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Advertisement Home > | Topic: Organ Harvesting in China's Labor Camps | Region: United States
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China Demonstrator Gets into White House Grounds
Reuters Apr 20, 2006
A woman (C) demands that Chinese Communist Chairman Hu Jintao end the persecution of Falun Gong during a ceremony on the South Lawn off the White House on April 20, 2006 in Washington, DC. (Roger L. Wollenberg-Pool/Getty Images)WASHINGTON - Chinese President Hu Jintao's visit to Washington on Thursday drew several hundred banner-waving protesters, including a demonstrator from the Falun Gong spiritual movement who gained entry to the White House grounds as a member of the press corps.
As Hu was welcomed by President George W. Bush in a White House ceremony, a Chinese woman who had been allowed into the press section began shouting slogans. She was escorted away by a uniformed U.S. guard.
"President Hu, your days are numbered. President Bush, make him stop persecuting Falun Gong," the woman yelled. U.S. officials later identified her as Wang Wenyi, 47, a reporter with The Epoch Times .
The Secret Service was interviewing the woman and a source said she would be charged with disorderly conduct.
Outside the White House, hundreds of yellow-clad Falun Gong practitioners, Taiwanese nationalists, and Tibetan youth group members demonstrated against Hu and his government.
The protesters denounced China's human rights record, its missile build-up near Taiwan and its 55-year-long rule over the Himalayan Buddhist region of Tibet.
"Communist Party = Tyranny + Lies," read a yellow banner, carried by one female member of Falun Gong, which China outlawed and brutally crushed in 1999.
"Taiwan is not a part of China," read a placard hoisted by one of around 300 Taiwan activists, who reject China's claim of sovereignty over the island. Tibetans, mostly U.S.-based students, called for independence for their homeland.
"China has been trying to annex Taiwan, and that goes against the will of Taiwanese," said Wang Neng-hsiang, a Washington, D.C. accountant.
Falun Gong demonstrators called out slogans late into Wednesday night near the house where the Chinese delegation was staying, prompting them to protest to the U.S. government, a U.S. official said.
The same official said Hu's aides were likely to have been offended by the White House heckler. "The hardliners on Hu's team are going to ask, why did it take so long for us to pick her up. It is not a good thing," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Organ Harvest Allegations
Falun Gong, which thrives overseas despite being largely stamped out in China, alleges that government persecution of the group includes a vast system of concentration camps, where doctors harvest inmates' organs for transplants.
"China pays for jet planes with organs harvested from prisoners of conscience," read a Falun Gong banner, in a dig at Chinese purchases of U.S. aircraft ahead of Hu's visit.
China has vehemently denied the organ harvest allegations. However, a U.N. torture investigator said on March 30 he was looking into them.
"In 50 countries around the world you can practice Falun Gong freely, and it's only in China that you can't, so there must be something wrong with China," said May Bakhtiar, who traveled from Switzerland to join the Hu protests.
Australia-based Falun Gong follower Dai Zhizhen, said her husband, Chen Chengyong, was tortured to death by police in their native Guangzhou in July 2001 after he was arrested for protesting China's banning of the sect.
In remarks at Hu's arrival ceremony, Bush did not mention Falun Gong, but he said he would discuss human rights. He urged Hu to allow "the Chinese people the freedom to assemble, to speak freely and to worship."
