August 19, 2002
Sadako Ogata
High Commissioner
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
Regional Office For the United States and Caribbean
1775 K. Street NW
Suite 300
Washington, DC 20006
Dear High Commissioner Ogata:
Today, we urgently must bring a situation to your attention that far exceeds the appearance of only affecting two people in a small country. The implications of it are widespread and foreshadow an ominous future if left unchallenged and uncorrected. The situation that we speak of is the recent news of two Falun Gong practitioners living in Cambodia, having their UN refugee status violated, and being deported to a Chinese detention center under pressure of the Jiang Zemin Regime simply for practicing their personal spiritual belief abroad.
On August 2, 2002, Li Guojun, 46, and his wife Zhang Xinyi, 39, were arrested at their Phnom Penh apartment by the Cambodian police and deported August 9, 2002 to a Mainland Chinese detention center in Hunan Province. Before their deportation, it was reported that the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees sought the couple's immediate release from the Cambodian authorities. First the Cambodian authorities denied that the couple was in their custody. Later when the UNHCR Regional Office in Bangkok sent a letter to the Cambodian officials they were told that the Chinese couple had already been deported to China. The couple's friends have not heard from them and are very concerned for their safety.
The arrest occurred less than a year after the couple was granted "persons of concern" status by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. This is clearly a violation of the 1951 Global Convention on Refugees, which both China and Cambodia ratified.
The couple arrived in Phnom Penh from China in1998, taught Chinese in a school and was known to practice the Falun Gong exercises and meditation several times a week at their home with a small group of friends.
Last June Zhang Xinyi received a package in the mail from Taiwan containing Falun Gong books. Later, on July 3, 2002, the couple was summoned by the Cambodian Department of Foreigners who informed them that "Cambodia and China enjoy friendly relations" and that the couple was damaging those relations. Near the end of July, Zhang Xinyi went to the Chinese embassy to have her passport renewed. The Chinese authorities confiscated her old passport and refused to issue her a new one. By the end of July, Zhang and her husband were dismissed from the Chinese school where they had been teaching.
This incident is a clear example of how the Jiang Zemin Regime has extended its persecution of Falun Gong outside China's borders and uses pressure and interference to manipulate other governments into persecuting Falun Gong in exchange for favorable relations with China.
With six more deaths of Falun Gong practitioners held in Chinese detention centers and labor camps, at the hands of the authorities, reported just this week alone, we have grave concerns for the safety of Zhang Xinyi and her husband Li Guojun.
We call upon the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees to intercede on behalf of Zhang Xinyi and her husband Li Guojun to insure their safe return to a country that will accept their status as "persons of concern."
We look forward to a positive response from you in the very near future.
Sincerely
New York Falun Dafa Association
Category: Perspective
