By Kirsti Adair Daily Post Staff
THE husband of a pregnant Chinese woman facing deportation claims she
will
be tortured if she returns home.
Jinfei Zhang, 25, a university student of Edge Lane, Liverpool, says a
clerical error meant his wife, Lili Lin, could not appeal when she was
turned down for asylum in the UK.
And ,as a practitioner of Falun Gong, a type of meditation banned by the
Chinese authorities, she faced certain persecution.
He said: “I fear the worst for her. She sought asylum because hundreds
of
practitioners have been tortured and the authorities over there know who
she
is.
“Friends of ours have already been imprisoned and I know there is a
practice
of forced abortions, so we are very scared for our baby.” Jinfei, a Ph.D
student in electrical engineering at Liverpool University, claims Lili
ran
out of time to appeal against the refused application. He said paperwork
informing her she had to leave was sent to the wrong address.
Lili, 28, from Fujian province in Southern China, applied for asylum in
Manchester in October, 2001, on the grounds of being a Falun Gong
practitioner.
She moved to Liverpool last year when she married Jinfei, but notice of
her
rejected appeal was sent to her former home.
She was arrested last Wednesday and is being held in a detention centre
at
Gatwick airport awaiting deportation on March 7. A medical examination
revealed she was six weeks pregnant.
Lili’s former solicitor, Mikky Ho, of the London-based Chinese
Information
and Advice Centre, said she did not inform him of her new contact
details
and so the appeal had to go ahead without her.
He said: “She thought the Home Office were informed of her new address,
but
they have said it was her responsibility to inform them.”
Friends of the couple have been lobbying MPs for a stay of the process.
Peaceful protests have been held outside the immigration office in
Liverpool’s Water Street.
Mary Cann, a mother-of-seven and Falun Gong devotee, came to Liverpool
to
show her support.
She said: “Lili is a lovely gentle woman who has done nothing wrong but
promote the principles of truthfulness, compassion and tolerance that
are
the teachings of Falun Gong.
“Despite a huge number of practitioners, the Chinese government banned
the
practice in 1999 as it had not been given to people by the Communist
party.”
A spokesman for Amnesty International said: “We are aware of
considerable
human rights abuses against hundreds of people practising Falun Gong in
China.
“There has been a 24-hour vigil outside the Chinese Embassy in London
and
many groups are campaigning against the persecution of practitioners.”
The Home Office said it would not comment on individual cases, but
confirmed
it had received a large number of calls about Lili Lin.
http://icliverpool.icnetwork.co.uk/0100news/0100regionalnews/page.cfm?ob
j
ectid=12699588&method=full&siteid=50061
Posting date: 5/March/2003
Original article date: 4/March/2003
Category: World News
