A group of Chinese individuals who claimed to be police officers forcibly took away Falun Gong display boards at a major tourist site in Malaysia, according to video footage and eyewitness accounts.
The incident took place on Aug. 15 at the National Monument, a prominent landmark in the capital, Kuala Lumpur, where local Falun Gong practitioners have a booth to raise awareness about human rights abuses in China.
A Falun Gong practitioner, identified only by her surname Yong because of safety concerns, said that a group of Chinese men and women arrived in a tour bus at about 9:45 a.m. local time while she was alone manning the booth. They forcefully seized all six display boards without presenting any official proof of identity or authority and drove away, Yong said, and she was unable to stop them.
The group consisted of seven men and two women who spoke Mandarin; at least one of them said they were with the police, apparently referring to the Chinese police, according to video footage obtained by The Epoch Times and local Falun Gong practitioners.
The video shows that most of the men and women were dressed in similar white tops and black pants. It also shows the tour bus’s license plate, NDX 8862, which belongs to a tourism agency that brings people from China to Malaysia.
“You guys don’t have the authority to take my stuff away. You guys are committing a crime, do you know that?” Yong can be heard saying in Mandarin to the group in the video.
A Chinese man, who tries to wave off the camera, responds in Mandarin saying, “We didn’t break any laws.”
“Who sent you guys? Did the Chinese Communist Party send you guys?” Yong says in the video.
Another Chinese man eventually responds to Yong’s questions by saying “pai chu suo” in Mandarin, which means “police station” in Chinese.
In response, Yong disputes the man’s claim and says, “We have human rights [in Malaysia].”
Local Falun Gong practitioners noted that the man’s choice of the phrase “pai chu suo” was unusual, as people in Malaysia typically refer to police stations using the Chinese term “jing cha ju” or the Malay term “balai polis.”
Yong informed The Epoch Times that local police have launched an investigation following her report of the incident.
“I was shocked,” Yong said, following the incident. “This should not happen in Malaysia. Malaysia is a country governed by the rule of law. I cannot understand how these individuals could act so brazenly and unlawfully in broad daylight.”
Yong urged the authorities to take swift action.
“I hope the police will bring these individuals to justice and restore a safe and just environment for us all,” she said.
The Epoch Times was unable to contact the local Malaysian police station for comment.
Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a spiritual discipline based on the principles of truthfulness, compassion, and tolerance. It was widely popular in China in the 1990s, with at least 70 million people taking up the practice by decade’s end, according to official estimates. In 1999, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) perceived the popular discipline as a threat to its rule and launched a nationwide persecution campaign targeting the practice.
Since then, millions of Falun Gong practitioners have been detained, with hundreds of thousands tortured while incarcerated and untold numbers killed, according to the Falun Dafa Information Center.
In April, CCP leader Xi Jinping traveled to Malaysia for a state visit. Two days before Xi’s arrival, approximately two dozen police officers detained nearly 80 Falun Gong practitioners. Those arrested included a 10-year-old child and a woman older than 80.
Among the group were also 29 people originally from China who were seeking protection from the sweeping persecution targeting their beliefs there. Several are U.N. refugees. The 47 Malaysian citizens were released hours after Xi left, and the Chinese nationals were freed during the two weeks that followed.
The U.S. State Department expressed concern over the mass arrest, which marked the first of its kind in Malaysia.
In response to the Aug. 15 incident, Malaysian Falun Gong practitioners are calling on the Malaysian government not to be misled by the Chinese regime’s smear campaigns against the practice. They urge the authorities to uphold Malaysia’s sovereignty and fundamental human rights, and to ensure that religious and belief freedoms are not compromised for the sake of economic interests.