BEIJING, September 6, 2000 (AP) -- Two members of the outlawed Falun Gong spiritual movement died from mistreatment in jail and a third plunged to his death while being interrogated by police, a rights group said Wednesday.

The deaths bring to 30 the number of Falun Gong members who have died in custody or following police mistreatment since China banned the group in July 1999, the Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy said.

One of the three reported to have died, 64-year-old Liu Yufeng, was detained July 18 while practicing Falun Gong meditation exercises near his home in eastern China' s Shandong province, the Hong Kong-based center reported.

When Liu' s family saw him in prison four days later, his body was covered in wounds and burn marks from an electric baton and three of his ribs were broken, the center said. He died a few hours after returning home.

Another [group] follower, Li Faming, 52, was picked up Aug. 10 on suspicion of distributing Falun Gong pamphlets in western Gansu province, the center said. Witnesses reported seeing him fall from his apartment window while three policemen searched his home, the center said.

Police ruled that Li " committed suicide for fear of punishment, " the report said.

Meanwhile, Zhang Tieyan, 29, died from respiratory problems caused by her imprisonment in a hot, airless cell with more than a dozen other people. Zhang had been arrested in April for refusing to renounce Falun Gong, the center said.

Falun Gong has attracted millions of followers with its philosophy of exercise, meditation and beliefs drawn from Buddhism, Taoism and the [unusual] ideas of its founder Li Hongzhi, a former government clerk. While followers say Falun Gong promotes health and morality, China' s officially atheistic government banned it as a cult and blamed it for leading 1, 600 adherents to their deaths.

Despite the crackdown, followers have continued to publicly protest the ban. In a letter to Chinese President printed in Wednesday' s New York Times, U.S. Falun Gong members protested against what they called the illegal arrest, imprisonment and torture of the group' s practitioners and asked for a meeting with [Chinese President].

[Chinese President] is attending the U.N. Millennium Summit, being held through Friday in New York. While the government has mostly refused comment on individual cases, it denies abusing Falun Gong members.