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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 427-acre (1.73 km2) compound in Deerpark, New York, United States, near the residence of Li Hongzhi.
Human rights in China are periodically reviewed by international bodies, such as human rights treaty bodies and the United Nations Human Rights Council's Universal Periodic Review. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), the government of the People's Republic of China (PRC), their supporters, and other proponents claim that existing policies and enforcement measures are sufficient to guard against human rights abuses. However, other countries, international non-governmental organizations (NGOs) including Human Rights in China and Amnesty International, and citizens, lawyers, and dissidents inside the country, state that the authorities in mainland China regularly sanction or organize such abuses.
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.
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.
Censorship in the People's Republic of China is mandated by the PRC's ruling party, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). It is one of the strictest censorship regimes in the world. The government censors content for mainly political reasons, such as curtailing political opposition, and censoring events unfavorable to the CCP, such as the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre, pro-democracy movements in China, the persecution of Uyghurs in China, human rights in Tibet, Falun Gong, pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong, and aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic. Since Xi Jinping became the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party in 2012, censorship has been "significantly stepped up".
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.
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.
Baiqiao Tang is a Chinese political dissident from Hunan province who led student protests during the 1989 democracy movement. After the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre, Tang fled from agents of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) who eventually arrested him in the city of Jiangmen. He was charged with being a counter-revolutionary and imprisoned. Upon his release, he fled to Hong Kong, where he co-authored the report Anthems of Defeat: Crackdown in Hunan Province 1989 - 1992 through Human Rights Watch with Dr. Robin Munro of the University of London. Tang was later accepted into the United States as a political refugee in 1992. Tang claimed that he graduated in 2003 with a Master's degree in international affairs from Columbia University, but university archive and registrar of Columbia University claimed that he studied there but did not graduate.
Ye Xiaowen is a Chinese politician who held various top posts relating to state regulation of religion in China from 1995 to 2009.
The 6521 Project, sometimes called the "6521 Group," was the moniker given to a nationwide operation initiated by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in 2009 to ensure "social stability" by cracking down on potential dissidents during anniversaries of political significance. The digits in the campaign’s name are a reference to the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, the 50th anniversary of the 1959 Tibetan uprising, the 20th anniversary of the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre, and the 10th anniversary of the persecution of Falun Gong.
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.
Book censorship in the People's Republic of China (PRC) is mandated by the PRC's ruling party, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), and is currently widespread in China. Enforcement is strict and sometimes inconsistent. Punishment for violations can be arbitrary many times leading to long sentences for crimes against censorship laws.
Antireligious campaigns in China are a series of policies and practices taken as part of the Chinese Communist Party's official promotion of state atheism, coupled with its persecution of people with spiritual or religious beliefs, in the People's Republic of China. Antireligious campaigns were launched in 1949, after the Chinese Communist Revolution, and they continue to be waged against Buddhists, Christians, Muslims, and members of other religious communities in the 21st century.
The 30th anniversary of Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 was principally events that occurred in China and elsewhere on 4 June 2019 - to commemorate the Chinese Communist Party's crackdown on the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 in which hundreds of people were killed.
Chinese censorship abroad refers to extraterritorial censorship by the government of the People's Republic of China, i.e. censorship that is conducted beyond China's own borders. The censorship can be applied to both Chinese expatriates and foreign groups. Sensitive topics that have been censored include the political status of Taiwan, human rights in Tibet, Xinjiang internment camps, the persecution of Uyghurs in China, the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre, the 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests, the COVID-19 pandemic in mainland China, the PRC government's COVID-19 pandemic response, the persecution of Falun Gong, and more general issues related to human rights and democracy in China.
Beginning in July 2017, the government of China has been censoring imagery of the anthropomorphic teddy bear Winnie-the-Pooh, particularly Disney's version of the character. The censorship is believed to be a result of General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party Xi Jinping being compared to the character in internet memes, which the Chinese government perceived as a disrespectful mockery of Xi. Despite the censorship, there is no general ban on books and toys depicting Winnie-the-Pooh in China; two Winnie-the-Pooh-themed rides still operate in Shanghai Disneyland.
References
- ↑ Schiller, Bill (4 January 2008). "Beijing braces for 'The Three T's'". www.thestar.com. The Star. Retrieved 10 August 2020.
- ↑ Chao, Eveline (26 October 2012). "Me and My Censor". foreignpolicy.com. Foreign Policy. Retrieved 10 August 2020.
- ↑ Das, Shanti. "Beijing leans on UK dons to praise Communist Party and avoid 'the three Ts — Tibet, Tiananmen and Taiwan'". www.thetimes.co.uk. Retrieved 10 August 2020.
- ↑ Spector, Mike; Ma, Wayne (4 June 2018). "If You Want to Do Business in China, Mind Your T's: Taiwan and Tibet". Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 10 August 2020.
- ↑ Yglesias, Matthew (2019-10-07). "The raging controversy over the NBA, China, and the Hong Kong protests, explained". Vox. Retrieved 2021-01-14.
- ↑ Watts, Jonathan (25 January 2006). "Backlash as Google shores up great firewall of China". The Guardian . Retrieved 10 August 2020.
- ↑ Mohan, Geeta. "German MP sports T-shirt supporting Taiwan, Tiananmen and Tibet". www.indiatoday.in. India Today. Retrieved 19 December 2020.