SAN FRANCISCO—The arrival of Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping for the high-stakes meeting with his American counterpart has turned the Golden State into a beacon for protests.
Dozens of activists and Falun Gong practitioners on Nov. 14 gathered near the Moscone Center, the venue where many Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meetings are being held, calling for an end to human rights abuses in China.
In front of the St. Regis hotel where Mr. Xi will be staying through the week, several Chinese petitioners briefly got into a shouting match with throngs of red-capped, flag-waving Beijing supporters, with chants of “welcome” and “give me back my property” heard in turn.
“They were paid to be here,” Qiao Jie, a petitioner from central China’s Wuhan city, said about the pro-Beijing supporters in an interview with The Epoch Times’ sister media outlet NTD.
Another petitioner, Jin Yuehua, shared with NTD how she was a victim of land expropriation. Originally from Shanghai, Ms. Jin said she had been seeking redress for 23 years since Chinese authorities seized her properties in 2000. Instead of helping Ms. Jin with her grievances, Chinese authorities decided to silence and persecute her.
“They threw me into a hospital, poisoned me, and injected me with poisonous drugs. They nearly killed me. I had no choice but to escape to the United States,” Ms. Jin said. She added that she made the long trip from New York so that she could seek justice from Mr. Xi.
Mr. Xi, who arrived in San Francisco on Tuesday, is scheduled to meet President Joe Biden on the sidelines of the APEC summit on Nov. 15. It marks their first meeting in a year since the pair met on the sidelines of the Group of 20 summit in Bali, Indonesia.
Reports said the two leaders will meet at Filoli, a historic country estate about 25 miles south of San Francisco. However, when asked on Tuesday, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre declined to confirm the location.
Cruz Fairfield, 18, from Central Valley, California, came to San Francisco to raise awareness, holding a sign with the words “China has concentration camps” while depicting a Uyghur with a hand over her mouth.
“I’m just here to spread awareness. And I hope when people see this being that it is an economic summit, they think I don’t want to buy Chinese-made products,” Mr. Fairfield told The Epoch Times.
“It’s not right that you should be born in captivity, like some animal, and be medically tested upon and kept there and brainwashed and taught to hate people that look like you.”
Mr. Fairfield said he wants people to know that “China has a dictator.”
The U.S. government has formally declared China’s treatment of Uyghurs in the region of Xinjiang as “genocide” and “crimes against humanity.” More than 1 million Uyghurs are locked up in internment camps, where detainees are subjected to forced labor, torture, political indoctrination, forced abortion, and other inhuman treatments.
‘Stop the Persecution’
Many Falun Gong practitioners of the San Francisco Bay area had a simple message—their practice is good for everyone and the world, and the CCP has absolutely no reason to continue the persecution that is now in its 24th year.
“My message to Xi Jinping is stop the persecution,” Asaf Markovitz from Israel told The Epoch Times. “Why persecute people for being good people?”
Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a spiritual discipline involving meditative exercises and moral teachings based on three core principles: truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance. The practice gained popularity in China during the 1990s, with 70 million to 100 million adherents by the end of the decade, according to official estimates at the time. The Chinese regime had initially supported the practice but eventually deemed its popularity a threat to its rule.
For 24 years, millions of Falun Gong practitioners have been detained inside prisons, labor camps, and other facilities, with hundreds of thousands tortured while incarcerated, according to the Falun Dafa Information Center. Many have become victims of China’s state-sanctioned practice of organ harvesting, as their vital organs were extracted by Chinese hospitals to fuel a booming organ transplantation industry in China.
Ahead of the Biden-Xi meeting, the center issued a statement on X, requesting the “immediate release” of all Falun Gong practitioners in China, including 10 who have family members in the United States. One of the 10 practitioners is Zhou Deyong, whose wife and son currently reside in Florida. In April, Mr. Zhou was sentenced to an eight-year jail term.
Mr. Zhou is one of 40 names on a list of political prisoners that the Congressional-Executive Commission on China has prepared for President Biden, asking him to hand the list to Mr. Xi when the two meet on Wednesday. Other names on the list include Chinese human rights lawyers, Uyghurs, Hongkongers, Tibetans, and Christians.
Dean Tsaggaris, an engineer from Silicon Valley, told NTD that the human rights situation in China has an impact on the world.
“If people inside China cannot practice truth, compassion, [and] forbearance freely, that doesn’t show that the future [of the country] is going to be very good,” Mr. Tsaggaris said. “So I think the people of the world should care because these are principles that are universal; they relate to all people. And if we can change the situation in China, then I think that will impact the whole world for the better.”
‘Take Firm Action’
Also taking part in Tuesday’s protest is Jenny Zhang, who started practicing Falun Gong in 1994 and left China for the United States in 2012. In an interview with The Epoch Times, she recalled how her mother was persecuted before leaving China.
Ms. Zhang said her mother, a college professor, had experienced torture while in Chinese custody. Later, her mother was forced to retire from the college, and her retirement pension was withheld—a policy of the Chinese regime to intentionally deprive Falun Gong practitioners of their source of income.
She had a message for those so-called Chinese patriots welcoming Mr. Xi to San Francisco: Go read the “Nine Commentaries on the Communist Party” published by The Epoch Times.
“If you go read it, you will know the Chinese regime has hurt countless number of Chinese people during its reign,” Ms. Zhang said. “You will know that the regime has never truly cared about its people.”
Abraham Thompson, a senior manager for a construction company who lives in San Jose, called on the Biden administration to take action.
“My message to the Biden administration is to take action, take firm action, and speak strongly about freedom and human rights with the Chinese government,” Mr. Thompson said in an interview with NTD.
“The persecution of Falun Gong has gone on for over 24 years. It’s just as savage and brutal as it’s ever been, taking innocent people, putting them in labor camps, and torturing them for their beliefs. We can’t stand for this, and the Biden administration should take action and speak strongly about this. This is a priority number one, in my opinion.”
From The Epoch Times
