BEIJING, Jan 27 (AFP) - Australia's embassy in China was trying Monday to contact one of its nationals who has apparently been kidnapped by Chinese agents because of her membership of the Falungong spiritual group [Editor's note: Falun Gong has no membership].

Nancy Chen, 34, was abducted last week while visiting her parents in Chengdu city in the southwestern part of China, Falungong said in a statement.

Her husband Herbert Lu later received confirmation that she had been taken away by members of China's National Security Bureau, the statement said.

The group, banned in China [...], said she was being held simply because she was a Falungong practitioner.

Chen's parents have been contacted by officials from the National Security Bureau who threatened them if the husband made the incident public in Australia or on the Internet, it said.

The Australian embassy here said Monday it had received no further information about what happened to Chen.

"We're trying to obtain information about her whereabouts and to contact her," an embassy spokesman told AFP.

[...]

Since banning the group in 1999, it [China] has jailed tens of thousands of its followers in prison, labor camps or police stations.

http://www.ptd.net/webnews/wed/cl/Qchina-australia-sect.RItz_DJR.html