CHINA: Special bimonthly FORB – Freedom of religion or belief (16-31.03.2022)

On March 27, Zhang Ligong and Wang Runyun of Taiyuan Zion Reformed Church were released from prison. Now, all five Christians initially charged with “illegally crossing the national border” have been released.

Family members and Christians from Zion Reformed picked them up at the detention center. They were full of peace and joy. Wang Runyun held his son in one hand and his daughter in the other. He posted on social media, “Dear family, we are back home safely. Thank you for your prayers. I am very grateful!”

Two days ago, street evangelist Chen Wensheng was released after serving seven-day administrative detention and eight days in a drug rehab center. Neither Chen Wensheng nor his family received any legal notice about his detention.

 Chen Wensheng was enormously grateful that he was detained due to preaching the gospel, believing that it is a rare opportunity God had for Chen to spread the gospel in detention and the rehab center.

Pastors of the Three-Self Church have been requested to study new directives on the Sinicization of religion, signed by Wang Zuo’an, who is deputy minister of the United Front Work Department of the Central Committee of the CCP and the director of the State Administration of Religious Affairs (which should be replaced by “something else,” according to a 2018 announcement, but for the time being is still in place).

On March 5, 2022, Chen Wensheng was arrested by the Hengyang police while preaching on the streets of Wenshan Zhuang and Miao Autonomous Prefecture in Hunan.

It is not the first time Chen, a popular character among Chinese house church Christians, is arrested.

News of the passing of a venerated Tibetan lama, who has spent years in a Chinese prison, emerged recently amid Chinese authorities’ heightened information lockdown campaign. The authorities reportedly restricted a number of devotees from attending the funeral and paying respects to the deceased by posting images and videos on social networking sites, a reliable source reported.

Shortly after a nurse was taken to prison to serve a seven-year term for her faith in Falun Gong, she was fired by the hospital where she worked.

Ms. Liu Xiaohong, 53, of Dalian City, Liaoning Province, was arrested on November 24, 2020, in a police sweep. The Political and Legal Affairs Committee gave the orders for the police to arrest the practitioners on their list.

A Chaoyang City, Liaoning Province resident was recently taken to the Shenyang Women’s Prison to serve a two-year term for practicing Falun Gong, a mind-body discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.

Ms. Liu Xiufen was arrested around July 2021, shortly after she was released from serving five years for suing former head of the communist regime for ordering the persecution. Details about her recent sentencing remain to be investigated.

Less than one year after Ms. Guan Fengxia passed away due to years of harassment for practicing Falun Gong, her husband, Mr. Dai Zhidong, also died, one month following his last arrest for his shared faith.

Ms. Guan, of Daqing City, Heilongjiang Province, took up Falun Gong in 1995. After witnessing how she changed into a much better person, Mr. Dai also began to practice Falun Gong a year later and was delighted to see many of his ailments disappear without medical treatment.

A Tangshan City, Hebei Province resident who has been denied family visitation since her arrest nearly two years ago was transferred to a local prison on February 18, 2022 to serve a three-year term for practicing Falun Gong.

Ms. Xiao Huijun was arrested together with her husband in a police sweep on June 18, 2020. While her husband, who doesn’t practice Falun Gong, was released on the same day, Ms. Xiao was kept in custody and taken to the Tangshan No.1 Detention Center a few days later.