The Falun Gong movement in China is a strange phenomenon. It is not clear how much it is the result of the lack of bourgeois democratic norms there, how much it is an expression of mystical movements that are more common in developed societies, and how much it is a reappearance of religious ideas common to China's feudal society.
The following extracts suggest that at least some of the leaders come from the new intelligentsia, not under the ideological influence of the communist party, but not necessarily fully capitalist.
Chris Burford
London
Guardian (extracts)
Monday December 27, 1999 8:50 am
BEIJING (AP)
Judges found the four Falun Gong leaders guilty of organizing and using a cult to undermine laws, causing deaths and illegally obtaining and disseminating state secrets, state-run media reported.
Li Chang and Wang Zhiwen were sentenced to 18 years and 16 years in prison, respectively - among the harshest sentences given to political or religious dissenters in China this decade. Ji Liewu and Yao Jie were sentenced to 12 years and seven years, respectively.
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Li, 59, was a leading official in the computer bureau of the national police ministry; Wang, 50, was an engineer in a materials company under the Railways Ministry; Ji, 36, was the manager of a Hong Kong subsidiary of a state nonferrous metals company; and Yao, 40, headed the party committee of a large Beijing real estate company.
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Falun Gong preaches a mixture of slow-motion meditation exercises and ideas drawn from Buddhism and Taoism said to promote health and morality. In seven years, it has attracted millions of followers in China and abroad.
The government has decreed the group a public menace and a threat to Communist Party rule, contending that its unorthodox practices - especially a recommendation that followers forgo medical treatment - have led to the deaths of more than 1,400 people.
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Judges in the trial ruled that the defendants ``organized and used the Falun Gong's evil cult organization to spread superstition and heresies and to deceive people, causing deaths,'' the Xinhua News Agency said.
Xinhua said Li, Wang, Ji and Yao set up a chain of command and ``plotted or directed'' 78 protests, including an April 25 demonstration attended by 10,000 followers.
Judges also found the four guilty of stealing 37 state secrets and illegally netting more than $54 million in profits from proselytizing sessions and sales of Falun Gong literature.
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