January to June 2024: 2,714 Falun Gong Practitioners Arrested or Harassed in China
From January to June 2024, 2,714 Falun Gong practitioners experienced harassment or were arrested by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for their faith. An increase in surveillance and monitoring was noted in multiple cases.
These cases were originally reported to Minghui.org, which documented 1,470 arrests and 1,244 cases of harassment. The greatest number of harassment and arrest cases occurred during the spring, with April, May, and March having 699, 618, and 543 cases, respectively.
Due to the anniversaries related to Falun Gong in April and May, the CCP appears to have intensified its persecution efforts during these periods. April 25 marked the 25th anniversary of a historic appeal when 10,000 people peacefully gathered in Beijing to request for the release of detained Falun Gong practitioners. May 13, World Falun Dafa Day, commemorates the introduction of Falun Gong to the public.
Five times more cases in Hebei
China consists of 22 provinces, 4 centrally controlled municipalities, and 5 autonomous regions. With the exceptions of Tibet, Xinjiang, Qinghai, and Zhejiang, all other jurisdictions reported arrest and harassment cases of Falun Gong practitioners during the last six months.
Hebei, a province located close to Beijing, had the most combined cases for a total of 472, which was nearly 5 times the number of average cases (100) nationwide. Shandong (354), Liaoning (336) and Jilin (297) also had some of the highest numbers of persecution cases. Eight regions total had cases in the triple-digit range, while fourteen regions had double-digit cases and the five remaining regions had cases in the single-digits.
Multiple group arrests also took place during this period, with two notable cases occurring in Jilin province, where 46 practitioners and 35 practitioners on two different occasions were arrested during the period from April to May. Twelve practitioners were arrested in Hebei Province in April, eighteen practitioners were arrested in Ning’an City, Heilongjian Province in May, and eight practitioners between the ages of 67 and 87 were arrested in Kunming City, Yunnan Province in June.
Seventeen percent elderly
Out of the 2,714 practitioners who were harassed or arrested, approximately seventeen percent (457) were 60 years of age or older. This included 135 practitioners in their 60s, 219 in their 70s, 96 in their 80s, and 7 in their 90s, with the oldest targeted practitioner being 99 years old.
In one case, 75-year-old Mr. Tian Yuchun was arrested on April 18, 2024, in Changchun, Jilin Province. He was told by the police that their superiors had ordered them to meet a certain quota for arresting Falun Gong practitioners by May 1. Although Mr. Tian suffered from high blood pressure, stroke symptoms, and retinal detachment, he was still admitted to a detention center and denied the right to legal representation and family visitation.
In another case, a Shandong local was released on bail in May 2024 after being held in detention for 37 days. When Mr. Wang Junheng was released, his family did not even recognize him due to the horrific abuse he had endured, including force-feeding and multiple beatings. Mr. Wang was originally arrested for helping two people advocate for the release of their mother, a Falun Gong practitioner, in April.
University student, new practitioner arrested
University students are not overlooked in this persecution. Ms. Xie Xiaoting, a college student at Guangdong Pharmaceutical University, was arrested on January 9, 2024, for removing an anti-Falun Gong propaganda poster on campus. After upholding her faith and refusing to renounce Falun Gong, Ms. Xie was threatened with expulsion.
Ms. Zhang Jinhua, an auditor from Shulan City, Jilin Province, began practicing Falun Gong in 2023 after struggling with chronic conditions that medication couldn’t alleviate. She experienced significant improvements in her health, including a healthy weight and increased energy. When asked by acquaintances about her recovery, she attributed it to her practice of Falun Gong. Despite these positive changes, Ms. Zhang was arrested on June 2, 2024, and has been held in a detention center since then.
Other documented cases in this sample include well-established professionals in their respective fields, ranging from professors, post office workers, prosecutors, engineers, doctors, and judges.
Bounties on practitioners
The CCP has not ceased in its efforts to persecute practitioners of Falun Gong ever since the persecution’s formal initiation on July 20, 1999. The CCP’s Ministry of Public Security (MPS), during one of its virtual meetings in December of 2023, ordered a renewed crackdown on “cults.”
For over two decades, the CCP has used the cult label to justify its persecution of Falun Gong, creating a negative connotation in the public’s mind.
The MPS’s statement was effectively a directive to continue this targeting, which included offering financial rewards for reporting Falun Gong practitioners, ranging from 500 to 5,000 yuan per report, organizing mass signature drives to obtain public support against Falun Gong, and posting anti-Falun Gong propaganda on public platforms. For instance, employees at China Pingmei Shenma Holding Group Co. Ltd. were coerced into signing a pledge against “superstitious” or anti-Marxist activities, using their full names and IDs. Those who refused faced threats of dismissal.
On February 28, 2024, the Xiangtan City PLAC and Xiangtan City Police Department posted a message about Falun Gong on WeChat, urging the public to report anyone labeled as a ‘cult,’ including Falun Gong practitioners. Additionally, China’s top three broadcasting companies received government notices to send the same anti-Falun Gong messages to their audiences.
In Jilin City’s High-tech Zone, a notice about illegal ‘cult’ activities was issued and distributed to residential areas via WeChat. Although no law in China criminalizes Falun Gong as a cult, the CCP has consistently associated it with this label in their efforts to target practitioners.
Elevated harassment during Two Sessions
Ms. Sun Guilan, a resident of Chicheng County, Hebei Province, was harassed multiple times during the Two Sessions, which marks the annual meetings of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and the National People’s Congress (NPC).
On March 5, 2024, police officers entered Ms. Sun’s home and inspected items related to Falun Gong. They asked her to renounce her faith and sign a statement to formalize this renunciation. Ms. Sun refused, asserting that she had not broken any laws by practicing Falun Gong. Her son supported her stance and confronted the police, who eventually left the premises.
A few days later on March 8, they harassed Ms. Sun again and threatened her with 10 days in detention if she refused to officially renounce Falun Gong. She remained steadfast and did not sign the renunciation paper.
Comprehensive surveillance system
As part of the intensifying harassment towards Falun Gong practitioners, a comprehensive surveillance system was implemented throughout China.
In Jinzhou City, Liaoning Province, the police officers installed surveillance cameras near the homes of targeted practitioners and even attached tracking devices on their electric bicycles.
In 2011, the Ministry of Railways and Ministry of Public Security began a real-name ticketing system in 2011, which required all train passengers to use their real names and provide identification documents when purchasing tickets. The significance of this system is that it acts as a mass surveillance tool to more easily enable the CCP to target Falun Gong practitioners and other groups who are viewed as enemies of the communist regime. Many practitioners have been arrested this way when their identities were unguarded while trying to use public transportation.
A further example of the CCP’s attempts to ostracize practitioners involves more blatant displays of targeting. Ms. Chen Wei, a resident of Shanghai, was evicted from her apartment in February for her faith. The police ordered her landlord to make sure no future tenants practiced Falun Gong.
Cash confiscation, home eviction
During some of the arrests reported during January to June 2024, several practitioners were also victims of significant financial theft when police raided their homes.
Mr. Li Zhuozhong and his wife Ms. Liao Yuanqun are residents of Xingning City, Guangdong Province, and they were accosted by over ten police officers on April 19, 2024. The police barged into their residence and spent three hours looking through their belongings. They confiscated multiple printers, more than twenty boxes of printing paper, boxes containing Falun Gong texts and informational materials, and 200,000 yuan (~$30,000 USD) in cash.
Ms. Liu Cuixian, a resident of Kunming City, Yunnan Province, was arrested at her home in early June 2024 while reading Falun Gong books with other practitioners. The police stole 100,000 yuan (~$15,000 USD) in cash from her home and froze her bank account, which contained several million yuan.
Mr. He Hongjun and his wife Ms. Fu Wenhui of Chaoyang City, Liaoning Province, visited the print shop of a fellow practitioner, Mr. Lan Qingzhong, in Chifeng City, Inner Mongolia, in May this year. However, as soon as they entered the shop, officers disguised in plainclothes went in and confiscated Mr. Lan’s printers, computers and 320,000 yuan cash, as well as 120,000 yuan cash from the couple. The police then accompanied Mr. He back to his residence in Chaoyang City, where they took possession of an additional 91,000 yuan in cash, his home keys, car keys, and other items.
