Chinese stopped from performing Falun Gong

Nancy Chen, an Australian of Chinese origin, told Khaleej Times, that on January 15, she and some practitioners performed Falun Gong exercises at some area in Gate 1 of the Global Village. They also distributed fliers and pamphlets of Falun Gong.

“On January 17, our second visit to the Global Village, we distributed the fliers once again. Someone informed the police, who stopped us and confiscated our fliers,” she said.

Chen, who works in the sales department of Epoch Times in Australia, added that they were questioned by the police and asked to show their passports.

When contacted, Ibrahim Abdul Rahim, Director, Global Village, told Khaleej Times: “They were stopped by the police from paractising Falun Gong at the Global Village. Before distributing fliers to visitors at the Global Village, they should have taken approval from the Ministry of Information of the UAE. We told them to get the approval and come back, but they never did.”

According to its practitioners, Falun Gong or Falun Dafa is a “traditional Chinese self-cultivation practice that improves mental and physical well-being through a series of easy to learn exercises, meditation and development of one's heart, mind and nature”.

Meanwhile, a Chinese source told Khaleej Times that Falun Gong practitioners were using the Global Village as a venue to distribute printed material that are banned in China. “It is not proper for them to distribute fliers about Falun Gong which attacks the Chinese government and is banned in China,” he said.