Fight Against Falun Gong Goes Smoothly: Embassy SpokesmanThe fight by the Chinese government and people against evil cult Falun Gong has in general proceeded smoothly and produced encouraging results over the past year, a spokesman for the Chinese embassy to the United States said Thursday in Washington."Destructive cults like the Falun Gong are a familiar phenomenon in many countries," Zhang Yuanyuan, press counselor and spokesman for the Chinese embassy here, said at a press conference. "As their menace intensifies, so does the fight against them. More countries are taking serious steps, including legislation and court actions, to counter the threat," he said, citing Japan and France as examples in this regard. "Given what Falun Gong did to the Chinese people, families and communities, it is all very natural and entirely legitimate for the Chinese government to deal with it in a resolute and decisive manner," he pointed out. "Thanks to (the Chinese) government's tenacious and painstaking efforts to educate and bring around the practitioners," Zhang said, "the rank of the cult has further dwindled." "The horror of self-immolation on Tian'anmen square on January 23, shocking as it is, proved to be a powerful catalyst for the massive recantation of the Falun Gong heresy by its remaining followers," he said. However, the spokesman said, Falun Gong remains active overseas. "Taking off his last fig leaf, Li Hongzhi has openly submitted himself to the service of international anti-China forces," he said. With generous financial support from such forces, Falun Gong has expanded its organization and operational space in many areas, including some big cities and small towns of the United States. "Their main goal is to win sympathy from mainstream America," Zhang noted. "Since they have already been discredited in China, and pretty much so in Chinese communities in foreign countries, Li Hongzhi and his diehard followers are eager to salvage their faltering standing by working on the media, local government and institutions, trying to get their message cross," he said. "The American people, I hope, must not be blinded by the seemingly peaceful appearance of the cult," the spokesman said. |
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