Congress of the United States

Washington, DC 20515

August 28, 2000

The President

The White House

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, N.W.

Washington, D.C. 20500

Dear Mr. President:

Over the past year, the human rights situation in the People's Republic of China has deteriorated badly. Perhaps the most egregious example of the PRC government's contempt for the rights of its own citizens has been the unrelenting campaign of repression against practitioners and defenders of Falun Gong.

According to international news media reports, at least 50,000 Falun Gong practitioners have been arrested and detained, more than 5,000 have been sentenced to labor camps without trial, 400 have been incarcerated in psychiatric facilities, and over 500 have received prison sentences in cursory show trials. Detainees are often tortured and at least 33 practitioners have died in government custody.

Consider, for instance, the death of Chen Zixiu, a 58-year-old retired autoworker from Weifang, China, who was killed by torture at the hands of government officials when she was unable to pay the fine for her jail time. As described by Ian Johnson in the Wall Street Journal, "The day before Chen Zixiu died, her captors again demanded that she renounce her faith in Falun Dafa. Barely conscious after repeated jolts from a cattle prod, the 58-year-old stubbornly shook her head. Enraged, the local officials ordered Ms. Chen to run barefoot in the snow. Two days of torture had left her legs bruised and her short black hair matted with pus and blood, said cellmates and other prisoners who witnessed the incident. She crawled outside, vomited, and collapsed. She never regained consciousness."

Practitioners like Ms. Chen suffer this kind of extreme mistreatment simply for peacefully exercising their beliefs, a right recognized by the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights and guaranteed by China's own Constitution. It is particularly disturbing that Chinese officials have publicly defended these atrocities on the spurious ground that Falun Gong is a "cult" that is allegedly destabilizing the country. In the past, Beijing has made similar statement about Christian "house churches" that refuse to submit to government oversight and direction. Indeed, Communist officials in China and elsewhere have recently begun defending their persecution of peaceful political and religious dissidents of all persuasions on the ground that these people are common criminals and that their detention and imprisonment is simply a manifestation of the "rule of law". Too often, international interlocutors attempting to "engage" Beijing have responded to these outrageous assertions with silence or equivocation rather than with the forceful condemnation they deserve.

As Rabbi David Saperstein, the immediate past Chairman of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, has stated: "Falun Gong has almost become the symbol for the struggle for religious freedom. And when thousands and thousands of people have been arrested...,imprisoned..., tortured, when people have died in prison, it is impossible for countries to say they are deeply committed to human rights and remain silent. And threat is why we have urged the United States government to speak out."

We were encouraged by the statement you made in December of 1999 condemning the Chinese government's crackdown on Falun Gong. Unfortunately, since then the situation have gotten worse rather than better. We therefore urge you to reiterate United States opposition to Beijing's persecution of Falun Gong practitioners in the strongest possible terms and in every available forum. In particular, we hope you will urge Chinese officials including President Jiang Zeming in the forthcoming United Nations summit and in other Sino-US government meetings to respect the rule of law by freeing all detained and imprisoned Falun Gong practitioners in jails and mental institutions. We urge you to convey to Beijing as strongly as possible that it is not Falun Gong or other political and religious dissidents who are destabilizing the country, but rather the government's brutal reaction against its own citizens.

Sincerely,

(Signatures of more than 80 Members of Congress)