AP: Rights activist criticizes Hong Kong official for interfering with Falun Gong painter's exhibition

DATELINE: HONG KONG

A human rights campaigner criticized a senior Hong Kong official Tuesday for trying to ban a catalog featuring the artwork of a Falun Gong practitioner - as well as a Falun Gong message - from an exhibit on public property.

"We believe the interference is arbitrary and politically motivated," said Law Yuk-kai, director of the Hong Kong Human Rights Monitor, a non-governmental organization. "It's ridiculous."

Law met with Secretary for Home Affairs Ho Chi-ping on Monday to find out why the government asked organizers of the art exhibit, which ran Friday through Monday, to remove copies of the catalog.

The catalog featured works by Zhang Cuiying, an Australian who was barred from entering Hong Kong last week to open the exhibit of her work, where she also planned to make an appeal against mainland China's suppression of Falun Gong.

Law said Ho sidestepped his questions and failed to explain what was wrong with the catalog, "The Golden Brush," which also includes Falun Gong information and a message from Zhang criticizing Beijing's efforts to eradicate the meditation [group] in mainland China.

The exhibition was organized by a U.S. publishing company, Epoch Group Ltd., which said it is not affiliated with Falun Gong.

Local officials had warned exhibit organizers that they breached a rental agreement for space inside the Hong Kong City Hall by distributing unauthorized printed material, but the organizers refused to remove the catalogs.

City Hall was the site of a January 2001 international Falun Gong conference that prompted Beijing's local allies to demand some sort of clampdown on the group' s activities in Hong Kong. [..]