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Amnesty International (AI) first began researching and reporting on the persecution of Falun Gong in the days immediately following the ban on the practice on July 20, 1999. Since that time, abuses against Falun Gong practitioners have been a regular feature of the China section of AI’s annual report. Thanks to multiple Urgent Actions that have been issued for adherents in imminent danger of being tortured, thousands of AI members have written to the Chinese authorities on behalf of practitioners and in several instances, contributed to better treatment or early release. In a special report on torture in 2001, AI highlighted the systematic use of torture by security agents in a nation-wide effort to force citizens to abandon the traditional Chinese practice. More recently, AI has featured Bu Dongwei, a practitioner serving a two-and-a-half year sentence in a Beijing labor camp, as one of the prisoners of conscience whose release it is calling for ahead of the 2008 Olympic Games. Annual Reports: 2010 Annual Report"The severe and systematic 10-year campaign against Falun Gong continued...Former RTL prisoners reported that Falun Gong constituted one of the largest groups of prisoners...The government campaign against Falun Gong intensified, with sweeping detentions, unfair trials leading to long sentences, enforced disappearances and deaths in detention following torture and ill-treatment."2009 Annual Report"Falun Gong practitioners were among those most harshly persecuted by the government. In the run-up to the Beijing Olympics, thousands were reported to have been arrested, with hundreds imprisoned or assigned to Re-education through Labour camps and other forms of administrative detention where they were at risk of torture and other ill-treatment sometimes leading to death."2008 Annual Report Falun Gong practitioners were at particularly high risk of torture and other ill-treatment in detention....During the year over 100 Falun Gong practitioners were reported to have died in detention or shortly after release as a result of torture, denial of food or medical treatment, and other forms of ill-treatment."2007 Annual Report2006 Annual Report2005 Annual Report2004 Annual Report2003 Annual Report2002 Annual Report2001 Annual Report2000 Annual Report General Amnesty International Description of Persecution against Falun Gong (compiled from recent Urgent Actions): "Falun Gong is a spiritual movement that gained large numbers of adherents in China during the 1990s. n July 1999, the government outlawed the group and launched a long-term campaign of intimidation and persecution, directed by a special organization called the 610 Office. Tens of thousands of Falun Gong practitioners have been arbitrarily detained since the spiritual movement was banned . Those accused of being Falun Gong leaders or organizers have been jailed. Others have been held in psychiatric hospitals, but the vast majority have been held in Re-education Through Labour facilities, a form of punitive administrative detention in which people can be deprived of their liberty without trial for up to four years. The crackdown on Falun Gong intensified in the lead-up to the Olympics. Falun Gong sources reported over 8000 arrests of Falun Gong practitioners nationwide during this period, and say that in 2008 over 100 died in custody or shortly after being released, due to torture, starvation and lack of medical treatment." Urgent Actions and Appeal Cases for Falun Gong practitioners Jiang Feng (m): Urgent Action: Falun Gong practitioner missing in China (10 May 2010)"Falun Gong practitioner Jiang Feng went missing in Shanghai on 18 February and is believed to be detained by the Chinese authorities. He is at risk of torture and other ill-treatment." Yan Dongfei (f) and Qiao Yongfang (m): Urgent Action: China: Ageing couple face jail for religious beliefs (9 October 2009)“An elderly couple are about to be put on trial because they practice Falun Gong. They may receive lengthy prison terms on account of their religious beliefs. They are in custody in the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, in northern China, and are at risk of torture or other ill-treatment.”See also: Urgent Action: China: Incommunicado detention/ prisoners of conscience/ fear of torture and ill-treatment (19 June 2009)See also: Urgent Action: Falun Gong practitioners Yan Dongfei and her husband Qiao Yongfang will be put on trial on 3 June. They may receive lengthy prison terms and are at risk of torture and other ill-treatment (28 May 2010) Ouyang Wen (f): Urgent Action: China: Medical concern/fear of torture or other ill-treatment (2 March 2009)“Falun Gong practitioner Ouyang Wen began a two-year term of Re-education Through Labour (RTL) in June 2008. While in custody her eyesight began to deteriorate, to the point where she is now almost blind, but she has been given no medical treatment. She was arrested without a warrant at her home in Beijing in May 2008, and sent to RTL, after she had been in custody for a month, for "hiding Falun Gong propaganda materials" in her home….This is the third time Ouyang Wen has been persecuted for her religious beliefs.”“Shortly after her release Ouyang Wen resumed practicing Falun Gong and declared on a Falun Gong website that she regretted signing the letter and had been coerced into doing so. Fearing the government would punish her for this; she fled her home and became destitute. She travelled for the next six years, only occasionally visiting her family at home. Her arrest on 14 May 2008 was a result of her visiting home to celebrate her daughter’s 17th birthday.” Chen Zhenping (f) Urgent Action: China: Further Information on Fear of torture / incommunicado detention (22 January 2009)“Chen Zhenping was sentenced in August 2008, after a secret trial, to eight years imprisonment for "using a heretical organization to subvert the law". Chen Zhenping’s family fear that she is likely to be moved to a prison far from their home. Falun Gong members are often moved to prisons in regions far from their homes by the Chinese authorities.”Urgent Action: China: Fear of torture (3 November 2008): “Falun Gong practitioner Chen Zhenping was arrested without a warrant on 9 July at her home in the city of Zhengzhou, Henan province. Her family have not been allowed to visit her, and it is unclear where she is now held. She is in grave danger of torture.”Urgent Action: Imprisoned woman tortured in China: Chen Zhenping (1 April 2010): Imprisoned Falun Gong practitioner Chen Zhenping, who is currently serving an eight-year prison sentence in China is believed to have been forcibly injected with drugs and subjected to regular beatings in prison. She remains at serious risk of further torture. Xu Na (f) China: Fear of torture and other ill-treatment / Prisoner of conscience (28 November 2008)“Falun Gong practitioner Xu Na is at risk of torture or other ill-treatment. She was sentenced to three years in prison on 25 November… Amnesty International believes she is a prisoner of conscience, detained solely for the peaceful exercise of her right to freedom of conscience and religion .""On 25 January 2008, Xu Na and her folk musician husband Yu Zhou were detained after a routine search, during which the Beijing police discovered they were carrying Falun Gong materials. Yu Zhou died in detention 11 days after being taken into police custody.” Bu Dongwei (m) Amnesty International featured Bu, who was serving a two-and-a-half year sentence in a Beijing labor camp, as one of the prisoners of conscience whose release it was calling for ahead of the 2008 Olympic Games. Thanks to the international pressure, Bu was released early. He subsequently traveled to the United States, where he currently resides with his wife and daughter.• Amnesty International Blog: “My life inside a Chinese labor camp” by former prisoner of conscience Bu Dongwei (7 December 2009)• Write-a-thon success stories: Bu Dongwei (2008)• Action: End Persecution of Falun Gong practitioner (10 December 2007)• Petition: China: Petition: Fair trials for all! Free Bu Dongwei• Urgent Action: Bu Dongwei (August 29, 2006) China: The Olympics countdown Repression of activists overshadows death penalty and media reforms (excerpts)Liang Wenjian and othersUrgent Action: Liang Wenjian and others (March 20, 2007)Gao Rongrong (f)Gao Rongrong Appeal Case (June 28, 2005)Liu YawenUrgent Action: Liu Yawen (April 22, 2005)Luo Rong and Luo ZhenUrgent Action: Luo Rong and Luo Zhen (November 29, 2002)Crackdown on Adherents in Changchun CityUrgent Actions: Crackdown on Adherents in Changchun City (action 1 / action 2) Urgent Actions and Reports on Lawyers Who Had Defended Falun Gong Adherents Chinese human rights defenders subjected to ‘absurd’ disbarment hearing (22 April 2010)Amnesty International has condemned as ‘absurd’ a legal hearing aiming to revoke the legal licences of two Chinese human rights lawyers who had defended Falun Gong practitioners."Breaking the law: Crackdown on human rights lawyers and legal activists in China" (excerpts) Excerpts from a report published in September 2009 detailing growing intimidation, assault, jailing, and disbarment of numerous human rights lawyers, many of whom had defended Falun Gong practitioners. In several instances, authorities' linked the lawyers' harassment and punishment directly to their defense of Falun Gong. Wang YonghangUrgent Action: China: Lawyer jailed for defending human rights (4 December 2009)“Human rights lawyer Wang Yonghang has been sentenced to seven years' imprisonment in connection with his work representing Falun Gong practitioners. He has appealed. He is a prisoner of conscience.” Urgent Action: China: Further information: Wang Yonghang formally arrested (28 August 2009) Urgent Action: China: Human rights lawyer detained, tortured: Wang Yonghang (28 July 2009) Wei Liangyue and wife Du YongjingUrgent Action: China: Fear of torture and other ill-treatment (26 March 2009)“Human rights lawyer Wei Liangyue and his wife Du Yongjing were detained on 28 February in the city of Harbin, Heilongjiang Province, reportedly for attending a Falun Gong meeting. They are currently held at Nangang District Detention Centre in Harbin. … Amnesty International believes they are at risk of torture and other ill-treatment.”China: Further Information on Fear of torture and other ill-treatment (31 March 2009)“Human rights lawyer Wei Liangyue and his wife Du Yongjing have been released and returned home after 30 days of detention. Both were released on bail on 30 March pending further investigation. Wei Liangyue remains under suspicion of “gathering a crowd to disturb social order” and Du Yongjing is still under suspicion of “using a heretical organization to undermine implementation of the law”…. Wei Liangyue believes that international attention and pressure contributed to him and his wife’s temporary release, and would like to thank those who have taken actions for them.” Li HepingUrgent Action (3 October 2007) Gao ZhishengUrgent Action: China: Arbitrary detention/Fear of torture and other ill-treatment (2 February 2009) “Beijing-based human rights lawyer Gao Zhisheng, who has been under house arrest since November 2007, was taken into custody on or shortly after 19 January . He is being held incommunicado at an unknown location. In the light of the harsh treatment he received earlier, he is considered to be at high risk of torture and other ill-treatment.” Urgent Action: China: Fear for safety/ possible incommunicado detention (September 28, 2007)Background briefing on Rights Lawyer Gao Zhisheng (December 22, 2006)Urgent Action: China: Further information on: Fear for safety/ death threats: Gao Zhisheng (October 23, 2006)China: Amnesty International fears for missing hunger-strike activists Reports and Press Releases on Falun Gong (1999-2000) China: Reports of torture and ill-treatment of followers of the Falun Gong (October, 22 1999)China: The crackdown on Falun Gong and other so-called ‘heretical organizations’ (March 23, 2000)People’s Republic of China: Falun Gong practitioners: list of sentences, administrative sentences and those detained (March 29, 2000)China: Falun Gong deaths in custody continue to rise as crackdown worsens (December 19, 2000) Internet Censorship and Cyberdissidents (2001-2008) People’s Republic of China: State control of the internet in China. (November 26, 2002)Appeal cases for Falun Gong cyberdissidents, including two adherents who died in custody: “People’s Republic of China: State control of the internet in China: Appeal cases” (November 26, 2002)People’s Republic of China: The Olympics countdown: One year left to fulfil human rights promises” (August 7, 2007)