On a recent trip to China, I had a taste of what life in a police state is like. It is not something I will remember with pleasure.
I am a final-year doctoral degree student studying computer science at Columbia University. I am also an Indian citizen and have been residing in the United States for 10 years.
I have presented research papers at conferences in North America, Asia, and Europe, publishing 10 papers. But when I attended a conference in Beijing recently, I was detained and interrogated—simply because I practice Falun Gong, a traditional Chinese meditation and spiritual discipline.
I have been practicing Falun Gong for nine years now and have greatly benefitted from it physically and mentally. In just two weeks after I started practicing, the headaches and stomach diseases that I had suffered from were cured and completely disappeared. I have been able to focus on my work, studies, and research much more effectively.
My paper was accepted by IEEE, the world’s largest organization for engineers, for a conference to be held in Beijing, China June 25–27. I was very excited. I had never been in China before and very much looked forward to being in Beijing and taking part in the conference.
I enjoyed going to the conference and presenting my paper as I had with previous conferences around the world. I met and discussed interesting research work in the area of wireless networks with researchers from around the world and in China.
But on Monday, June 28, the day after the conference and my last day in the city, I walked around Beijing, hoping to see some tourist spots that I had missed. I was completely surprised when two police officers stopped and searched me in the middle of the street.
They found in my bag a yellow T-shirt that had on it the words “Falun Gong” and “Truthfulness-Compassion-Tolerance” in Chinese and English. Truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance are the principles that guide the practice of Falun Gong.
I do not believe I was searched at random—I did not see any other foreigners being searched on the street by police during my time in Beijing. Falun Gong practitioners outside China are regularly monitored by Chinese consular officials and agents.
I am a final-year doctoral degree student studying computer science at Columbia University. I am also an Indian citizen and have been residing in the United States for 10 years.
I have presented research papers at conferences in North America, Asia, and Europe, publishing 10 papers. But when I attended a conference in Beijing recently, I was detained and interrogated—simply because I practice Falun Gong, a traditional Chinese meditation and spiritual discipline.
I have been practicing Falun Gong for nine years now and have greatly benefitted from it physically and mentally. In just two weeks after I started practicing, the headaches and stomach diseases that I had suffered from were cured and completely disappeared. I have been able to focus on my work, studies, and research much more effectively.
My paper was accepted by IEEE, the world’s largest organization for engineers, for a conference to be held in Beijing, China June 25–27. I was very excited. I had never been in China before and very much looked forward to being in Beijing and taking part in the conference.
I enjoyed going to the conference and presenting my paper as I had with previous conferences around the world. I met and discussed interesting research work in the area of wireless networks with researchers from around the world and in China.
But on Monday, June 28, the day after the conference and my last day in the city, I walked around Beijing, hoping to see some tourist spots that I had missed. I was completely surprised when two police officers stopped and searched me in the middle of the street.
They found in my bag a yellow T-shirt that had on it the words “Falun Gong” and “Truthfulness-Compassion-Tolerance” in Chinese and English. Truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance are the principles that guide the practice of Falun Gong.
I do not believe I was searched at random—I did not see any other foreigners being searched on the street by police during my time in Beijing. Falun Gong practitioners outside China are regularly monitored by Chinese consular officials and agents.
Detained
Once they found my T-shirt, one of them held on to me as a police van came up and took me to the Tiananmen Square police station. There I was thrust into a room with five or six police officers, one of whom interrogated me in English.
