Toronto: Practitioners Stage a Symbolic Hunger Strike in Front of Chinese Consulate Demanding the Immediate Release of American Citizen Charles Li (Photos)

By a Toronto Falun Gong practitioner

(Clearwisdom.net) From 9am to 5 pm June 1 2003, Toronto Falun Gong practitioners went on hunger strike in front of the Chinese Consulate demanding the immediate release of Charles Li, a Falun Gong practitioner and American doctor who has been on hunger strike in a Chinese prison for five days. On the same day, practitioners throughout Canada started hunger strike protests in front of the Chinese Embassy and Consulates in Canada.

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Confirmed by Voice Of America, American citizen Charles Li, who was (illegally) sentenced to three years imprisonment by the Chinese government, went on hunger strike on May 27^th in Nanjing Prison.

Doctor and practitioner Ms. Zhu Dan said, "Charles is a doctor and he knows the severe outcomes of hunger strike. Many organs are exhausted after a hunger strike and the changes can be irreversible. If he was not persecuted so badly by the Chinese government, he would not choose this way to protest."

Mrs. Shou, who is in her 80's, said that she came to the Consulate to participate in the hunger strike protest this morning. She was very clear about the cruel persecution of Chinese practitioners in Mainland China. The persecution has extended to foreign countries. The Falun Gong issue is no longer just a China issue. It is a global issue. The Chinese government uses fabricated charges to imprison foreign citizens. We cannot allow this to continue.

Doctor Charles Li was arrested immediately upon his arrival at Guangzhou airport on January 22 2003. On March 21, after a one-day show trial, he was sentenced to three years and jailed in Nanjing Prison. In the prison, he wrote 94 pages of material to give to the American Consul in Shanghai. But the prison withheld 8 pages he had written related to his wanting to become party to the lawsuit against Jiang and others for the inhumane treatment he has received.

Nanjing Prison has forbidden all communications between Dr. Li and his fiancée Yongqing Foo, and even used the prison locale's high SARS infection rate as an excuse to reject the American Consul's request to visit him.

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