LONDON—Some British lawmakers this week offered a voice for those who don’t have the freedom to speak out in China.
They spoke out for practitioners of a peaceful meditation practice that has been banned in China for 20 years.
Falun Gong is a spiritual discipline that teaches truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance. But within China this practice, also known as Falun Dafa, is suppressed by the country’s communist regime.
At a seminar about China’s crimes against humanity inside UK Parliament this week, practitioners of the spiritual practice shared their stories.
“As a direct result of the persecution, my poor father [has] lost sight in both his eyes,” said Destiny Tang, who’s father was arrested five times for his faith.
She said that during his time in detention, her father suffered prolonged sleep deprivation, medical testing, forced feeding, beatings, violence and other barbaric forms of torture.
Her case is not isolated. Reports of torture against Falun Gong practitioners in China are in the hundreds of thousands, according to the Falun Dafa Information Center. 4,135 practitioners are documented to have died as a result of torture in police custody in China, but the number is thought to be much higher.
“It’s hard to believe that 20 years later, the persecution is still going strong,” MP Jim Shannon, who chaired the seminar, remarked.
Perhaps even harder to believe are the findings from a people’s tribunal held last month which concluded that the Chinese state has—and continues to—forcibly remove organs from prisoners of conscience; with Falun Gong practitioners likely to be the main supply.
Martin Elliot, Professor of Cardiothoracic Surgery at University College London, was a panelist on the tribunal. He reiterated the tribunal’s final judgement at the parliamentary seminar.
Earlier this year, 53 MPs signed a motion that calls on the UK government to condemn the practice of forced organ harvesting.
“They’re just peace-loving people. Why should they not be allowed to live their lives, why can they not be afforded the same compassion that they show?” Labour MP Marie Rimmer said.
Scottish National Party MP Patrick Grady said it’s an issue that some British lawmakers are taking seriously.
“There are several members of Parliament, both in the House of Commons and indeed the House of Lords, who have been working together on a cross-party basis to promote religious freedom around the world, and particularly the way that the Falun Gong practitioners are affected by all this,” he said.
Falun Gong practitioners meditated outside Parliament. There is hope among practitioners and their supporters that such peaceful protests will help to end the suffering of practitioners in China.
“I hope it will be cumulative. It’s like climbing a mountain or building a pyramid, you’ve got to keep adding blocks to the top,” said Lord Hylton a crossbench member of the House of Lords.
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