Former Hong Kong Leader Threatens Falun Gong Practitioners in Finland

On August 13, former Hong Kong Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying approached and verbally intimidated Falun Gong practitioners in Helsinki, Finland, as they were meditating and collecting signatures on a human rights petition in a public park.

“Once we have your names,” Leung said in a recording obtained by the Falun Dafa Information Center (FDIC). “We can immediately check [a surveillance database] when we go back. One by one.”

Leung, also known as CY Leung, had served as Hong Kong’s Chief Executive from 2012 to 2017 and is now Vice Chairman of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC). He was accompanied by his wife, Regina Leung Tong Ching-yee, and two others. His wife joined him in interrogating practitioners about their personal details and taking photos of individual practitioners at Sibelius Park in Helsinki.

The Falun Gong group remained calm and contacted Finnish police. Officers arrived shortly after Leung’s group had departed, took statements from the practitioners, and confirmed that the demonstration was legal and protected under Finnish law. Police stated they would monitor the area and ensure that no interference would be tolerated.

“The tone and behavior were clearly threatening,” said one practitioner who was present during the incident. “We’re concerned that even in a democratic country like Finland, Chinese officials feel emboldened to intimidate people.”

As Vice Chairman of the CPPCC, Leung Chun-ying holds a senior appointment within a body widely described as part of the Chinese Communist Party’s united front system. In that context, efforts to elicit personal details from peaceful religious believers and demonstrators—paired with remarks referencing prior scrutiny—are reasonably interpreted as carrying political weight.

The episode is the latest example of transnational repression, in which the CCP or its proxies reach across borders to intimidate, threaten, and even physically assault members of diaspora communities and critics.

Proactive confrontation and intimidation

At approximately 2:15 p.m. on August 13, Leung and his wife were walking through the park when they noticed the Falun Gong group. They approached and then pressed practitioners for their names, origins, financial background, and affiliations. They also denied the reality of the human rights violations faced by Falun Gong practitioners in China, claiming it was all “lies.” The exchange was confrontational and carried overt political undertones.

Leung’s remarks carried the tone of interrogation rather than conversation, pressing practitioners for personal details. Following a common CCP trope, he implied that Falun Gong practitioners were being paid to practice and collect petitions in public rather than doing it as concerned citizens and victims of persecution.

“You don’t dare say your full name, your surname,” said Leung. “You don’t dare say how much money, you don’t dare say where the money comes from.”

Practitioners described the encounter as deeply unsettling, especially given harassment at the same park earlier this year by Chinese individuals who recorded and reported the Falun Gong practitioners to the local embassy. Several of those practitioners’ relatives in China were indeed later approached by Chinese authorities.

At one point, Leung admitted to past surveillance and scrutiny of the faith community in Hong Kong, stating: “Falun Gong in Hong Kong — after so many years, we’ve investigated everything thoroughly.”

High priority for the CCP

“This episode is part of a larger trend of Chinese Communist Party officials and affiliates attempting to intimidate, surveil, and silence Falun Gong practitioners outside of China,” says Levi Browde, executive director of the Falun Dafa Information Center. “That a senior Chinese official would personally confront peaceful meditators in a European democracy highlights how high a priority suppressing Falun Gong remains for Beijing. Several of Leung’s comments also illustrate how deceived by CCP propaganda Chinese officials are themselves.”

August 13 marks the third instance within the past year in which pro-CCP individuals have threatened or physically assaulted practitioners at this same meditation site. According to Finnish media, Falun Gong practitioners in Helsinki were also harassed in January and last September, when assailants used slurs and claimed to have reported them to the Chinese Embassy.

Beyond Finland, transnational repression targeting Falun Gong practitioners has been escalating in Europe. In Russia, over the past two years, Falun Gong practitioners have faced presumably Beijing-triggered detentions and prosecutions, including prison sentences widely condemned by international human rights bodies. In Italy, Poland, Austria, Spain, and France, anonymous but ultimately fake bomb threats targeted venues hosting shows by Shen Yun Performing Arts, a classical Chinese dance company founded by Falun Gong practitioners; in at least one case, a performance was delayed because of a temporary theater evacuation due to the false alarm.

“As the Chinese regime intensifies its global campaigns of intimidation and coercion, it’s vital that democracies take action to protect vulnerable communities like Falun Gong and Finnish citizens practicing this faith,” says Browde. “Given that this is the third such incident at this location in Helsinki, we urge Finnish authorities to publicly condemn Leung’s behavior and launch an investigation into the Chinese government’s surveillance and harassment of Falun Gong in Finland.”