Article from a Belgian Newspaper

Slow movements in long pulls, balance exercises between mind and body. Exactly three years ago there were tens of millions of Chinese doing their morning exercises in parks and on squares. All of this is now history. The hunt for Falun Gong was opened in 1999 and costed the lives of almost 400 people and imprisoned thousands of others.

Dai Jane Zhizhen (39) is a Falun Gong Widow. Her daughter Fadu, now two years old, barely knew her father. "When I read a book about Falun Gong, I knew I found what I was looking for." Together with this book, she also found her husband Chen Chengyong. Both of them decided to live according to the philosophy of Falun Gong, which is no more then the combination of striving for truth, compassion and forbearance. Nothing threatening, but the Chinese government concluded in 1999 that there were more members of Falun Gong then there were members of the ruling party.

"But people who live by that philosophy - and those were between 70 and 100 million people in 1999 – have never united themselves," says Zhao Ming. "They do their exercises whenever they want and with who they want."

The Chinese government thought otherwise, and decided that Falun Gong was illegal, because not registered. From that point on, everybody that practised in public was dangerous to the state. Elderly, women, children, housefathers : The 610-police that was especially created to catch Falun Gong made no exception.

Chen Chenyong was arrested and dissapeared. Months later his body was found. His sister was sent to a labour camp, his father died of grief. Eventually, Jane could get away thanks to her Australian passport.

Labour camp

With Zhao Ming, things turned out differently. He heard about the persecution while he was studying computer sience in Dublin. "During the Christmas holiday season of 1999 I returned home for the holidays and I read what the censored press wrote about Falun Gong. I was convinced that the office of appeal, where the Chinese can deposit their remarks without retribution, would be satisfied with my appeal about Falun Gong. But everything could be discussed, except Falun Gong."

Zhao got arrested, detained and sent to a labour camp. In prison, real criminals are rewarded with a decrease of their penalty if they can get members of Falun Gong to sign a paper in which they renounce Falun Gong. "It even happened that a naked woman was locked up in a cell with heavy criminals to let her ‘confess’," says Zhao. Already many members died during these kind of interventions. Zhao was tortured, deprived of sleep for days and had to sit on his knees for hours. He was released after more then two years because he was studying in Dublin and the western world put pressure on the Chinese. "But I was a lucky one. The friend who I was practising with was killed in prison."

Widow Dai Jane Zhizhen and student Zhao Ming are reporting on the repression in Beijing.

Gazet Van Antwerpen
15/04/2002 – article by Désirée De Poot