May 25, 2002

BEIJING, May 25 (AFP) - Three members of the Falungong spiritual group, including two from Japan, have gone missing and are feared arrested in Beijing, the group's Japanese branch said Saturday.

The three women were set to take part in a protest against official repression in China against the group, a Falungong member said, adding the third person arrested was a Chinese permanent resident in Japan.

They had arrived in China as tourists on an organized trip.

"The travel agent contacted us. We are trying to check the information," a Japanese embassy spokesman said.

Beijing police said they would not comment on the matter until after the weekend at the earliest.

Police contacted the family of the Chinese woman aged 37 to say her passport was lost, the Falungong member said, adding it could be a pretext for keeping her in detention in China.

In a photograph the group sent to AFP, the three women are shown in a hotel room holding banners proclaiming the Falungong motto: "Truthfulness, Benevolence, Forbearance."

Documents showed the two Japanese women were named Yuko Holie, 31, a waitress in Osaka and Abe Ayumi, also 31, from Niigata in western Japan but born in China. The Chinese woman's name was given in Japanese as Yuko Kaneko, a resident of Niigata.

Foreign members of the Falungong have staged several protests in central Beijing's Tiananmen Square over the Chinese government's ban imposed in 1999 following a massive demonstration.

Most foreigners are swiftly expelled following their arrests. But tens of thousands of Chinese members have been arrested and thousands languish in reform-through-labour camps, human rights organisations say.

Some 400 Falungong members have died as a result of police ill-treatment, the group says.

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