Unregistered Protestant Churches

NEWS RELEASE

The Voice of the Martyrs, Inc.

http://www.persecution.com

Top-Secret China Document Reveals Systematic Campaign Against Unregistered Protestant Churches

VOM News, (Bartlesville, Okla.)–A top-secret document recently obtained by The Voice of the Martyrs proves the Chinese government has an ongoing, systematic campaign to expose and destroy unregistered Protestant churches in Hebei Province. The directive-the first one of its kind ever seen by the public-is a work plan order from the Public Security Bureau of Baoding to PSB sub-bureaus in all counties, cities and districts of Hebei Province. It instructs the bureaus to terminate “illegal Protestant activities.” The document describes the work plan as an effort to “embrace and create a sound and secure social environment in a concerted citywide action of the Communist Party Committee and the government in advance of the Communist Party’s 16th National Party Congress,” which was held last November. The plan was to crack down against illegal Protestant activities from August 20th to October 20th, 2002.

The directive-dated August 20th, 2002-details the effort to “establish a secret force” to infiltrate unregistered church groups to gather in-depth intelligence against illegal Protestant church activities. Bureaus were directed to “set up full files; recognize influential people and illegal meeting places.” They received further instructions to clearly identify legal and illegal church activities in order to take action against those “which are organized by freelance missionaries, which are overseas infiltration; and prepare to terminate them.”

One section of the work plan details the establishment of a government task force created to send supervisors to Public Security Bureaus in all counties, cities and districts to assure the implementation of compulsory measures against the Christians such as “subpoena penalty, ordered confessions” and “detention.” Bureaus are instructed to confiscate “illegal publicizing” materials used for evangelism and are told that “stubborn members,” believers refusing to “voluntarily obey regulations of the government” should be “severely punished.”

“This directive is a smoking gun,” said VOM spokesman Gary Lane. “It proves the Public Security Bureau is working on the provincial level to destroy unregistered churches and severely punish their leaders.”

The top-secret document also directs all grassroots police stations to strengthen their daily management of Christian affairs to assure targeted unregistered churches would be prevented from spreading and staging a comeback. It also informs the bureaus that awards would be granted to them “on the basis of performance and achievement.”

“We urge Christians everywhere to pray for our persecuted brothers and sisters in China who are suffering extreme measures against them by their government,” said Lane. “We also ask Americans to contact their representatives in Congress and the Chinese government to lodge formal complaints against this systematic targeting of believers.”

American Christians wishing to make a polite protest to the Chinese embassy in Washington DC should contact: Ambassador Yang Jiechi Embassy of the People’s Republic of China 2300 Connecticut Ave NW Washington DC 20008 Tel:(202) 328-2500 Fax:(202) 588-0032 Director of Religious Affairs: (202) 328-2512

Media Note: To read a translation of the top secret Chinese work plan document in its entirety, log-on to persecution.com and look for the link on the VOM News scroller.

–35 Years of Serving the Persecuted Church–

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