UK Prime Minister and Foreign Office: Call for Chinese Authority to release Honghua Ling

 Dear
Sir/Madam

 


My
name is Lei Chen. I am a permanent resident in the UK, and writing to you at
this time to ask for your help by signing a petition. My sister, Honghua Ling,
is a prisoner of conscience in China. She is hand-cuffed, shackled at her
ankles, beaten, deprived of sleep, and forced to do hard labour as punishment
for believing in Truthfulness, Compassion and Forbearance. Our 82 year-old
mother travelled from Wuhan to Shenzhen to see Honghua, but was refused to be
allowed to visit her daughter, and turned away by the guards. Honghua is at
high risk of torture, or worse, so I’m campaigning for her release, and need
your support at this time.

 

Honghua
is 58 years old, and is a mathematics teacher in a secondary school. She loves
art, and has a wonderful talent for knitting. She is older than me, and growing
up, she would often take care of me, and my younger siblings. She was so kind
and caring, that she was more like a mother. In 1996, she and I started
practising Falun Gong, at the recommendation of our father, who practiced
himself, and had recovered from partial paralysis after a stroke. Falun Gong is
a peaceful meditation practice, helping improve people’s physical and spiritual
wellbeing, and was widely practiced in China. However, since 1999, Falun Gong
has faced severe persecution by the Chinese authorities, which oppresses many
forms of faith and belief.

 

Honghua
lives in Wuhan, the capital city of Hubei Province, in central China. In
February this year, she travelled to Shenzhen, a southern Chinese city, which
borders with Hong Kong, to spend the Chinese New Year with her son and her
grandson.

 

On
11 March, when Honghua was meeting two local Falun Gong practitioners at a KFC
restaurant in Shenzhen’s Nanshan District, they were identified by plainclothes
policemen, and subsequently kidnapped by scores of police officers. They were
taken to Gaoxin police substation.

 

At
the police substation, Honghua and the other two Falun Gong practitioners were
denied food and water for a long period of time, and were kept in handcuffs
overnight. Honghua was beaten by the police. Her fingers were hurt and her neck
bore bruises from the beating. The following day, Honghua was transferred to
the No. 1 Detention Centre of Shenzhen’s Nanshan District.

 

The
detention centre refused to accept her, however, because they conducted a
physical check-up and found she had tuberculosis. The police tried three times
to send her to the detention centre, and were turned away three times. Finally,
the police sent her to the hospital attached to the detention centre. She was
kept there for two days and then taken into the centre. In the centre, she
remains hand-cuffed and shackled.

 

Our
family are extremely worried about Honghua’s safety. Since the CCP began
persecuting Falun Gong in 1999, a large number of practitioners have been
severely tortured and murdered while they were imprisoned. The former UN
Rapporteur on Torture identified that Falun Gong practitioners formed the
largest population of prisoners of conscience in prisons in China. Amnesty
International and Human Rights Watch both reported this year that human rights
in China are getting worse. There is now a lot of evidence that prisoners of
conscience in China are being killed and harvested for their organs, sold for
profit in a black market trade in transplantations. I’ve enclosed more
information about this harvesting, which makes me fear for my sisters
life. 

 

It
is my belief that by helping rescue my sister Honghua Ling, together we can
help raise awareness of the plight of all those in China who face persecution,
imprisonment, and torture. Thank you in advance for your support at this time.

 

Kind
Regards,

 

Lei
Chen