(Minghui.org) Twenty-five years ago, on April 25, 1999, 10,000 Falun Gong practitioners spontaneously gathered at the Central Appeals Office in Beijing, and asked that the authorities release practitioners wrongfully arrested in Tianjin days before and a free environment to practice their faith.
Although the appeal was peaceful and orderly, it was depicted by the communist regime as a “siege” of the central government and used as an excuse to launch the persecution three months later.
Some argued that the appeal triggered the persecution, but the fact is, the police in Beijing had already attacked practitioners years before the appeal.
Between April and May 1997, the police in Huairou County, Beijing raided a volunteer coordinator’s home in Changshaoying Manchu Ethnic Township in Huairou. A copy of Zhuan Falun(the main text of Falun Gong) and some Falun Gong lecture audio tapes were confiscated. It’s reported that the raid was conducted due to an internal document issued by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party).
A year later in April 1998, the police in Huairou County raided the coordinator’s home again and confiscated a Falun Gong banner that was displayed on the wall. When the coordinator demanded the local police chief return it, he refused and said he was following an order from his superiors. The coordinator also went to the Huairou County Police Department to ask for the confiscated items, but to no avail.
After the incident, many local practitioners appealed to the Beijing Police Department. Only then did the police in Huairou return the items.
Around the “April 25 Appeal” in 1999, the police in Beijing also interrupted the practitioners at their practice sites. Right after the persecution was formally launched in July 1999, the police arrested local coordinators, raided their homes and held them in custody.
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