July 4, 2001

We bring shocking news and urgent appeal for your help.

We are appalled and saddened to learn of the torturing to death of at least 15 female Falun Gong practitioners, around June 20, 2001, at the Wanjia Labor Camp in Harbin City, Heilongjiang Province in China. At least 10 more practitioners remain in critical condition due to the same treatment.

We, Falun Gong practitioners in Canada, urgently request that the Canadian government take immediate action by urging Chinese president Jiang Zemin to stop massacring Falun Gong practitioners.

As a direct result of the recent new laws legalizing the execution of Falun Gong practitioners in China, and Jiang Zemin's stated policy of "no means are too excessive to exterminate Falun Gong," "beating [FLG people] to death is counted as null, considered a suicide", and "[there is] no need to identify the bodies or sources [residences of the dead FLG practitioners], just cremate [them] locally," we have seen a dramatic increase in the number of Falun Gong practitioners being brutally murdered in the labor-camps and the so-called "transform-through-education" (brainwashing) classes in China.

In June 2001 alone, 35 deaths of Falun Gong practitioners have been reported, while the actual number is impossible to know because of the severe information blockage and the policy of counting such reports as a severely punishable crime of " revealing state secrets." Meanwhile, Jiang Zemin's has ordered that all deaths of Falun Gong practitioners in police custody (at least 250 to date) be attributed to either suicide or heart disease to cover up their atrocities and to defame Falun Gong.

Around the same time as the 15 deaths in Wanjia, four horrifying murders of Falun Gong practitioners occurred in Baiguo Township (Macheng City, Hubei Province). The local police beat one practitioner to death; chained two others to motorcycles and driving away at high speeds, dragged them to their deaths; dragged the body of another practitioner to the front of the local government building after beating him into unconsciousness, and set him on fire even though he was still alive. Police then declared to the on-lookers that the fourth practitioner died due to self-immolation!

Such crimes of unrestrained brutality and the alarming escalation of the persecution and defamation of Falun Gong must be stopped immediately!

We urgently seek immediate action from the Canadian government. Please make your voice of conscience and justice heard by the Canadian government and help our government make the right and important moves on this serious issue.

The silence of the international community will only be interpreted by Jiang Zemin's regime as acceptance of their atrocities, and the consequences will eventually cause great harm to the rest of the world if such crimes are not stopped.

As always, we thank you for your continued support of Falun Gong.

Sincerely,

Falun Dafa Practitioners in Canada

(More information about the persecution of Falun Gong in China: www.faluninfo.net)