Falun Gong
On 20 July 1999, the government banned Falun Gong and all unauthorised 'heterodox religions', and began a nationwide crackdown on the popular new religious movement following a demonstration by 10,000 practitioners outside the leadership enclave at Zhongnanhai on 25 April. Protests in Beijing were frequent for the first few years following the 1999 edict, though these protests have largely been eradicated. Practitioners have occasionally hacked into state television channels to broadcast pro-Falun Gong content. Outside mainland China, practitioners are actively appealing to the governments, media, and people of their respective countries about the situation in China.
According to Pulitzer prize-winning journalist Ian Denis Johnson, the government mobilized every aspect of society, including the media apparatus, police force, army, education system, families and workplaces, against Falun Gong. An extra-constitutional body, the "6–10 Office" was created to do what Forbes describes as "overseeing" the terror campaign." The campaign was driven by large-scale propaganda through television, newspaper, radio and internet. Human Rights Watch noted that families and workplaces were urged to cooperate with the government, while practitioners themselves were subject to various coercive measures to have them recant their beliefs. Amnesty International raised particular concerns over reports of torture, illegal imprisonment including forced labor, and psychiatric abuses.
In March 2006, Falun Gong and The Epoch Times said that the Chinese government and its agencies, including the People's Liberation Army, were conducting "widespread and systematic organ harvesting of living practitioners" specifically at the Sujiatun Thrombosis Hospital in Shenyang according to two eye-witness accounts that practitioners detained in the hospital's basement were being tissue-typed, and killed to order. In July 2006, David Kilgour and David Matas, requested by a Falun Gong related group to investigate the allegations, published a report which they admitted the evidence was circumstantial, but which taken together supported the allegations that large numbers of Falun Gong practitioners were victims of systematic organ harvesting whilst still alive.
The Chinese government has refused to believe that its policies constitute any mistreatment of Falun Gong practitioners, and a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman denounced the organ harvesting allegations as "absurd lies concocted by the Falun Gong cult followers". Dissident Harry Wu said the two Epoch Times witnesses were "not reliable and most probably they had fabricated the story"; he rejected the totality of the allegations after sending in investigators. A Congressional Research Service said that there was "insufficient evidence to support this specific allegation," without elaboration. David Ownby, a noted expert on Falun Gong, said "Organ harvesting is happening in China, but I see no evidence proving it is aimed particularly at Falun Gong practitioners." Glen McGregor of the Ottawa Citizen said "Depending on who you believe, the Kilgour-Matas report is either compelling evidence that proves the claims about Falun Gong... or a collection of conjecture and inductive reasoning that fails to support its own conclusions".
In September 2012, a report published on the website of the US's House Committee on Foreign Affairs said: " Medical doctors outside China have confirmed that their patients have gone to China and received organs from Falun Gong practitioners".
Read more about this topic: Political Repression In The People's Republic Of China, Civil Liberties, Religious Freedom