In the Press...
The Epoch Times article on Smith hearing'Congress Warned About Beijing's Repression on US Soil''Beijing's actions constitute a playbook that can be directed at any group, Falun Gong spokesperson said during hearing.'By Eva Fu WASHINGTON—The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) sweeping repression targeting one faith group is creating a challenge to the United States and allowing Beijing to expand its toolbox to persecute other communities, a Falun Gong spokesperson testified to Congress. Erping Zhang described a wide spectrum of Beijing-linked tactics targeting the spiritual community, playing out in America—including assault, anonymous violent threats, spying, disinformation, and frivolous lawsuits. The tactics can be used against “any group the CCP decides is a problem,” Zhang told the Congressional-Executive Commission on China on Sept. 22. “The regime’s actions undermine the basic rights of Americans and the rule of law,” he said in his written testimony.
“The impact of this activity reaches far beyond our own community, creating a playbook of tactics that the regime can use against other targets while undermining U.S. democracy, freedom, and sovereignty.” Zhang pointed to a June report by the Falun Dafa Information Center, which identified more than 600 cases of transnational repression incidents across 30 states. Falun Gong practitioners have faced these threats for simply practicing their faith in the United States, Zhang said. Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a meditation practice with spiritual teachings based on the core tenets of truthfulness, compassion, and forbearance. In the 1990s, 70 million to 100 million people began practicing, with many crediting Falun Gong for uplifting their physical and mental well-being. In 1999, the Chinese communist regime marked it for eradication. Organizations monitoring the persecution have verified thousands of deaths, which they say represent a drop in the ocean. Between March and April, nearly 800 practitioners in China reported experiencing harassment, arrest, or house raids, according to Minghui.org, a clearinghouse for such information. The oldest of them was 94. Since 1999, Falun Gong practitioners have been “detained by the millions, tortured, sexually abused, forced into producing goods that reached American shelves, subjected to forced organ harvesting,” Zhang said. “That apparatus was later turned onto the Uyghurs.” Several Chinese officials hit with U.S. sanctions for repressing Uyghurs in China’s Xinjiang region have a history of persecuting Falun Gong, an Epoch Times review of their records found. Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.), who chaired the congressional hearing, noted that the repression doesn’t end at the prison gate. To see “spiritual disciplines like Falun Gong suffer so horribly in China underscores that we have to do more, not less,” he said.
Be it Falun Gong practitioners, Christians, or Uyghurs, Smith said, “they are the best citizens imaginable.” “Very often, they have a code of conduct that’s written on their hearts,” he told The Epoch Times. “Why wouldn’t you want more of that? I don’t get it.” Beyond China, the Falun Gong community has become a top target for the regime’s “unrestricted war” against religious freedom, Zhang said in his written testimony. In 2023, the Department of Justice charged two Chinese agents for trying to bribe an IRS official to act on a fake whistleblower complaint against Shen Yun Performing Arts, a New York-based arts company founded by Falun Gong practitioners. John Chen, one of the alleged agents acting under Chinese authorities’ orders, stated his goal was to help the regime “topple” Falun Gong, according to court documents. Both Chen and the other Chinese national pleaded guilty. Since March 2024, more than 300 anonymous death threats and bomb threats linked to Chinese individuals have been sent, targeting Falun Gong and Shen Yun, as well as lawmakers supportive of Falun Gong, and several civil institutions, according to Falun Dafa Information Center. The center also counted dozens of cases in which individuals impersonated Falun Gong practitioners to make fake threats. In late January, foreign influence research group Graphika flagged a cluster of websites linked to Chinese companies that push Beijing’s propaganda overseas while masquerading as legitimate Western media, corroborating an Epoch Times report finding similar operations on X. Zhang said Falun Gong has long served as a target of Beijing’s repression tactics. “The Party has tried all means to bankrupt us, to silence us, and to delegitimize us,” Zhang said in his testimony. “What it has done to Falun Gong is one of the most comprehensive demonstrations available of how the Party behaves when it believes it is threatened.” |
