Hundreds of Falun Gong practitioners rallied outside Ontario’s legislative building this week to mark 26 years since a large-scale appeal in Beijing, where thousands of adherents called for the freedom to practise their faith. The peaceful demonstration was soon followed by a widespread suppression of Falun Gong in China that continues today.
The Toronto rally was held on April 24, one day before the 26th anniversary of the April 25 “peaceful appeal” by Falun Gong practitioners in Beijing in 1999, when more than 10,000 adherents from across China assembled outside the appeals office to call for the release of 45 practitioners who had been arbitrarily detained by police in the eastern city of Tianjin….