August 8, 2008: Olympic Preview Special News Bulletin

• Behind the Olympic Spectacle: A Journalist’s Walking Guide to the Persecution of Falun Gong in Beijing
• Beijing Reporters, Tear Down This Firewall (and How To)
• CIPFG: Torture Outside the Olympic Village: A Guide to China’s Labor Camps
• Screws Tighten on Persecuted [Group]
• Chinese Officials Cover Up Abuses against Falun Gong in Reneging on Promises of Internet Freedom for Journalists
• 46-Year Old Woman Dies from Torture in Shandong Province

Behind the Olympic Spectacle: A Journalist’s Walking Guide to the Persecution of Falun Gong in Beijing

Report details locations in and around Beijing where Falun Gong adherents were detained, tortured or killed

Among the thousands of reporters, athletes, and spectators arriving this week for the Beijing Olympics, most have likely heard of Falun Gong and the Communist Party’s often brutal campaign to crush it. But what few realize is the extent to which the violence meted out against these peaceful religious believers has in some cases taken place within walking distance of Olympic venues, hotels, and prominent landmarks.

To assist journalists covering the 2008 Olympic Games, the Falun Dafa Information Center released today a report providing detailed leads on 16 Chinese citizens detained or killed recently in Beijing and surrounding provinces for practicing Falun Gong.

To read more:  http://faluninfo.net/topic/150/

Beijing Reporters, Tear Down This Firewall (and How To)

The Falun Dafa Information Center Offers Tools for Breaking through the CCP’s Internet Filters and Securing your Data while Covering the Beijing Olympics

With the International Olympic Committee having admitted prior consent to the Chinese authorities to block access for foreign reporters to certain websites (article), the Falun Dafa Information Center, in cooperation with Internet freedom activists, hereby offers journalists in Beijing a resource to gain free access to information during their stay in China.

The tools available on the Global Internet Freedom Consortium (GIFC) website http://www.internetfreedom.org  allow anonymous, secure access to public websites normally accessible outside of the CCP’s filters.

To read more: /article/753/?cid=84

CIPFG: Torture Outside the Olympic Village: A Guide to China’s Labor Camps

The Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong (CIPFG) presents a guide to labor camps and detention facilities just a stone’s throw from Olympic venues. 

As Olympic Games spectators and reporters travel to China, they will witness the world’s top athletes compete–but they will not witness the hundreds of thousands languishing in labor camps nearby, many detained for exercising the same fundamental rights we take for granted every day. Where are these Chinese gulags? Who is detained there? And what goes on inside?

To read more:  http://www.humanrightstorch.org/news/guide-to-olympic-village-labor-camps/

Screws Tighten on Persecuted [Group]

Mary-Anne Toy, Sydney Morning Herald, in Beijing

Helen, a university graduate who speaks English and another European language fluently, lives in poverty in a rundown apartment block in a Chinese city we cannot identify to protect her.

The flats on either side of her are occupied by the mistresses of Chinese businessmen.

Helen, not her real name, also lives a secret life – one that is far more dangerous and less acceptable to China’s Communist leaders than being or keeping a mistress.

She believes in Falun Gong, a quasi-Buddhist spiritual movement preaching “truth, forbearance and compassion” and teaches qi gong – ancient Chinese breathing exercises – to improve health and allegedly even cure illnesses and injuries.

To read more: http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/screws-tighten-on-persecuted-sect/2008/07/25/1216492734168.html

Chinese Officials Cover Up Abuses against Falun Gong in Reneging on Promises of Internet Freedom for Journalists

IOC’s decision to cut deal with Beijing on Internet censorship “irresponsible at best, complicit at worst”

Journalists in Beijing covering the Olympic Games have found their Internet access restricted according to several major media reports, including those from the BBC and USA Today.

At a Tuesday news conference, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman, Liu Jianchao, admitted Falun Gong sites would remain blocked, while Sun Weide, the spokesperson for the Beijing Olympic Committee (BOCOG) attacked Falun Gong by stating that the traditional Chinese discipline “is an evil, fake religion which has been banned by the Chinese government.”

The Center is also calling upon the IOC to reconsider the deal it reportedly struck with the BOCOG allowing Internet restrictions. In so far as these restrictions further Beijing’s agenda to cover up human rights abuses, to let them stand is irresponsible at best, complicit at worst.

To read more: /article/752/?cid=84

46-Year Old Woman Dies from Torture in Shandong Province

Site of the Olympics Sailing Competition in Qingdao

The Falun Dafa Information Center has learned that a 46-year old woman who had been illegally arrested and tortured continuously for 21 days, died from her wounds and was cremated on June 21, 2008.

Xiao Sumin was the 3,163rd adherent known to have died as a result of the persecution of Falun Gong in China, though it is expected that the actual number is many times higher.  Ms. Xiao was from Pingdu city in Shandong province; approximately 80 km north of Qingdao, site of the 2008 Beijing Olympics sailing competition. The province is also notable for having the fourth highest death rate throughout China for Falun Gong practitioners tortured by security personnel for their spiritual beliefs.

To read more: /article/751/?cid=84