(Clearwisdom.net) Before the one-month Edinburgh Fringe Festival concluded, Falun Dafa practitioners in the United Kingdom once again obtained the approval from the city government of Edinburgh and the festival committee, and held a parade in Edinburgh on August 26 to call attention to the Jiang Zemin regime's criminal persecution of Falun Gong. On August 4, Falun Gong practitioners' float and performance won the first prize at the opening ceremony parade of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and now this is the second time that practitioners display the beauty of Falun Dafa and raise awareness of the persecution in China through parading during the festival.
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After the Falun Gong procession won first prize of the parade performance, the Chinese consul general wrote to the festival committee to put pressure on them. But the festival director said, "Obviously, the consul general was quite upset. But we considered that in the parade procession, the float and dance performance of Falun Dafa practitioners were the best. What especially upset the consul general was that the Falun Gong float won the first prize for their group performance." He added, "As far as I know, Falun Dafa has nothing to do with politics. We know that they are banned and persecuted in China."
Before the parade set off, the former UK Minister of Foreign Affair, Lord Thurlow, Mr. Jim from the Amnesty International, and vice president of the European Branch of Friends of Falun Gong, John Dee, delivered speeches to condemn the Jiang regime's persecution of over three years of Falun Gong. Zhao Ming, a graduate student from Dublin Trinity College also gave a speech. Zhao was imprisoned in China for 2 years for practicing Falun Gong. He suffered all kinds of tortures while imprisoned. A Hong Kong practitioner who had gone through the Hong Kong unjust trial also spoke to call on the United Kingdom to pay attention to Hong Kong and prevent Jiang's regime from extending their persecution of Falun Gong to Hong Kong and demolishing the "one country, two systems" policy.
The parade was very successful. Police vans led the procession to clear the way for practitioners. Accompanied by the song "Falun Dafa is good," practitioners displayed to the spectators the beauty and peacefulness of Falun Dafa. Thousands of Dafa truth-clarifying flyers were quickly distributed.
