NEW YORK—Banners and protesters were never too far from Chinese leader Xi Jinping while he was in Seattle and Washington, D.C., the first two stops of his formal state visit to the United States. Now in New York, where Xi will deliver a keynote speech at the 70th anniversary session of the United Nations on Sept. 28, similar banners are being displayed outside the U.N. headquarters, the Chinese regime’s consulate and permanent mission to the U.N., and near the historic Waldorf Astoria, where Xi is staying.
Among the most prominent and difficult to avoid, are the banners calling for Xi to prosecute his predecessor, the former head of the Communist Party Jiang Zemin. Jiang launched a massive persecution against a popular spiritual practice, Falun Gong, in 1999, and the campaign has hung like a dead weight over Chinese politics ever since.
Over 100 protesters held up these signs on Sept. 26 near the Waldorf Astoria.
Some of the protesters performed the slow moving Falun Gong exercises to music set just loud enough to be heard through the din of traffic. Others handed out pamphlets at street corners for a couple of blocks leading to and from the Waldorf Astoria hotel, the traditional accommodations of choice for overnight stays of dignitaries in New York.
Falun Gong, the traditional Chinese spiritual discipline, became a target for Jiang Zemin when he became frightened by how popular and independent it was. He saw a massive political campaign against the group as a way to amass power in the Party. But the practice was not eradicated, as he hoped, and instead, 16 years later, those who were tortured and put to forced labor are now calling for him to be brought to justice.
Since the end of May, over 180,000 Falun Gong adherents have filed criminal complaints against Jiang for crimes against humanity with China’s highest legal bodies, an act made possible after a change in China’s legal regulations on May 1. Previously, practitioners who tried to lodge complaints against the country’s leader would be thrown in detention, where they faced torture and death.
