Falun Gong or Falun Dafa is a new religious movement. Falun Gong was founded by its leader Li Hongzhi in China in the early 1990s. Falun Gong has its global headquarters in Dragon Springs,a 173-hectare (427-acre) compound in Deerpark,New York,United States,near the residence of Li Hongzhi.
Zeng Qinghong is a retired Chinese politician. He was a member of the Politburo Standing Committee of the Chinese Communist Party,China's highest leadership council,and First Secretary of the Secretariat of the Central Committee between 2002 and 2007. He also served as the Vice President of China from 2003 to 2008. During the 1990s,Zeng was a close ally of then-Party general secretary Jiang Zemin,and was instrumental in consolidating Jiang's power. For years,Zeng was the primary force behind the party's organization and personnel.
Luo Gan is a retired Chinese politician. Between 2002 and 2007,Luo was one of China's top leaders,serving as a member of the nine-man Politburo Standing Committee of the Chinese Communist Party,and as the Secretary of Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission (Zhengfawei),which became one of China's most powerful political offices,and well-funded bureaucracies,during Luo's term. In his Zhengfawei role,Luo held oversight for many law-enforcement institutions,including the police,public security officers,armed police,labor camps,prisons,and the judicial system. Luo retired from politics in 2007.
The Shanghai clique,also referred to as the Shanghai gang,Jiang clique,or Jiang faction,refers to an informal group of Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials who rose to prominence under former CCP General Secretary Jiang Zemin while he served as the party chief and mayor of Shanghai.
The Foreign Affairs Commission of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party,commonly called the Central Foreign Affairs Commission,is a commission of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) that exercises general oversight on matters related to foreign affairs.
In the People's Republic of China,Deng Xiaoping formally retired after the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre,to be succeeded by former Shanghai CCP secretary Jiang Zemin. During that period,the crackdown of the protests in 1989 led to great woes in China's reputation globally,and sanctions resulted. The situation,however,would eventually stabilize. Deng's idea of checks and balances in the political system also saw its demise with Jiang consolidating power in the party,state and military. The 1990s saw healthy economic development,but the closing of state-owned enterprises and increasing levels of corruption and unemployment,along with environmental challenges continued to plague China,as the country saw the rise to consumerism,crime,and new-age spiritual-religious movements such as Falun Gong. The 1990s also saw the peaceful handover of Hong Kong and Macau to Chinese control under the formula of One Country,Two Systems. China also saw a new surge of nationalism when facing crises abroad.
The Central Commission for Discipline Inspection (CCDI) is the highest supervisory organ of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The CCDI is under the control of the CCP Central Committee,per the principle of unified power. It is tasked with defending the party constitution,enforcing inner-party regulations,coordinating anti-corruption work,and safeguarding the core position of Xi Jinping in the CCP Central Committee and the party as a whole. Safeguarding the political position of Xi and the Central Committee is,officially,the CCDI's highest responsibility. Since the vast majority of officials at all levels of government are also CCP members,the commission is,in practice,the top anti-corruption body in China.
Freedom of religion in China may be referring to the following entities separated by the Taiwan Strait:
Falun Gong,also called Falun Dafa,is a spiritual practice and system of beliefs that combines the practice of meditation with the moral philosophy articulated by its leader and founder,Li Hongzhi. It emerged on the public radar in the Spring of 1992 in the northeastern Chinese city of Changchun,and was classified as a system of qigong identifying with the Buddhist tradition. Li claimed to have both supernatural powers like the ability to prevent illness,as well having eternal youth and promised that others can attain supernatural powers and eternal youth by following his teachings. Falun Gong initially enjoyed official sanction and support from Chinese government agencies,and the practice grew quickly on account of the simplicity of its exercise movements,impact on health,the absence of fees or formal membership,and moral and philosophical teachings.
Falun Gong,a new religious movement that combines meditation with the moral philosophy articulated by founder Li Hongzhi,first began spreading widely in China in 1992. Li's first lectures outside mainland China took place in Paris in 1995. At the invitation of the Chinese ambassador to France,he lectured on his teachings and practice methods to the embassy staff and others. From that time on,Li gave lectures in other major cities in Europe,Asia,Oceania,and North America. He has resided permanently in the United States since 1998. Falun Gong is now practiced in some 70 countries worldwide,and the teachings have been translated to over 40 languages. The international Falun Gong community is estimated to number in the hundreds of thousands,though participation estimates are imprecise on account of a lack of formal membership.
The Tiananmen Square self-immolation incident took place in Tiananmen Square in central Beijing,on the eve of Chinese New Year on 23 January 2001. There is controversy over the incident;Chinese government sources say that five members of Falun Gong,a new religious movement that is banned in mainland China,set themselves on fire in the square. Falun Gong sources disputed the accuracy of these portrayals,and claimed that their teachings explicitly forbid violence or suicide. Some journalists have claimed that the self-immolations were staged.
Zhong Gong (中功) is a spiritual movement based on qigong founded in 1987 by Zhang Hongbao. The full name (中华养生益智功) translates to "China Health Care and Wisdom Enhancement Practice." The system distinguished itself from other forms of qigong by its strong emphasis on commercialisation,and a targeted strategy that aimed to build a national commercial organisation in China in the 1990s.
Masanjia Labor Camp is a "re-education" through labor camp located in the Yuhong district near Shenyang,in the Liaoning province of China. The facility is sometimes called the Ideology Education School of Liaoning Province.
The Weiquan movement is a non-centralized group of lawyers,legal experts,and intellectuals in China who seek to protect and defend the civil rights of the citizenry through litigation and legal activism. The movement,which began in the early 2000s,has organized demonstrations,sought reform via the legal system and media,defended victims of human rights abuses,and written appeal letters,despite opposition from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Among the issues adopted by Weiquan lawyers are property and housing rights,protection for AIDS victims,environmental damage,religious freedom,freedom of speech and the press,and defending the rights of other lawyers facing disbarment or imprisonment.
The persecution of Falun Gong is the campaign initiated in 1999 by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to eliminate the spiritual practice of Falun Gong in China,maintaining a doctrine of state atheism. It is characterized by a multifaceted propaganda campaign,a program of enforced ideological conversion and re-education and reportedly a variety of extralegal coercive measures such as arbitrary arrests,forced labor and physical torture,sometimes resulting in death.
Protesters and dissidents in China espouse a wide variety of grievances,most commonly in the areas of unpaid wages,compensation for land development,local environmental activism,or NIMBY activism. Tens of thousands of protests occur each year. National level protests are less common. Notable protests include the 1959 Tibetan uprising,the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre,the April 1999 demonstration by Falun Gong practitioners at Zhongnanhai,the 2008 Tibetan unrest,the July 2009 Ürümqi riots,and the 2022 COVID-19 protests.
Li Dongsheng was a Vice Minister of China's Ministry of Public Security and a member of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. He oversaw the office in charge of suppressing the Falun Gong and other banned spiritual groups. Seen as an associate of Zhou Yongkang,Li was investigated for corruption allegations in 2013 and charged with abuse of power and bribery. In 2016,he was sentenced to 15 years in prison.
The organization of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is based upon the Leninist concept of democratic centralism.
Heterodox teaching is a concept in the law of the People's Republic of China (PRC) and its administration regarding new religious movements and their suppression. Also translated as 'cults' or 'evil religions',"heterodox teachings" are defined in Chinese law as organizations and religious movements that either fraudulently use religion to carry out other illegal activities,deify their leaders,spread "superstition" to confuse or deceive the public,or "disturb the social order" by harming people's lives or property. What exactly these definitions mean has been interpreted in various ways since their establishment in 1999/2000. Organizations that are found by local police forces in the PRC to be distributing heterodox teachings are targeted for disruption,and its leaders and organizers are severely prosecuted.
Sun Lijun is a former Chinese politician and police officer. He was investigated by the Chinese Communist Party's anti-graft agency in April 2020 and was given the death sentence with reprieve for bribery and corruption in September 2022. Sun Lijun was affiliated with a group of other corrupt officials associated with Jiang Zemin.
