Practitioners in Geneva were Interviewed by a Radio Station

Several hundred Falun Gong practitioners from all parts of the world gathered in Geneva for the opening of the sixtieth session of the United Nations Human Rights Commission, to appeal peacefully for a halt to the persecution that has been raging in China for almost five years. The Swiss Falun Gong Association and two victims of the persecution were interviewed by Radio City, a local radio station, for a broadcast devoted entirely to Falun Gong.

The purpose of this broadcast was to present Falun Gong to the listeners and to inform them of the suppression now raging in China and outside China. The journalist focused her questions particularly on the practice of Falun Gong, its impact on health and inner stability, its peaceful nature and the values of truth, benevolence and tolerance that the method naturally develops.

To illustrate the cruelty of the persecution in China, two victims were able to recount their stories and to tell how they were threatened with death or force-fed with hot spicy liquids. The second victim took the opportunity of the interview to launch an appeal to rescue his sister who is at death’s door in a detention centre.

The journalist was particularly interested in the persecution’s extension beyond China to our own countries, for example in what happened in France in January 2004.

At the end of the broadcast, the journalist told the participants that she intended to send the cassette of this programme to Africa where it would be widely broadcast and would touch many listeners who are particularly aware of the suppression of the freedoms of belief and of conscience.