All in Journalism 我的報導
Zhang Erping, a practitioner of the spiritual discipline Falun Gong, said he felt encouraged by seeing religious freedom discussed at a ministerial level for the first time. He hopes that international condemnation can do more to end the persecution of the practice in China, which has lasted for more than 19 years.
A roundtable focusing on religious persecution in China set the stage on July 23 for the U.S. Department of State’s first ever Ministerial to Advance Religious Freedom. The ministerial signals that the Trump administration intends to place religious freedom at the center of its foreign policy agenda.
According to a popular Chinese commentator, a possible second summit between President Donald Trump and President Vladimir Putin would be part of a game of “wooing and swaying” among the United States, China, Russia, and Europe.
Nineteen years are more than enough for a generation to grow up. Yet the same generation of people are still coming back to Washington, around the same day each year, to call for an end of the now 19-year-long persecution in China of the spiritual practice of Falun Gong. Some bring along their children born during these years.
On a warm, sunny day, a group of around 600 people gathered at the Washington Monument with a most gloomy message: “19 Years of Torture; 19 Years of Murder; 19 Years Too Long,” said one banner. They gathered to call for an end to the now 19-year-long persecution of Falun Gong in China, which started on July 20, 1999.
“I feel uplifted. I feel like I want to go back for more. I feel like I am missing something. Like they are calling me to go back and I want to go back…”
