannot continue to be callous about the hardship of those practitioners who have claimed asylum. We should care about the practitioners and their family who are in great difficulties. Whatever help we can offer, be it material or spiritual, even if it’s just a few words with care and warmth, could let them feel the boundless and compassionate power of Dafa, rid them of the terrible feeling of loneliness, and help them strengthen their righteous belief in the Fa. Because whatever we are offering them beams with compassion and the sense of “whole body”, which are results of our cultivation in this great Fa! Isn’t this also a proactive effort to break up the old forces’ arrangements?
Now let’s talk about this issue from the perspective of practitioners who are applying for asylum.
I think every practitioner claiming asylum should ask him or herself a question, “Why am I claiming asylum?” And we should understand this issue from the Fa.
I’ve talked with many practitioners who have applied for asylum, but most of them have never thought carefully about this issue. Some said they applied because other practitioners advised them to do so. Some feel that claiming asylum is not something glorious – who wants to become a refugee? What’s more, many other practitioners don’t understand the difficult situation they are in, and choose to imagine what attachments they have. And this makes them feel that they seem to be doing something that is not dignified. Some practitioners are wondering, once they have started the application, when they will be able to go back. They are in a situation in which going back doesn’t seem to be an option, and staying is not something desirable, either. They feel very bitter at heart, and feel that they have lost a lot. They cannot break up the obstacles in their hearts which have been caused by the attrition between human hearts. Some practitioners think they will just let it be and accept whatever happens – if the Immigration Bureau refuses my application, I’ll just go home, “What’s the big deal?” They have taken a passive role in this whole matter, and their passive attitude makes them unable to clarify the facts actively. Some other practitioners think that, as they are not good at the language and don’t understand the legal stuff involved, they don’t have to put in effort into this matter, because “There are fellow practitioners who have offered help.”
In view of all the above, we organised these practitioners to study the Fa together and share their understanding and experience in this matter.
A practitioner had her application refused, and then her appeal case was also turned down (a combination of unlikely circumstances occurred during this process, and also this practitioners doesn’t speak the language), which means that she can be deported by the immigration authorities at any time. She doesn’t know what to do, and her husband didn’t take it seriously, either, and didn’t even tell other practitioners, thinking that launching another appeal would be too troublesome, and that it is nothing to fear if he were to go back to China with his wife.
It’s true that, for Dafa disciples, going back to China isn’t anything to fear. But Fa-rectification cultivation shouldn’t be confined to the narrow scope of personal cultivation, in which letting go of life and death is the defining factor. Dafa disciples can let go of life and death, because they’ve seen through the human phenomenon of life and death, and they don’t care about the sufferings in such a brief moment in the long journey of life. However, the human bodies of Dafa disciples are used to validate the Fa, and, whatever we do, we must think of the sentient beings waiting to be saved.
Now that you have chosen to apply for asylum, you should deal with it with a sense of responsibility towards the sentient beings. Let’s think about this: When Dafa is being persecuted in the human world, we, as Dafa particles, ask for help from other countries. If this country does not care and does not offer any help, what will their future be like? This will bring us immense losses. We represent Dafa in the human world, and we are playing such magnificent roles. We want to save sentient beings, and whether or not we can do it successfully depends on whether we can really consider for them, use our hearts to tell sentient beings the goodness of Dafa, and let them support Dafa.
One practitioner once said that, after he began his asylum application, he felt that he had been connected with the destiny of that country, and felt a great sense of responsibility. Every Dafa disciple should understand his or her own role correctly.
Therefore, how can we take it lightly and give up those sentient beings just because we don’t want trouble? We should try our best to appeal, and regard this process as an opportunity to clarify the facts and do it whole-heartedly.
Talking about clarifying the facts, there is another phenomenon among the practitioners claiming asylum in our country, which is that some practitioners have not put their hearts into this effort, and have been relying on other practitioners. With other people’s help, a lot of materials have been collected and sent to the Immigration Bureau, but the person doesn’t even know what is written in those materials himself. Aren’t you supposed to be clarifying the facts to the government? Can it ever be right if you don’t know what you are going to talk about yourself?
When you apply for asylum, you need to go through an interview, in which the applicant is required to state his or her reasons for claiming asylum. If you can tell the Immigration Officers what Dafa is really about, and what the nature of Jiang’s regime is, aren’t you validating Dafa to them, and manifesting the spirit of Dafa through your action? Some practitioners cannot even name all five exercises during the interview, and some others cannot tell the whole story of why and how the 25th April incident happened. Some of them cannot even remember what they said themselves in their statement that they have submitted to the Immigration Bureau. These things make the Immigration Officers believe you are a fake Falun Gong practitioner. Can this be a responsible attitude? How can we save sentient beings with such an attitude?
One practitioner saw his asylum application as a good opportunity to clarify the facts to the government and to save sentient beings, and took it very seriously from the very beginning. He prepared every document carefully, and, during his interview, instead of following the Immigration Officer’s line of thinking, took complete control over the meeting, telling the officer what Dafa is, how Jiang Zemin has been persecuting Dafa, how his regime has been trying to extend the terror beyond the Chinese border, and why the persecution happened. He gave a lot of examples to explain how evil Jiang’s state terrorism has been, and how they have been committing genocide against a group people whose only agenda is to cultivate according to the principles of “Truthfulness, Compassion, Tolerance”. He told the officer that, if the Chinese dictators were to be appeased and allowed to get away with their systematic anti-human policies of genocide, then the whole world would suffer the consequences sooner or later. The Immigration Officer took a lot of interest in his testimony, and said Falun Gong people’s analyses were truly great. As a result, his refugee status was granted soon afterwards. Therefore, every asylum applicant needs to be responsible in clarifying the facts. I suggest that practitioners in other countries also organise all practitioners applying for asylum to study the Fa together and sharing their thinking about the asylum issue and how better to clarify the facts.
Another thing is that we must look within ourselves. When a state persists, we need to search our own hearts to see whether we have some loopholes in our xinxing that has been taken advantage of by the old forces. I know that some practitioners whose applications are not ratified for a long time complain about the government. This isn’t the right thing to do, because it’s looking externally for reasons, and it won’t have any real effects. I understand that, before the application is ratified, practitioners may suffer a very painful feeling of uncertainty, because we all have human attachments left within ourselves. However, I think, as we are Fa-rectification Dafa disciples, we should maintain our righteous thoughts. No matter how hard it is, we should not consider ourselves, and should keep in mind Dafa and the sentient beings.
Of course, we should not be attached to the results, and always think about whether or not the Immigration Bureau will grant us legal status. Master said in Zhuan Falun, “it is an attachment if you think too much about them. Aren’t you attached to a pursuit if you think too much about it?” Master also said, “Get rid of any attachment you have, and don’t think about anything. Just do everything a Dafa disciple should do, and everything will be covered.” (Teaching the Fa at the Washington, D.C. International Fa Conference, “Guiding the Voyage”)
At the same time, we need to calm down and study the Fa every day, because studying the Fa well is a guarantee for maintaining powerful righteous thoughts and doing Dafa work effectively and efficiently. Master said, “When you do well in the Fa-rectification, I can see that it's always because you are able to understand the Fa from the Fa; and when you do somewhat poorly, I can see that it's because you aren't making a priority of Fa-study and you aren't able to understand the Fa from the Fa.” (Teaching the Fa at the 2002 Fa Conference in Boston)
Master said, “To do well is to not walk down the path arranged by the old forces”. (Teaching the Fa at the Washington, D.C. Fa Conference, 2002) On this sensitive issue of asylum application, we must do well and walk down a righteous path. Because “This Great Fa of the cosmos is to leave for sentient beings at different levels in different periods of history a reference for when problems occur in different periods at different levels, and is to leave for beings ways of handling all kinds of situations that occur at different times in history.” (Teaching the Fa at the 2001 Canada Fa Conference)
Because of my personal limitations, and the fact that what I know is confined to my own country, the above personal sharing is just for your kind reference, and I welcome anyone to point out anything in it that is not in compliance with the Fa principles. I hope we could use our wisdom, which has come from our cultivation in the Great Fa, to save more sentient beings.
Chinese version available at:
http://www.yuanmingeurope.net/articles/200302/17702.html
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