Clearwisdom Reporting Team

(Clearwisdom.net) November 20, 2001 -- About 2pm Beijing Time, 36 Western Falun Gong practitioners displayed a banner stating "Truthfulness, Compassion, Forbearance" and staged a peaceful appeal for Falun Gong on Tiananmen Square. A few minutes later, they were all arrested by Chinese police.

These 36 Western Falun Gong practitioners, who came from 12 countries including the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Germany, United States, Canada, and Australia, displayed a banner stating "Truthfulness, Compassion, Forbearance" and sat in meditation on the Square. One of them called out loudly "Falun Dafa Is Good" to the tourists and was beaten by the police. According to an eyewitness account, a few minutes later, all 36 practitioners were arrested by the police. One practitioner made a brief phone call to a friend from a police station near Tiananmen Square about their situation and said that reporters from CNN and other overseas media were arrested along with them at the same time.

Major western media such as the New York Times, BBC, CNN, Reuters, and AP have also reported on this incident. The AP photo to the right was taken on November 20.

(Updated at 11:15am EST. New information and media reports will be posted under "Worldwide News and Activities.")

Posting date: 11/20/2001
Original article date: 11/20/2001
Category: News & Media Reports
Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.ca/mh/articles/2001/11/20/19995.html