(Minghui.org) The Virginia House of Delegates passed a resolution on February 23, 2023 to commend a Falun Gong practitioner from China's Liaoning Province. The resolution commends Ms. Wang Chunyan for her efforts to promote the cause of human rights and religious liberty. Ms. Wang continued to uphold her faith, Falun Gong, despite being persecuted in China. For years she visited state and local officials to talk to them about Falun Gong and the ongoing persecution in China, and exposed the tyranny of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
Kaye Kory, Virginia Delegate for the 38th District, introduced the bill. She addressed the assembly and told the delegates that Ms. Wang was persecuted and imprisoned in China and was forced to make clothes for an American designer brand in a labor camp for years because she refused to renounce her faith in Falun Gong. She called Ms. Wang a tough survivor, and said that Ms. Wang cared about others even when she was in a difficult situation. “She is not only a witness to the CCP’s tyranny, but also an example that inspires all of us who pursue freedom,” said Kory.
Delegate Kaye Kory (right) and Falun Gong practitioner Ms. Wang Chunyan
Seven Nightmarish Years in Prison
After Ms. Wang began practicing Falun Gong in 1998 her chronic insomnia and arthritis disappeared. She realized her belief in the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance was more precious than her money-making business.
After the CCP launched the persecution of Falun Gong in July 1999, it propagated false information to defame the practice and practitioners. Because the truth about Falun Gong was nowhere to be heard, Ms. Wang spent her own money to print fliers to clarify the truth and expose the CCP’s lies. The authorities arrested and imprisoned her. Her husband died because of the persecution.
Because she refused to give up her faith, the authorities incarcerated her in the Masanjia Forced Labor Camp, notorious for its cruelty, twice. She refused to sign false statements to renounce her faith no matter how the guards tortured her.
The seven years of prison was “truly a nightmare,” she said. The guards viciously beat her and drew her blood three times. She did not know then that they tried to match her blood with patients who needed organ transplants. One day they took her to a hospital for surgery, and she narrowly escaped death after they found out that her blood type did not match the patient’s.
She had to do forced labor for over ten hours every day to make designer clothing. The head guard told the inmates that the clothes were to be exported to Europe and America. Back then she wished that one day she could show people around the world that these clothes were evidence of the CCP’s crimes.
“Every day I faced enormous pressure, and I never knew if I would live to see tomorrow. I held on because I had Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance in my heart,” she said.
Escape to the Free World
The authorities continued to monitor her after she was released seven years later. Realizing that she could be taken back to prison any time, she escaped to Thailand before coming to the U.S. She did not forget her wish, and used her story to expose the CCP’s crimes to the world.
She took every opportunity to clarify the truth to the officials of all levels of government and participated in numerous human rights activities. In the past two years she traveled to over 40 cities in the state of Virginia with other practitioners to tell them about the persecution that continues to this day in China.
One time a county official met with Ms. Wang. The official told her friend, “She’s like a survivor of the holocaust. Her being here is more powerful than having dozens of books written.”
Witness to the Persecution
Ms. Wang’s wish in prison came true. She was able to take two pieces of the clothes she made in prison with her. Now she shows them as evidence of slave labor inside Chinese prisons.
In 2022 Ms. Wang was invited to a human rights roundtable discussion held by the Virginia Attorney General. She showed the two pieces of clothing to the AG, who took photographs of the clothes. Delegate Kaye Kory has shown the clothes to her colleagues when speaking about Ms. Wang’s experience at the General Assembly. The Assembly passed House Resolution No. 9 (H.R.9) on February 11, 2022. In addition to condemning the torture, forced labor, and organ harvesting of Falun Gong practitioners by the CCP, it urged the CCP to stop persecuting Falun Gong immediately.
Ms. Wang said after receiving the commendation, “This is a recognition of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance, which is very exciting. The US government and people have made the right choice and sided with justice and conscience. In China many Falun Gong practitioners are still suffering under the persecution. I worry about them. This commendation is not for me personally, but for practitioners and Falun Gong.”
“This resolution is very important,” said Kaye Kory, as it set an example to commend a person who should be respected. “Her extraordinary courage should be commended, and we should learn from her.”
Virginia House Resolution 367 to commend Ms. Wang Chunyan
Text of Virginia House Resolution 367Offered February 20, 2023Bill Title: Commending Chunyan Wang
WHEREAS, Chunyan Wang, a resident of Northern Virginia, began practicing Falun Gong in China in 1998, strictly conducting herself according to the principles of Falun Gong—Truthfulness–Compassion–Forbearance—from which she benefited physically, mentally, and spiritually; and
WHEREAS, from July 1999, shortly after Chunyan Wang began practicing Falun Gong, to the present day, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has brutally persecuted Falun Gong practitioners in China through surveillance, harassment, arrest, imprisonment, physical and psychological torture, slave labor, and live organ harvesting; and
WHEREAS, the CCP twice imprisoned Chunyan Wang for printing Falun Gong leaflets, sentenced her to a total of seven years of slave labor, forced her to work ten hours a day making products for export to the United States and Europe, and subjected her to unexplained blood tests three different times, which were suspected of being conducted as part of a program that harvests organs from prisoners of conscience; and
WHEREAS, Chunyan Wang courageously maintained her faith in Falun Gong despite the profound losses she suffered at the hands of the CCP, including the loss of her husband, who was tortured to death for trying to protect her; the loss of her daughter, who was forced to flee China to escape the CCP’s harassment; and the loss of her business, her livelihood, and her considerable life savings; and
WHEREAS, since 2020, Chunyan Wang and her fellow Falun Gong practitioners have traveled to over 40 counties and cities throughout the Commonwealth, and back and forth to Richmond over ten times, to raise awareness about Falun Gong among state and local officials who are unknowingly and unintentionally facilitating the CCP’s practices of slave labor and live organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience in China; and
WHEREAS, responding to the efforts of Chunyan Wang and her fellow practitioners, the House of Delegates adopted HR 9 during the 2022 Session of the General Assembly, condemning the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners by the CCP and its practices of slave labor and live organ harvesting from prisoners of conscience; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED by the House of Delegates, That Chunyan Wang, an advocate with the courage to expose the tyranny of the Chinese Communist Party, hereby be commended for her efforts to promote the cause of human rights and religious liberty and to encourage more people in the Commonwealth to make their own contributions to help maintain our current freedoms; and, be it
RESOLVED FURTHER, That the Clerk of the House of Delegates prepare a copy of this resolution for presentation to Chunyan Wang as an expression of the House of Delegates’ admiration for her contributions to the Commonwealth.
Background: What Is Falun Gong and Why Is the CCP Persecuting It?
Falun Gong (also known as Falun Dafa) was first introduced to the public by Mr. Li Hongzhi in Changchun, China, in 1992. The spiritual discipline is now practiced in over 100 countries and regions worldwide. Millions of people who embraced the teachings, which are based on the principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance, and learned the five exercises, have experienced improved health and well-being.
Jiang Zemin, former head of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), perceived the spiritual discipline’s growing popularity as a threat to the CCP’s atheistic ideology and on July 20, 1999, he issued an order to eradicate the practice.
Under Jiang’s personal direction, the CCP established the 610 Office, an extralegal security organization with the power to override the police and judicial systems and whose sole function is to carry out the persecution of Falun Dafa.
Minghui.org has confirmed the deaths of thousands of practitioners as a result of the persecution over the past 23 years. The actual number is believed to be much higher. Countless practitioners have been imprisoned and tortured for their faith.
There is concrete evidence that the CCP sanctions the harvesting of organs from detained practitioners, who are murdered to supply China’s organ transplant industry.
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