North Wales couple will appeal for UN intervention
By: Joe Barron, Staff Writer
April 14, 2001A North Wales couple has embarked on a crusade to end the Chinese government's persecution of a spiritual movement.
Allen and Joyce Wu both regularly practice the discipline known as Falun Gong, a combination of exercise and mediation adherents say leads to improved health an inner peace.
The Chinese communist government calls it a cult and in 1999 began arresting and torturing its practitioners, according to Allen and Joyce, and since January, they have gathered 2000 signatures on a petition calling for an end to the repression.
On April 14, Joyce will carry the petition to Geneva, where she intends to submit it petition to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights.
Allen and Joyce appeared before the Montgomery Township Board of Supervisors April 9 to ask for signatures. April 10 they reiterated their request before the North Wales Borough Council, and added a request that the council to set aside a week in May as "Falun Gong" week.
Allen described the violence both in general terms and through the stories of individuals. In North Wales, he showed the council a picture of an elderly farmer sitting on the ground in front of a police officer. The old man opened a sack, Allen said, and showed the officer several pairs of shoes he had worn out walking to Beijing from the countryside.
The man had journeyed for months to appear in the capital and tell the world the government was wrong, according to Allen.
"I don't know this person," he said. "I don't know if he is alive or not. But I will never forget his face."
More than 180 Falun Gong practitioners have died at the hands of Chinese police, and more than 10,000 have been imprisoned without trial in labor camps, according to Allen.
The Chinese government's campaign has also reached the shores of the United States, he said. On a recent Sunday, he told the North Wales council, he telephoned a local Chinese bookstore, and the proprietor told him he had removed all books on Falun Gong.
"I asked them why," he continued. "They said, because they got pressure. It was said the Chinese government would stop their book and magazine sources for them."
North Wales Councilman Kenneth Graham wondered aloud why the Chinese government would want to suppress such a seemingly harmless thing.
"I think the reason is too many people practice Falun Gong," Joyce replied. "Over 100 million people there follow Falun Gong. The numbers already exceed the number of the Communist Party. They feel threatened."
Allen and Joyce's plea fell on sympathetic ears. At the Montgomery Township and North Wales meetings, officials and spectators signed the petitions almost to a person and extended to Joyce and Allen their good wishes.
North Wales Mayor Doug Ross invited them to demonstrate Falun Gong at the borough's community day May 19.
Allen and Joyce Wu came to the United States from China 10 years ago, Joyce said. Both hold advanced degrees - he a Ph..D in chemistry, she a master's degree in information technology - and both work for the Merck corporation.
SIDEBAR
Two years ago, Joyce Wu felt stressed out at the end of every day at Merck, where she works as a systems analyst. She had trouble sleeping.
To help herself relax, she turned to Falun Gong, a combination of meditation and exercises resembling those of Tai Chi. The practice was introduced in China in 1992 by a man named Li Hongzhi, and Wu swears by it.
"After practicing only a couple of weeks, I felt totally different," she said. "I never need the sleeping pills anymore. I feel energized, and every day people saw me, and [said,] 'Oh Joyce, looks wonderful now.'"
Falun Gong also stresses the principals of truthfulness, compassion and forbearance, Wu said.
"I tell myself I need to do it continually. I don't want to stop anything," she said. "This is the righteous way."
However righteous it may be to her, to Chinese government, Falun Gong is a cult. The communist regime initiated a violent crackdown in 1999.
Joyce will travel to Geneva, Switzerland, April 14 to submit a petition to the United Nations Commission on Human Rights calling for an end to the repression.
"I just feel that it's stupid," Joyce said. "Why do they stop people from doing this? It's really good exercise."
©Montgomery Newspapers 2001