Hong Kong Falun Gong Practitioners Gather at Singtao Daily to Protest Misleading Article

(Clearwisdom.net) According to today's Apple Daily, a report with photos entitled "Radical Religions Advocate Destruction of the World" appeared on page A7 of Singtao Daily in Hong Kong yesterday. The article absolutely distorted the truth by listing Falun Gong in the report and even showcasing it in the most prominent position on the upper right hand corner of the paper. Because of this report, Hong Kong Falun Gong practitioners went to Singtao Daily's office the same day to protest and request that the newspaper clarify the deceptive article. Here is the report from Apple Daily.

Risking a category 3 typhoon, nearly 80 Hong Kong Falun Gong practitioners went to Singtao Daily News Agency yesterday afternoon to protest the listing of Falun Gong among the radical religions who "advocate the destruction of the world" in a slanderous and ill-intentioned article.

The practitioners asked to have a dialogue with the chief editor and requested that the newspaper clarify the untruthful report and apologize for it. However Singtao Daily's senior staff did not deal with the issue, but instead allowed administrative staff members to accept the protest letter. The practitioners left peacefully after the appeal.

Hong Kong Falun Gong representative Kan Hung Cheung talked to Apple Daily about the protest. Some practitioners learned of the Singtao Daily report yesterday morning and were very concerned about it, so in that afternoon they spontaneously went to the Singtao Daily office in Kowloon to protest and to request that the untruthful report be clarified and corrected. Having informed the police in advance, about 80 practitioners were present at the peak time.

Yesterday the editorial department of Singtao Daily published a written statement and expressed the following opinions: The purpose of the report was to discuss the viewpoints of new religions about the end of the world. The majority of the contents were from scholars and it was not intended to highlight any new religions. The contents related to Falun Gong were quotes from various references and are not a critique of Falun Gong. The newspaper respects all legal organizations in Hong Kong to express their opinions freely and will react properly [to their appeals].

However, Kan Hung Cheung was very unsatisfied with the statement from the Singtao Daily editorial department and commented that in fact the newspaper had not admitted its mistake. He pointed out that the references about Falun Gong used in the report came from early propaganda from the Beijing government. Since the Falun Gong association had pointed out the absurdity of this propaganda a long time ago, the newspaper was not conforming to the facts.
Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.ca/mh/articles/2001/9/22/16870.html

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