Name: Death Threats in Chinese Target Falun Gong, US Lawmakers Who Voice Support
Uploaded: 2025-01-29T15:44:09.000Z
Description: A faith community that escaped persecution from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is facing new threats in New York, with Chinese operatives warning of bombing and other attacks targeting them and lawmakers in Congress who have voiced support.

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A faith community that escaped persecution from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is facing new threats in New York, with Chinese operatives warning of bombing and other attacks targeting them and lawmakers in Congress who have voiced support.

In a Chinese language email that the Falun Dafa Information Center (FDIC) made public on Jan. 28, the anonymous sender claimed to have made a “large number of incendiary bombs” using alcohol and glass bottles.

On the first day of the Chinese New Year, the person said they’d send people to Dragon Springs in upstate New York, which is the site of a Tang Dynasty-style Buddhist temple, as well as rehearsal spaces for the performing arts company Shen Yun, and a campus hosting two religious arts schools, Fei Tian College and Fei Tian Academy of the Arts.

The email went on to detail a plan to wreck the site: they’d set fire to vehicles, throw gasoline bombs at the wooden buildings, slash anyone they come across, and “attack congressmen who support Falun Gong.”

Founded in New York’s Orange County by Falun Gong practitioners, Shen Yun has been a prominent target of the CCP since 2006, when it began touring to showcase Chinese civilization as it existed before the communist takeover. Shen Yun productions also include pieces that depict torture inflicted on Falun Gong practitioners in modern day China, including <a href="https://www.theepochtimes.com/china/taiwan-indicts-surgeon-who-sent-patients-to-china-for-organ-transplants-amid-organ-harvesting-concerns-5766820">forced organ harvesting</a>. Eight separate companies are currently on tour and will perform in roughly 200 cities across the globe this year.

In an attempt to block Shen Yun’s performances, Chinese diplomats have for years exerted economic and <a href="https://www.theepochtimes.com/china/chinese-embassy-admits-efforts-to-block-shen-yun-shows-in-south-korea-5521410">political pressure</a> on democratically elected officials and theater operators worldwide, often putting relationships with China on the line.

But the campaign to stop Shen Yun appears to have been dialed up to another level over the past year.

Since March 2024, the FDIC has documented 17 such intimidation emails targeting Shen Yun. Many contain graphic descriptions of violence and threats of assaults on performers and their families. The center said that suspicious individuals have been attempting to approach Dragon Springs’s entrance to take photos or breach its security barrier in recent months.

Theaters hosting Shen Yun performances in the United States, Europe, Canada, and Taiwan also received at least 14 other threats collectively. None have come to pass, but they have prompted additional investments in security and law enforcement resources.

The frequency of such threats noticeably increased since December 2024, according to FDIC, with five of those dated on or after Jan. 13, citing members of Congress as potential targets.

The Chinese New Year holiday, which falls on Jan. 29 this year, is a time traditionally for family reunions. By picking this particular day to incite fear, the Chinese operatives have demonstrated their “malicious intent” to “sabotage and silence Shen Yun and the broader Falun Gong diaspora,” said FDIC Executive Director Levi Browde.

Levi Browde, executive director of Falun Dafa Information Center, speaks in an interview with NTD in New York, on Nov. 27, 2024. (Otabius Williams/The Epoch Times)

Taking together what happened over the past year, Browde believes there’s “almost certainly a connection back to Beijing.”

The Epoch Times learned in December that Chinese leader Xi Jinping personally gave instructions in 2022 for top officials to suppress Falun Gong globally, putting a heavy focus on leveraging Western mechanisms with no visible ties to Beijing—including social media influencers and media outlets—to sway public opinion against Falun Gong-founded entities.

U.S. prosecutors have recently publicized several Chinese agents’ efforts to sabotage Falun Gong. One of the cases <a href="https://www.theepochtimes.com/us/doj-charges-2-suspected-chinese-agents-for-targeting-falun-gong-in-the-us-5295028">involved</a> two men trying to bribe IRS agents and “manipulate the IRS Whistleblower Program" in an attempt to strip Shen Yun of its tax-exempt status, according to court filings. Both men have been <a href="https://www.theepochtimes.com/falun-gong/chinese-agent-who-tried-to-bribe-irs-against-shen-yun-sentenced-to-20-months-in-prison-5762591">prosecuted</a> for the act.

On social media platforms such as X and YouTube, posts meant to incite hatred have also emerged.

Frances Hui, a Hong Kong activist <a href="https://www.theepochtimes.com/china/hong-kong-pro-democracy-activist-under-ccp-threat-on-american-soil-5547973">wanted</a> by the now communist-controlled city over her pro-democracy activities, said intimidation is a favored tactic for the CCP to silence critics.

“By continuously threatening and intimidating us, to also create a general chilling effect and create fear inside of every single member of the community,” she told The Epoch Times after a Hudson panel on U.S. human rights policy on Dec. 15, 2024.

“They will give up on the front line. They will give up on fighting for what's right because they want to avoid those consequences.”

Human rights watchers at the event agreed that there needs to be consequences for the Beijing-aligned agents for going after dissidents through increasingly covert means.

“It's really important that as the CCP is more creative, more tough with its tactics, that we also increase our protection for these dissidents here,” panelist Anouk Wear, a research and policy adviser at Hong Kong Watch, told The Epoch Times.

As Falun Gong practitioners in China continue to face risks of death for adhering to their beliefs, the escalation in the threat overseas against Falun Gong and Shen Yun, including in the frequency and violent tone, should also raise alarms, said Browde.

With the CCP’s “deadly propaganda and violence ​​against Falun Gong practitioners” extending to those in the United States and their supporters in Congress, he said, it’s all the more urgent for the U.S. government to open a “full-fledged counterintelligence investigation” to hold the responsible actors to account “before a tragedy occurs.”

The email message comes from an IP address located in France, but the perpetrator likely used a virtual private network to mask their location, the New York-based research group said. It added that both it and Shen Yun had reported the incident to law enforcement and Capitol Police.

<em>From<a href="https://www.theepochtimes.com/china/death-threats-in-chinese-target-falun-gong-us-lawmakers-who-voice-support-5800343"> The Epoch Times</a></em>

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Eva Fu is a New York-based writer for The Epoch Times focusing on U.S. politics, U.S.-China relations, religious freedom, and human rights. Contact Eva at eva.fu@epochtimes.com

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