The Globe and Mail: Falun gong demonstrators defy Beijing

Blood flows again in Tiananmen Square as police arrest, beat protesting dissidents

Tuesday, January 2, 2001

Agence France-Presse -- Police beat and arrested members of the outlawed falun gong spiritual movement as hundreds defied a huge security presence to demonstrate in Tiananmen Square yesterday.

Small groups protesting against the government's 17-month-old ban on the movement popped up all over the square throughout the day as thousands of police and soldiers grabbed them and forced them into vans.

Journalists saw at least 700 falun gong members trucked away as about 20 police vans patrolled the square, while thousands of Chinese and overseas tourists looked on.

Falun gong followers said the protests began on New Year's Eve and resumed yesterday morning, suggesting that the number arrested could be significantly higher.

Yesterday's main demonstration began when about four groups of falun gong members, positioned at different points across the vast esplanade, suddenly started shouting slogans.

They threw leaflets into the air and unfurled red and yellow banners with the banned [group's] name on them.

Many practitioners were thrown to the ground and kicked in the face before being dragged away. At least one woman was seen with blood pouring from her head, but the police made no effort to help her as cleaners moved in swiftly to wash away the pool of blood.

Several young children were taken away as they clung to their mothers, while the square was strewn with shoes lost in the melee.

One woman was beaten severely as she screamed that she did not belong to falun gong. Police left her sprawled on the square in tears as they went after other protesters.

Although the protests had died down somewhat by late afternoon, at least 100 followers were seen in the many different police vans parked around the square.

The Buddhist- and Taoist-inspired Chinese spiritual movement has continued to defy a ban imposed by Beijing in July, 1999, and has seized on every public holiday to try to demonstrate against the country's Communist leadership.

The movement says it has up to 70 million followers in China, but the government says that there are only two million.

The government has denounced falun gong, which combines meditation and breathing exercises with Eastern philosophies, [].

The Hong Kong-based Information Centre for Human Rights and Democracy says Beijing has also jailed core leaders of the movement for as much as 18 years and sent tens of thousands to re-education camps since banning it.

Meanwhile, in Singapore yesterday, 15 falun gong followers who were arrested for gathering without a permit on New Year's Eve refused bail, insisting that they were not criminals. A spokesman for them said they were demanding to be freed unconditionally.

Copyright 2000 | The Globe and Mail