I am responding to the July 21 LNP | LancasterOnline article “Chinese human rights lawyer living in Mountville speaks from ICE detention center as family waits for hearing.”

My wife and I moved to Lancaster County a year ago. We have been practicing Falun Gong since 2001. I have read many accounts of attorneys in China being harassed, disbarred, arrested and/or tortured for defending Falun Gong practitioners.


Chinese dissidents petition Homeland Security to release Mountville human rights lawyer in ICE custody

The most famous example is of Gao Zhisheng, a prominent human rights attorney who was arrested and tortured. His whereabouts are currently unknown. He was often referred to as the “Conscience of China.”

Falun Gong is a spiritual path based on the principles of truthfulness, compassion and tolerance. From 1992 to 1999, 70 million to 100 million Chinese citizens took up the practice. (That is the Chinese government’s estimate.) In 1999, then Chinese President Jiang Zemin (now deceased), who was one of the organizers of the Tiananmen Square massacre, launched the brutal persecution of Falun Gong that continues today. He did this out of fear and jealousy.

If an attorney who defended Falun Gong practitioners managed to escape China and get to the United States, I believe that person should be able to remain here. This is especially true now. Since 2024, Chinese President Xi Jinping has intensified the persecution worldwide — physically, and through lawfare and propaganda.

Philip Randell

West Hempfield Township

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