HONG KONG, Nov 8, 2000 -- (Agence France Presse) Another member of the Falun Gong spiritual group has died in prison in China, bringing the number of members reported to have died in police custody to 68, a Hong Kong-based rights group said Wednesday.

Zou Songtao, 28, a biology professor at Qingdao Maritime University in eastern Shandong province, died Saturday in the Number Three Shandong Reform Through Education Camp in Zibo city, the Information Center for Human Rights and Democracy said.

Officials at the detention center told the family that Zou had committed suicide, but they refused to allow Zou's wife to see the body, the center said.

His cremated remains were returned to the family on Sunday.

Camp officials refused to comment when questioned by AFP over the incident.

Zou, who graduated from Nanjing University in 1995, was arrested on July 18 and sentenced to three years detention for protesting the ban on the spiritual group in Beijing and attempting to petition the central government's crackdown at a Complaints Bureau in the capital.

The rights group said Zou's family doubted he would have committed suicide especially since he had given birth to a daughter 10 months ago.

The Falun Gong was banned in China in July 1999 and accused of [...].

The government has called the group the biggest threat to its political rule since the 1989 Tianamen democracy protests were brutally crushed by the Chinese military.

Members of the spiritual group follow the Buddhist-inspired teachings of their exiled guru Li Hongzhi, who advocates clean living and group morning exercises that involve traditional Chinese breathing routines.

Some 450 members have received prison sentences of up to 18 years and more than 600 have been sent to mental hospitals, the rights group said. Around 10,000 others have been placed in labor camps and another 20,000 locked up in temporary detention centers, it added.

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