Suizhou City Officials Falsely Blame Falun Gong Practitioners When Unemployed Workers Strike After Failed Appeals to Higher Authorities

The Tieshu Group textile factory in Suizhou City once employed a few thousand workers, but has now gone bankrupt due to corrupt dealings between the factory leaders and the local government officials. In order to be able to support themselves, many jobless workers appealed to higher authorities on several occasions with no result. Finally, the unemployed workers protested by blocking the local railways. One such incident in 2003 alarmed the Central Government. The unemployed workers were seeking a compensation amount that the government was not able to pay.

Information circulating among the workers said that Mayor Wu Chao was falsely telling the higher authorities that the railway blockings were caused by Falun Gong practitioners. On February 8, 2004, these workers decided to block the railways again, and in order to prevent the local authorities from falsely accusing Dafa practitioners, when marching to the railway, the workers who walked in front of the crowd shouted, "Falun Gong practitioners, don't go to the protest!" The protest lasted a long time, with a lot of people being arrested. Twenty of them were falsely arrested for allegedly practising Falun Gong and taken to the Hubei Province Denglin Farm (a jail), where the police did not allow visits from their family members.

As practitioners, we can never accept false accusations against Dafa or Dafa practitioners.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2004/5/15/74708.html