Daily News

In early August, Chen Yinghus, a 30-year-old Falun Gong practitioners in Jiaxing City, China was arrested for distributing CDs about the practice.

She has been in jail ever since, and her brother, Chen Yingyi, who lives in Nanaimo, claims she is being tortured. Chen's sister is one of many Falun Gong practitioners in China who have been arrested for practicing Falun Gong, which combines the physical and meditative aspects of qi gong with certain moral precepts.

It is the plight of people like Chen Yinghua that Canadian Falun Gong adherents hope to bring to the attention of the Canadian government and public during a cross-county campaign aimed at pressuring China to stop its repression of Falun Gong.

The prime minister is going to visit China. I hope he can raise this issue, says Chen, who is a lab technician at the Pacific Biological Research Station.

The cross-Canada Tour for Justice will be in Nanaimo Oct 14 to raise awareness of the plight of Falun Gong practitioners in China.

Falun Gong Tour for Justice for Victims will gather at city hall (455 Wallace St.) at 1:30 p.m. Tuesday. There will be a picture display, Falun Gong demonstrations and a number of speakers. Chen is not a Falun Gong
practitioner himself, but his mother and sister are. He hopes public pressure will help her.

Chen's sister has been in custody since Aug. 8. She refused to tell police where she got the Falun Gong CDs she had been distributing, and when she was not released she started a hunger strike on Sept. 13. Officials responded by strapping her to a hospital bed and force-feeding her through a tube, Chen says. He fears she could die.

Falun Gong started in China in 1992. Originally, the government tolerated and even encouraged it.

But Falun Gong practitioners claim there are now 100 million practitioners in China, and the Chinese government now views it as a serious threat.