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Matthew Vella
Wang Wenwi, the Falun Gong activist who five years ago slipped past security in Malta to get within centimetres of Chinese president Jiang Zemin, is back at the forefront of protest against the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners.
The 47-year-old Chinese-American was given press credentials at the White House, and was on Thursday apprehended after a three-minute palaver against Chinese president Hu Jintao during his state visit to Washington.
She is expected to be charged with attempting to harass a foreign official.
Despite warnings by the Chinese to the White House to be careful about who was admitted, Wang was granted a one-day pass as a journalist for the Falun Gong publication Epoch Times.
Just 90 seconds into Hu’s speech on the South Lawn, Wang started shrieking “President Hu, your days are numbered!” and “President Bush, stop him from killing!”
It took a full three minutes for the Secret Service to stop the woman screaming, while President Hu attempted to continue his speech.
White House and Secret Service officials told reporters Wang was “a legitimate journalist” and that there was nothing suspicious in her background. Bush apologised to the Chinese leader in the Oval Office. “Frankly, we moved on,” National Security Council official Dennis Wilder told reporters, describing the incident as a “momentary blip”.
In 2001, the pathologist had been refused media credentials in Malta because she was considered to be a “security risk”, but still managed to slip through a security cordon protecting Jiang Zemin, who was on a walk around Mdina.
Jiang was reported to have been taken aback when Wang introduced herself and asked him to stop the killing of Flaun Gong practitioners in China.
The President had departed from his official programme after a visit to the Cathedral Museum, to take a short walk. Wang managed to get within centimetres of Jiang at the bastion close to Fontanella Cafeteria.
“He was very agitated,” Wang had told the press. Security guards immediately intercepted Wang but it was Jiang who asked her to be allowed back, who answered her in an agitated voice.
Falun Gong followers were in Malta during Jiang’s visit in a series of peaceful protests against China’s treatment of followers. Falun Gong has been the focus of international controversy since the government of the People’s Republic of China began a nationwide suppression of Falun Gong on July 20, 1999.
Wang, a graduate of the Norman Beihune university of medicine in Changchun, Jilin Province in China, moved to the US 16 years ago, where she graduated in western medicine and later obtained a PhD in neuroscience from the University of Chicago. She leads one of the study groups of Falun Dafa in San Diego, California.
President Hu Jintao was the toast of the White House on Thursday with a 21-gun salute and a troop review, whose American visit was only marred by protests from the Falun Gong activist who was given press credentials by the White House.
But the event was full of gaffes: the official announcer said the band would play the “national anthem of the Republic of China” – the official name of Taiwan; vice-president Dick Cheney wore sunglasses for the ceremony; and when Hu attempted to leave the stage from the wrong staircase, he was yanked back by his jacket by President George W Bush.
Their beliefs
Falun Gong is a belief system that centres on five meditation exercises that its believers say are a way to reach enlightenment and even cure disease. It claims 100 million adherents, mostly in China.
China banned the movement as a dangerous cult in 1999, and human rights groups claim China has tortured and killed hundreds of followers. Western experts are split on whether the group is a cult. They are also worried over Falun Gong’s emphasis that its meditation exercises cure illnesses.
mvella@mediatoday.com.mt
Links: http://clearwisdom.net/emh/articles/2001/7/28/12594.html
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