Falun Gong Persecution: Article 300, 610 Office, and Asylum

The persecution of Falun Gong is a state campaign the Chinese Communist Party launched in July 1999 to eliminate a meditation and moral practice that, by the government’s own pre-ban estimate, had drawn 70 million followers in China.¹ More than 25 years later it continues. Nearly 3,000 practitioners were arrested in 2024, and an independent tribunal has found credible evidence of state-sponsored forced organ harvesting that it classifies as a crime against humanity.²

What Falun Gong Is and Why It Was Banned

Falun Gong, also called Falun Dafa, combines qigong exercises and meditation with a moral philosophy centered on truthfulness, compassion, and forbearance. It was introduced publicly in 1992 and grew quickly. Estimates of practitioners ranged from 3 million to 70 million, making it one of the largest independent social movements in China.³

On April 25, 1999, more than 10,000 practitioners gathered peacefully outside Zhongnanhai, the leadership compound in central Beijing, to ask for official recognition and relief from local harassment. The demonstration was orderly, but the Party read any coordinated gathering of that size as a threat to its authority.³

On July 20, 1999, public security officers across China detained Falun Gong leaders in overnight raids. The Ministry of Civil Affairs then dissolved the group, banned public practice, and prohibited the distribution of Falun Gong materials. Party leadership described the campaign internally as an effort to “eradicate” the practice.³

Article 300: The Law Used to Prosecute Practitioners

The main legal instrument used against Falun Gong is Article 300 of China’s Criminal Law, which punishes anyone who organizes or takes part in a group the government labels a “cult organization” (xie jiao). Adopted in 1997, the provision was repurposed after 1999 to target Falun Gong. More than 20 groups now carry the designation.⁴

A standard conviction carries three to seven years in prison plus a fine. Cases deemed “especially serious” can bring seven years or more, up to indefinite detention, with asset confiscation. Even “minor” cases carry up to three years or short-term detention. The severity tiers are vague, and in practice judges and prosecutors have used them to impose long sentences for possessing Falun Gong literature or sharing information about the practice online.

The 610 Office

To run the crackdown, the Party created a dedicated security body on June 10, 1999, known as the 610 Office. It had no formal legal mandate, operated outside the judicial system, and reported directly to a member of the Politburo Standing Committee. Its sole purpose was suppressing Falun Gong.⁵

The office directed police, courts, propaganda organs, and local security bureaus in a unified campaign and could override normal legal procedures. In 2018, its functions were absorbed into the Central Political and Legal Affairs Commission and the Ministry of Public Security, which continue the same work today.

Detention, Torture, and Forced Organ Harvesting

Practitioners have been held in prisons, detention centers, and the now-abolished Re-education Through Labor camps, frequently without trial. The U.S. Department of State called for their release from those camps as early as 2001, noting that people who should never have been incarcerated were dying inside them.⁶

Documented abuse of detained practitioners includes electric shock with cattle prods, severe beatings, force-feeding, prolonged sleep deprivation, and forced psychiatric treatment. The stated aim is to coerce practitioners into signing statements renouncing their beliefs; those who refuse face escalating abuse. The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom’s 2025 Annual Report found that Chinese authorities “continued to target Falun Gong,” with believers facing arrest, imprisonment, and deaths from abuse in custody. USCIRF’s victims database lists 217 Falun Gong cases, roughly 26 percent of all documented religious freedom victims in China.⁷

The most serious allegation is the forced harvesting of organs from living Falun Gong practitioners and other prisoners of conscience. In 2019, the independent China Tribunal, chaired by Sir Geoffrey Nice KC, the former lead prosecutor of Slobodan Milošević at The Hague, concluded unanimously that forced organ harvesting has occurred across multiple locations in China over at least 20 years and continues today. The Tribunal assessed credible transplant volume at 60,000 to 90,000 operations per year and identified Falun Gong practitioners as “probably the principal source” of harvested organs. It found that these acts constitute crimes against humanity, committed with the knowledge and sponsorship of the Chinese state.²

In June 2021, twelve United Nations Special Procedures mandate holders said they were “extremely alarmed” by allegations of organ harvesting targeting Falun Gong practitioners, Uyghurs, Tibetans, and Christians in Chinese detention. They reported credible information that detainees from religious and ethnic minorities were being subjected to blood tests and organ examinations without consent, with results entered into a living organ source database.⁸

The Persecution Today

The campaign continues at scale. A 2025 UK government country assessment drawing on verified reporting recorded 2,828 newly arrested practitioners in 2024, 764 prison sentences, and 164 deaths from the persecution. Another 2,864 incidents of harassment were logged that year. Fines imposed on practitioners totaled nearly 3 million yuan, roughly $400,000.⁹

The first half of 2025 continued the pattern: 948 arrests, 1,055 harassment cases, and 430 prison sentences ranging from several months to ten years. More than half of sentenced practitioners received terms of three years or longer. Beyond formal prosecution, practitioners face surveillance through tracking devices and facial recognition cameras, pension suspensions, and forced enrollment in “brainwashing centers” designed to compel renunciation of belief.⁹

Reach Beyond China’s Borders

The persecution follows practitioners abroad. The FBI identifies transnational repression, in which foreign governments harass and intimidate their own nationals living in the United States, as a category of threat, and China’s targeting of Falun Gong practitioners is a prominent example.¹⁰ USCIRF’s 2025 testimony specifically recommended an FBI-led counterintelligence operation focused on transnational repression of Falun Gong practitioners.⁷

The concern is not hypothetical. In a Department of Justice prosecution, John Chen was sentenced to 20 months in prison for acting as an unregistered agent of the People’s Republic of China in connection with a plot to target U.S.-based Falun Gong practitioners. His co-defendant, Lin Feng, received 16 months. Charges included acting as illegal foreign agents and bribing an IRS agent.¹¹

Documented methods of overseas intimidation include physical assaults at protests by visiting delegations or pro-Beijing proxies, suspicious break-ins targeting sensitive information, vehicle tampering, and pressure on local businesses to sever ties with Falun Gong-affiliated organizations. Incidents have been recorded in the United States, Czech Republic, Taiwan, Brazil, Argentina, Thailand, and Indonesia.

International Legal Responses

Governments have begun to act. In June 2016, the U.S. House of Representatives passed H.Res. 343, condemning state-sanctioned forced organ harvesting, demanding an end to the persecution, and calling for the release of Falun Gong prisoners of conscience.¹² The Stop Forced Organ Harvesting Act (H.R. 1503), which passed the House in the 119th Congress, would require the State Department to include forced organ harvesting assessments in its annual human rights reports for every country, and would direct the President to compile and sanction a list of individuals who fund or facilitate the practice. As of mid-2025, the bill was pending before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.¹³ The Falun Gong Protection Act (S. 817), introduced in March 2025, takes aim at the persecution more broadly, and USCIRF has urged the Senate to pass it alongside expanded sanctions and stronger refugee pathways.¹⁴

On January 18, 2024, the European Parliament adopted a resolution urging the Chinese government to end the persecution and release imprisoned practitioners. It called on EU member states to use the EU Global Human Rights Sanctions Regime against perpetrators, including visa refusal, asset freezing, expulsion, and criminal prosecution, and demanded an end to state-sanctioned forced organ harvesting.¹⁵

Asylum in the United States for Practitioners

Practitioners who have fled China may qualify for asylum in the United States. Federal law permits asylum for anyone who shows a well-founded fear of persecution based on religion, political opinion, race, nationality, or membership in a particular social group. The applicant must prove that one of those protected grounds is at least a central reason for the persecution.¹⁶

For Falun Gong practitioners the religious persecution ground is the most direct route, and the documented record of the campaign supports these claims. The U.S. State Department has imposed visa restrictions on specific Chinese officials for “particularly severe violations of religious freedom of Falun Gong practitioners,” including detention and interrogation, which reinforces the factual basis for individual applications.¹

Practitioners apprehended at the border or placed in removal proceedings can request a credible fear screening, which requires showing a “significant possibility” of establishing persecution or torture upon return.¹⁷ Practitioners already in the United States who experience surveillance, threats, or intimidation tied to a foreign government should report it to the FBI.

1
U.S. Department of State. International Religious Freedom Reports: Custom Report Excerpts
2
China Tribunal. China Tribunal Summary Judgment
3
EveryCRSReport.com. China and Falun Gong
4
U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. China’s Religious Freedom Violations on the Basis of Article 300
5
Jamestown Foundation. The 610 Office: Policing the Chinese Spirit
6
U.S. Department of State. Falun Gong in China
7
U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. Freedom Forsaken: Falun Gong and Beijing’s Playbook for Repression
8
Tom Lantos Human Rights Commission. Forced Organ Harvesting in China: Examining the Evidence
9
UK Government. Country Policy and Information Note: Falun Gong, China, November 2025
10
Federal Bureau of Investigation. The China Threat
11
U.S. Department of Justice. California Man Sentenced for Acting as an Illegal Agent of the People’s Republic of China Government and Bribery
12
U.S. Congress. H.Res.343 – Expressing Concern Regarding Persistent combating of State-sanctioned Forced Organ Harvesting
13
U.S. Congress. H.R.1503 – Stop Forced Organ Harvesting Act
14
U.S. Congress. S.817 – Falun Gong Protection Act
15
European Parliament. Motion for a Resolution on the Ongoing Persecution of Falun Gong in China
16
Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 8 USC 1158 – Asylum
17
U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Questions and Answers: Credible Fear Screening