There will a renewed focus over the coming month on the continuing human rights abuses carried out by the Chinese government, as we come towards June 4 – the twentieth anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, where thousands of protesters were killed by the military.
The ‘tank man’ photo from that day has become hugely inspirational to many people and one of the most iconic examples of courage and defiance in the face of authoritarian power.
In the twenty years since, there has been a lot of economic progress in China, but very little improvement in the human rights arena.
Far less attention will be given to another anniversary linked to thousands of deaths inflicted by the Chinese government. This period marks the tenth anniversary of the Chinese government outlawing the Falun Gong spiritual group. The New York Times says that
in the past year, as many as 8,000 practitioners have been detained, according to experts on human rights, and at least 100 have died in custody.
There are many groups targeted for persecution by the Chinese government, but Falun Gong practitioners may well be the biggest target of all at in recent years.
The Chinese government labels Falun Gong an “evil cult”, but they have in effect turned what was an apolitical group into a group who are tireless in their efforts to highlight all the evidence of serious restrictions on freedom of belief and widespread torture and killing carried out by the Chinese regime.
The New York Times notes
In cities around the world, Falun Gong devotees — and their offbeat re-enactments of torture and gory visual aids — have become a common sight.
Their demonstrations may sometimes seem ‘offbeat’, and some of their beliefs might seem odd to others, but none of the could possibly excuse or justify the monumental persecution inflicted on them.
One Trackback