United Kingdom: Car Tour Through York Exposes the Persecution of Falun Gong

In order to let more British people know about the CCP's trade in organs harvested from living Falun Gong practitioners, four UK Falun Gong practitioners carried out a car tour in York County.

The car tour took place in York County

A lawyer’s sense of justice

Our first stop was the University of Durham. We received an invitation from a lawyer in the university to talk about the persecution of Falun Gong in China.

When we met the next day, the lawyer had a high pile of material about Falun Gong on his desk. He is very interested in Falun Gong issues and before we met he had already read lots of information. He was holding an English translation of Chinese law items and pointed out to us the absurdity of the constitution of Chinese law with a scholar’s strict attitude.

A veteran Falun Gong practitioner went came us; in China, she became destitute and homeless, and also had countless tough times. She came to the UK last year. She talked about her painful experience in China to the lawyer. A western practitioner talked about the recently exposed matter of Falun Gong practitioners having their organs removed while they were still alive, and gave him a copy of Canadian ex-MP David Kilgour’s independent investigation report.

We all complemented each other, talking about the benefits of practising Falun Gong, of peaceful protest against atrocity and the facts of the CCP’s inhumanity. He sighed with emotion hearing all of this. Then he invited us to hold an open workshop about Falun Gong human rights persecution for next term’s fifty law department students. These students also needed to know the fact about Falun Gong being persecuted.

The kindness of a reporter

The media is the best way of spreading information and of course is the key point of this car tour, so we decided to visit media sources one by one.

Some media refused the first time and then we visited them again. As long as they were willing to arrange an interview, no matter how far, we still drove back for the interview. The Sunderland Echo’s interview was such an opportunity.

First of all, a photographer took a picture of us sitting in meditation. Then, we received an interview from an elderly reporter. She is sympathised with us. During the interview, she was moved by the practitioners’ kindness. She interviewed us for more then an hour in great detail and still did not want to us to leave, until we reminded her that if we did not go, we would miss the next media interview, by then she had to stop. Just before we left, she gave an elderly practitioner a very warm hug and a kiss and wished her the best.

Change of media’s attitude

That day, our car tour started in Sheffield. We went to a local newspaper office and told them the purpose of our visit. The receptionist acted disapprovingly in order to get rid of us, she asked us to leave material, saying that she would pass it to the news department. A practitioner sspoke to her patiently. Gradually, her attitude was changing; at last she telephoned the news department. The people in the news department appeared to be not interested, and did not want to see us and would only agree to talk to us by phone. We did not give up and kept our minds calm, still explaining the situation to them. As a result, things changed dramatically. Reporters not only came to meet us, they interviewed us immediately, brought a photographer to take a picture of us. The photographer not only took photos of us, and also took photos of the pictures of practitioners being persecuted in China.

City hall members moved

Halifax is a small town situated in York County. We have carried out Falun Gong activities at the city hall before, however, the city hall only allowed us to do the exercises and did not allow us to tell people the truth of the persecution. So we decided to take this opportunity to talk to them as the next step.

Group photo with city hall members in Halifax

We met city hall members at an arranged time. During meeting, a western practitioner introduced Falun Gong, the reasons for the persecuted and the on-going persecution. Then rest of us gave our own experiences. When the veteran practitioner was relating her inhuman encounter, two of the city hall members were moved to tears, other practitioners also were in tears. They then made suggestions to us, and will do their best to help.

When we mentioned that Halifax city hall did not permit us to tell people about Falun Gong being persecuted, they thought this was not understandable and also absolutely shouldn't be the case. They indicated that they would look into this matter and help to resove this problem. Thus, a difficult thing, it seems like a hard nut to be cracked, has been resolved through righteous thoughts and explaining the situation.

Stories about us

We had made plenty of preparation before the car tour. Many practitioners helped to collect material to set up databases. A few days before we started our tour, practitioners stayed up late day after day, preparing nearly one thousand letters and some of them had already been sent out, in order to arrange proper meetings before the start of our car tour. We received some replies asking us for interviews after car tour ended.

Because this car tour lasted only five days, in order to visit more media, city hall members etc. our journey was fully arranged, sometimes we got up at about 5am and left at about 6am, everyday we visited three to four cities, even eating hurriedly while driving. Physical fatigue over came us quite lot after each days activities. We asked the veteran practitioner who was nearly seventy years old whether she could sustain the physical effort. She said although she was very tired she was very happy inside.

A western practitioner who went with us, he is a new practitioner who only obtained the Fa thirteen months ago; he is very introverted and shy. But, he conquered psychological pressure and took on almost all the contact with the outside world, representing a Falun Gong practitioner’s soberness and self-confidence.

During the car tour, every one of us carried out different tasks, and cooperated with each other, we let go of self-ego, forming a strong body without any conflicts. Based on this, this car tour successfully achieved its aim. During the five days, we have visited major cities in the North of England and many cities within York County, received six media’s interview, and visited UK MPs, city hall members, human rights lawyers and so on, and benefited lots from it.

During the interviews with the media, quite a lot of the media asked us the same question: "What are you going to do after this car tour?" We told them: "We will organise car tours in other places, in order to let more UK people know the truth of the CCP persecuting Falun Gong".