Monday, October 15, 2001

Just 14 months ago, Jingman Li was a captive in a Chinese prison where she was beaten and tortured.

Her crime was practising Falun Gong and withholding her name from police when they tried to arrest her for it.

To protest her detention, the 54-year-old said she staged a hunger strike. But the guards had seen this form of dissent before and were prepared.

"They took me, bound my arms and legs and forced a tube up my nose, down my throat and into my stomach," said Li through a translator.

"There was a lot of blood and I was screaming for them to stop."

[...] She was one of about 30 people assembled in front of the Chinese embassy yesterday to mark the 100th day of protest over the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners in China.

The demonstrators were also asking Prime Minister Jean Chretien to raise the issue of human rights abuses on his trip to China this month.

"It is our intention of stop state-sponsored terrorism against peaceful practitioners in China," said speaker Xun Li.

"We want the prime minister to carry a message that this is no better than any other form of terrorism today. It must end."

http://www.canoe.ca/OttawaNews/OS.OS-10-15-0007.html