Amnesty International Holland Begins Campaign Together with Two Other Dutch NGOs

Amnesty International Holland started a letter writing campaign and signature collection together with two other Dutch human rights organisations, Jubilee Campaign and ACAT, to urge the Chinese government to respect the basic human right of freedom of religion and to immediately stop torturing and persecuting people because of their beliefs.

Prior to their campaign, Amnesty dedicated their two-monthly newsletter on human rights and philosophy completely to religious freedom in China. Several articles were published in it about human rights violations by the Chinese government against several religious groups and movements. Falun Gong was extensively covered in the newsletter and mentioned as one of the most severely persecuted. A quote from one of the articles read:

“In March 2000 Amnesty International published a list of 2.300 Falun Gong adherents that had been jailed, arrested or sentenced since July 1999. In 2001 at least 200 Falun Gong adherents have died in custody due to torture. Falun Gong itself claims 422 members to have died in prison. The violence against Falun Gong is obviously meant to eradicate the movement.”