A press conference has
been called for Monday August 13 to urge
China to release Dr. Chunyan Teng, an acupuncturist
and professor at the New York College of
Oriental Medicine. Teng has been imprisoned
in China since November 2000 on charges of
espionage.
Teng
is one of the many practitioners of Falun Gong, a physio-religious
movement that has been outlawed by the Chinese government.
Falun Gong followers are not allowed to practice their
yoga-like exercises, and many have been imprisoned
for a variety of offenses, be they real or fabricated.
Teng is charged with having assisted the world
media by arranging interviews with Falun Gong
practitioners who had been illegally imprisoned
and tortured in Chinese mental institutions.
After her conviction, Teng spent three months
in such an institution, where, she alleges, the
Chinese government tried to brainwash her and
other Falun Gong members into renouncing their
faith.
Sponsoring the drive for Teng's release are
the victim's mother, actress Celeste Holmes,
the organization 'Friends of Falun Gong', and
various other students and human rights activists.
Friends of Falun Gong is a US-based non-profit
organization which seeks the release of prisoners
of conscience in the People's Republic of China,
and the end of the persecution of the Falun Gong
sect.
The drive for Teng's release comes at a time
when 130 Falun Gong members are reported to have
prolonged their hunger strike at the Masanjia
Labor Camp, in the Liaoning Province of China.
The protest started when camp authorities did
not release the prisoners at the end of their
terms.
The Falun Gong, though repressed in China, are
active in the United States. They recently organized
a nation-wide walk to raise awareness for human
rights abuses. The press conference on Monday
aims to highlight the injustices caused to Falun
Gong members, and increase the sect's supporters
in this country. Organizers hope that eventually
the US government will increase pressure on China
to clean up its civil rights policies.
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