Houston Chronicle: Falun Gong [practitioners] sue area hotel

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Seventy-two [practitioners]¹ of a spiritual group banned in China filed a federal lawsuit Friday accusing a Galleria-area hotel of canceling their reservations at the request of Chinese agents during an October 2002 visit to Houston by the Chinese president.

[Practitioners]¹ of Falun Gong, a spiritual self-improvement group, allege that Homestead Studio Suites Hotels canceled reservations of all those identified as being associated with the group.

The lawsuit also accuses the hotel of canceling the reservations of all those with Asian names.

The hotel acted at the request of a Chinese agency known as the Falun Gong Control Office, or Office 6/10, the lawsuit charges.

Falun Gong [practitioners]¹ were planning to protest the official persecution of the group, outlawed in 1999, during a visit by then Chinese President Jiang Zemin.

The hotel canceled the reservations "in an effort to suppress the practice of their beliefs, freedom of assembly and to undermine their ability to speak out against the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners," the lawsuit says.

A spokesman for the hotel could not be reached late Friday, but hotel officials said at the time that the reservations were canceled because the hotel was overbooked.

The lawsuit calls the explanation a "pretextual excuse."

Falun Gong attorney Richard Ellison could not be reached for comment.

The lawsuit seeks an unspecified amount in damages.

http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/metropolitan/2672465