Dafa Practitioners in Korea Charge Chinese Consular Officials with Defamation

Falun Gong practitioner Piao Zhongyuan and others in Seoul, the capital city of Korea, filed lawsuits with the Seoul Central Court, charging Li Bin, the Chinese ambassador in Korea, Zhang Xin, the Chinese Consul General and five other Chinese consular officials with defamation.

The Chinese consular officials have published dozens of Falun Gong-slandering articles on their Chinese consulate website. These articles twisted facts, sent misleading information to people and damaged the reputation of Falun Gong and Falun Gong practitioners. Regarding this illegal behaviour, the Korea Falun Dafa Association sent a letter to the Chinese consulate on September 24, 2003, urging the defendants to delete all slanderous contents from their website.

The defendants, however, have ignored the request and continued their illegal acts. If the Falun Gong practitioners had allowed the slander to continue, more people would be deceived, making it harder to restore the reputation of Falun Gong and all Falun Gong practitioners, including the plaintiffs. Piao Zhongyuan, as a representative of the Falun Gong practitioners who are defamed, filed a lawsuit against the Chinese consular officials.

This is not the first defamation lawsuit filed by overseas Falun Gong practitioners against Chinese consular officials. Joel Chipkar, a Canadian Falun Gong practitioner filed a lawsuit against Pan Xinchun, the Chinese Deputy Consul General in Toronto, charging him with slander and inciting hatred. On February 3, 2004, judge Harvey Spiegel of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice ruled against Pan Xinchun.

Korean Falun Gong practitioners said the purpose of the lawsuit is to clarify the truth to the judge and other legal officials, to expose the defendants' crime of defaming the plaintiffs, and to prevent them from continuing to promote Jiang's persecution abroad, so people can be saved from Jiang's mind-poisoning lies.