Japan: Falun Dafa Practitioners Appeal for the release of practitioner Yoko Kaneko

On April 2, 2003, the Japan Falun Dafa Association sent a letter to the Japanese Minister for Foreign Affairs to request her help in rescuing Yoko Kaneko.

The letter said, "We just returned from the UN Committee on Human Rights meetings in Geneva in order to rescue Yoko Kaneko and many more persecuted Falun Gong practitioners in China. We heard that you would visit China on April 6, so we write this letter to request you to help rescue the wife of Kaneko Atusi and Falun Gong practitioner Yoko Kaneko. Yoko Kaneko was arrested in China on May 24, 2002 and is being detained at the Daxing District Women Forced Labour Camp in Beijing. You may know that news about Falun Gong practitioners being tortured to death in China can be heard nearly every day. In the last 30 days, over 40 Falun Gong practitioners have been tortured to death. As of today, it has been confirmed that more than 648 Falun Gong practitioners have been tortured to death. Yoko Kaneko's life is in danger. We ask you to pay attention to this issue and use your influence to help rescue Yoko Kaneko. Successful rescue cases in Canada and Ireland indicate that support and help from the government and people are invaluable. We sincerely hope that you will try your best to help secure the release of Yoko Kaneko from China's forced Labour camp."

The letter also expressed gratitude for the efforts that the Foreign Minister and the Japanese government have made for the release of Yoko Kaneko.

On April 2 to 4, Falun Gong practitioners in Japan once again peacefully appealed in front of the Japanese Parliament, requesting the Foreign Minister to raise the issue of releasing Yoko Kaneko with the Chinese government during her upcoming visit to China on April 6.

Yoko Kaneko was illegally detained last May for distributing Falun Gong truth-clarifying materials in Beijing and later sentenced to 18 months of forced labour. Many practitioners came to the appeal in the rain, handing out flyers, collecting signatures and clarifying the truth. Elderly Dafa practitioners came early in the morning, hung banners and stayed there until the evening.

During our petition, it happened that a local Chinese delegation visiting Japan got off a big van near our petition group and went to visit the Parliament. The practitioners made good use of this opportunity to hand out truth-clarifying materials to them, had a conversation with the driver and left some materials and VCDs in the van for those delegation members to read. Some delegation members encouraged the practitioners to keep up their good work.