Germany: Falun Gong Practitioners Participate in the Fourth Multicultural Festival in Augsburg

On July 7th, 2007, Falun Gong practitioners were invited to participate in the 4th Multicultural Festival in Augsburg, the third largest city in Germany. With the theme of “peace, freedom and respect for beliefs” the Festival was well attended by local residents and people from neighbouring cities. It was the third time for Falun Gong practitioners to be invited to perform the Falun Gong exercises at the festival.

Falun Gong practitioners are invited to perform the exercises on the Multicultural Festival in Augsburg

In addition to performing five sets of the Falun Gong exercises, Falun Gong practitioners also participated in a grand parade, along with other groups from South Korea, Japan, Thailand, India, Malaysia, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Congo and the people from various ethnic groups in Germany. Composed of Chinese and Western practitioners donning golden yellow clothes or yellow T-shirts, the Falun Gong group was the most striking one and was highly welcomed by spectators on the two sides of the street.

When the practitioners were performing the exercises on the stage, many spectators were so enchanted with the Falun Gong exercises that they wanted to learn them on the spot. They said that they couldn’t imagine that such peaceful and kind-hearted practitioners were illegally arrested and convicted and their internal organs were even harvested.

After the demonstration of the exercises, many spectators went to the Falun Gong booth to view the photos on display. After reading about the Chinese Communist regime’s atrocities and the inhuman methods of the persecution against Falun Gong, they signed to support the campaign initiated by Falun Gong practitioners to counter the Chinese regime’s persecution and atrocious tyranny. They also expressed their admiration for Falun Gong practitioners’ courage in exposing the fact about the persecution. Furthermore, they encouraged the practitioners to persist in this regard.

After participating in the festival activities and learning about the facts of the persecution, a lady said, “To my understanding, two thirds of China’s 1.4 billion population are farmers. Due to arbitrary extraction of taxes and fees, requisition of donations and expropriation of farmland for construction, the overwhelming majority of the farmers cannot meet their basic needs for subsistence. As a result of the polarised differences in wealth, people’s lives are not properly protected. Given these, how can a government without basic human rights and freedom of speech host the Olympic Games that is symbolic of peace, freedom and unity? In this regard, every government and its people should make a wise judgment and a right choice.”