PRESS STATEMENT
MICHAEL R. POMPEO, SECRETARY OF STATE
JULY 20, 2020
Since 1999, the Communist Party of China (CCP) has sought to eradicate Falun Gong, a spiritual practice originating in China, and its peaceful practitioners and human rights defenders who have fought for their right to practice their beliefs. Extensive evidence shows the PRC government continues to repress and abuse this community to this day, including reported torture of Falun Gong practitioners and detention of thousands.
Last year, I welcomed Dr. Yuhua Zhang, one among many Falun Gong survivors of the CCP’s campaign of persecution, to the Ministerial to Advance Religious Freedom. After surviving what she described as torture while in a labor camp and a prison in China, she advocates on behalf of her imprisoned husband, Ma Zhenyu, who has endured months of torture because he refuses to renounce his Falun Gong beliefs.
We call on the PRC government to immediately end its depraved abuse and mistreatment of Falun Gong practitioners, release those imprisoned due to their beliefs, such as Ma Zhenyu, and address the whereabouts of missing practitioners. Twenty-one years of persecution of Falun Gong practitioners is far too long, and it must end.
Aric Chen
Editor