Using dramatic photographs of tortured Falun Gong practitioners in China, members of Falun Dafa Association at Iowa State hosted a public appeal to the ISU community Monday afternoon.

Margaret Jiang, president of the Falun Dafa Association at Iowa State, said the demonstration, in the Free Speech Zone west of the Hub, was to protest to the Chinese government’s recent persecution of Falun Gong practitioners in Changchun, China.

Jiang, graduate student in food science, said more than 100 Falun Gong practitioners have been reported killed and more than 5,000 kidnapped by the Chinese government since March 5. The killings are a result of an illegal broadcast by Falun Gong practitioners over state-run Chinese television.

“The broadcast exposed the injustices committed by the Chinese government in their effort to eliminate Falun Gong from China,” she said.

These new allegations of human rights violations by the Chinese government are alarming but not surprising, Jiang said.

“The Chinese government started its crackdown on Falun Dafa in 1999, and thousands of people have died at the hands of the government for practicing Falun Gong,” she said.

Falun Gong, or Falun Dafa, is a practice of meditation and teachings based on the principles of “truthfulness, compassion and tolerance,” Jiang said. The practice, made public in 1992 by Li Hongzhi, gained popularity throughout the 1990s, with more than 100 million practitioners by 1999.

“The Chinese government supported the practice of Falun Dafa at first,” she said.

“Then as [Falun Dafa] became more popular, they felt it was a threat to the government and banned the practice from China.”

Laura Chen, member of Falun Dafa Association at Iowa State, said she has personally benefited from the practices and teachings of Falun Gong.

“Different people benefit in different ways,” said Chen, ISU alumna. “I personally feel more balanced because of it.”

Chen said she feels free to practice Falun Gong on campus, due to Iowa State’s “open and supportive” atmosphere. She said she hoped students would become aware of human rights issues in China because of the demonstration.

“Students don’t always know about these issues because they’re not well publicized,” she said. “We want more people to know what is really happening.”

Ben Rittgers, senior in computer science, signed a petition supporting the practice of Falun Gong.

“[Falun Gong practitioners] should be able to practice what they want to,” Rittgers said. “People in China should have freedoms over there like we do here.”