AP: American deported after weekend protest supporting Falun Gong [group]

By CHRISTOPHER BODEEN, Associated Press Writer

Mon Apr 15,10:56 PM ET

BEIJING - China has deported an American college student detained for demonstrating in Beijing's Tiananmen Square against the government's ban on the Falun Gong [group], the U.S. Embassy said Tuesday.

Andrew Muir Ellsmore, 21, hugs his mother, Cindy Ellsmore, as he arrives at San Francisco International Airport from Beijing, Tuesday, April 16, 2002. China detained then deported Ellsmore, a Humboldt State University junior, for demonstrating in Beijing's Tiananmen Square against the government's ban on the Falun Gong [group]. Ellsmore's was the latest in a string of protests by foreign Falun Gong practitioners in China. (AP Photo/Paul Sakuma)

China's Foreign Ministry confirmed to the embassy that an American was questioned and expelled on Sunday, the day of the protest, an embassy spokesman said on condition of anonymity.

The spokesman did not identify the American, citing privacy rules. However, the demonstrator identified himself to The Associated Press on Sunday as Andrew Muir Ellsmore, and Falun Gong supporters in the United States released the same name.

Ellsmore, 21, a junior majoring in geology at Humboldt State University in Arcata, California, was taken off the square in a police van after shouting "Falun Dafa is good" in broken Chinese and unfurling a banner emblazoned with the same [words].

In a statement released by Falun Gong just after the protest, Ellsmore said the act was intended to "help people who have no voice and are in desperate need of justice."

Ellsmore's was the latest in a string of protests by foreign Falun Gong practitioners in China. All have been detained and quickly deported.

Some have complained of abuse at the hands of police, although China claims all were treated humanely. Ellsmore was not visibly mistreated during his arrest or in the immediate hours afterward.

Falun Gong gained millions of followers in China and abroad during the 1990s, with its mixture of eastern philosophy, meditation and light exercise techniques.

Fearful of independent groups that could challenge the Communist Party's political monopoly, China banned the [group] in 1999 [...] and has sought to eradicate it with a relentless campaign of propaganda, arrests, and detentions.

Falun Gong claims almost 400 followers have died under suspicious circumstances in police custody. China denies abusing them, saying they have died from suicide, hunger strikes or by refusing medication.

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