By Nina Wu

02/17/2002

Five Bay Area residents who went to Beijing to unfurl banners bearing the message "Falun Gong is good" returned to San Francisco shaken, but not deterred.

The group was on its way to Tiananmen Square when it was detained by Chinese police for about 24 hours, before being sent back to the Bay Area, where they arrived Friday.

David Kute, 23, of San Rafael, the first to walk into the arrival lobby, said undercover officers arrested him, Chun Lee, 24, of San Jose and Steve Ispas, 33, of Sunnyvale after Ispas unfurled a banner as the trio neared the square.

"They all set upon me and they mobbed me," Ispas said of the police.

"It felt like they were pulling my skin, twisting it. Then they threw me on the ground and it felt like I was being punched by a bunch of people."

The five, who also included Eugen Carai, 45, of Santa Clara and Huy Lu, 34, of Daly City, departed Feb. 10 to join about 40 other foreigners planning to hold Falun Gong demonstrations at the square.

Lee was likely beaten the most, activists said, because she looked Chinese. The mother of a small child was celebrating her 24th birthday Friday, and she wept as she explained how police kicked her in the head, broke her glasses and punched her in the nose.

While she was screaming, she said, they stuffed a scarf into her mouth. She thought her jaw was broken because she could not close it. Falun Gong activist Sherry Zhang said friends later discovered in a restroom that Lee's body was covered with bruises.

[...] The protesters were escorted to Rep. Nancy Pelosi's office and then to a hospital, Zhang said.

http://www.examiner.com/news/default.jsp?story=n.falun.0217w

Posting date: 2/20/2002
Original article date: 2/17/2002
Category: News & Media Reports

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