A team of supporters flocked to Sherman Monday to voice concern and raise awareness for rescuing Charles Li, an American citizen being detained in China.

The team is criss-crossing the United States, with banners, photos and information in tow, to help bring Li back, as well as spreading the word of torture and human rights violations in China.

"Charles went to China in January with the intention to interrupt TV signals to broadcast the truth of Falun Gong (a form of meditation), but he was detained 15 minutes after he arrived (in China)," said Jason Wang, a chief supporter of Li's release. "After show trial, he was sentenced to three years imprisonment. He has been tortured."

Through the U.S. Consulate in Shanghai, China, Wang said they've learned that in the past two months Charles has been on a hunger strike three times to protest the prison police beating and torture he's endured. Wang said Li's parents were brought in to "implore him to give up his belief in truth, compassion and tolerance, the tenets of Falun Gong." Of which he didn't, and followed with a 96-page letter of appeal to the U.S. government for his rescue.

Wang said the Chinese government has persecuted the Falun Gong movement for more than four years, and in that time, "we have received almost daily accounts of practitioners in China being tormented, abused and tortured, even tortured to death. Charles put down his fear of death, left his comfortable life in America and his fiancee, and went to China to expose the persecution."

Wang said Li's actions remind many Chinese natives in America of human rights heroes such as Martin Luther King Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi.

"They fought for human rights, equality and freedom under the spotlight of the media and under the protection of public attention," Wang said.


For information, contact Wang at (713) 539-5609, or go to
www.rescuecharles.org.


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