Dear President Obama: 

It is with a tremendous sense of urgency, we are writing you on the cusp of your visit to China.  Families of American residents are being torn apart, as their husbands, brothers, sons and daughters are enduring incomprehensible forms of torture and abuse such as electrocution, gang rape, force feeding, sleep deprivation, forced labor, and 24-hour surveillance in China under the communist regime for their steadfast belief in Falun Gong. 

President Obama, eighty-year-old Parsippany, NJ resident John Shen has messages for you to carry to Chiana’s president Hu Jintao. For the past 8 years, his daughter-in-law Ms. Luo Fang has been imprisoned for practicing Falun Gong. She was arrested on February 1, 2002 along with her husband and Mr. Shen’s son, Shen Lizhi when they were caught by the Chinese police with printed materials extolling the virtues of Falun Gong on their persons. A month later, on March 3, 2002, Shen Lizhi was killed in jail.  Ms. Luo, who was pregnant at the time of her arrest, survived, but was later forced to have an abortion at eight months of pregnancy.  Her tormentors also injected her with nerve-damaging drugs that paralyzed her legs. For her belief, she was sentenced to 12 years in prison without a trial.  Having lost his son, Mr. Shen does not want to lose his daughter-in-law as well.  

Ms. Huang Hongjian, a New York resident, has not seen nor heard from her husband Mr. Zhang Yuhui since October 2000, when he was unlawfully arrested by the Chinese communist regime for publishing a series of articles supporting Falun Gong on the Internet.  Mr. Zhang has been reportedly tortured brutally.  Consider further the case of Ms. Zhang Shuangying, a New York resident, whose father Zhang Xingwu was arrested in July 2008 -for the third time in the past ten years - for practicing Falun Gong. 

President Obama, what we are presenting is the most important and serious issue we will ever face in our human lives - the imminent violent death of our loved ones.   We are extremely concerned for their safety and health, as well as for their rights. The inhumane persecution towards Falun Gong is an affront to humanity, and as such it cannot be tolerated. 

In a few days, you are going to meet with China’s president Hu. We seek your assistance to request President Hu to immediately release these relatives of our fellow residents. 

Yours truly,

Li Li

Executive Director