SAN FRANCISCO—Hundreds of Falun Gong practitioners rallied on April 25 in front of the Chinese Consulate in San Francisco, marking the anniversary of 10,000 fellow practitioners’ peaceful appeal 26 years ago in Beijing, the political center of the ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
The group made the appeal in 1999 for freedom of belief to follow their meditative practice of Falun Gong, also called Falun Dafa, and for the CCP to stop harassing practitioners throughout the country.
Practitioners in Beijing were told at the time that the issue had been resolved after then-Prime Minister Zhu Rongji met with several representatives. Upon the news, the 10,000 people, who had gathered of their own accord, packed up as quietly as they had arrived and left to return to their homes across China….