Key takeaways

• Chinese security forces are aggressively detaining known Falun Gong practitioners, many who have avoided arrest for over a decade: Detailed analysis of a key sample of cases reveals that police across China have been detaining known Falun Gong practitioners in large numbers, in some cases via coordinated raids of 30 people based on predetermined lists or when people were gathering in a private home to study spiritual texts. Included among those arrested are dozens of practitioners who have managed to avoid arrest for an average of 16 years or who have been detained for the first time. Many have subsequently been sentenced to prison.

• Over 100 cases of first-time detentions or arrests after a 10-year gap reported from February to April 2025: The Falun Dafa Information Center (FDIC) has identified 53 cases recorded during only the two months of February to April 2025 in which a Falun Gong practitioner who had been jailed in the early years of the persecution but then avoided arrest for at least 10 years has been detained—and in many cases sentenced to prison. In an additional 49 cases, Falun Gong practitioners whose arrest had never been previously reported were detained for the first time. This sample of cases are drawn from those documented by the Minghui and Weiquanwang websites, which aggregate reports of persecution from grassroots activists and religious believers in China. This sample represents only a portion of the total number of Falun Gong practitioners arrested during this time period, but their unique characteristics offer particular insights on the trajectory of the persecution.

• Nationwide crackdown, elderly a prime target: The phenomenon is occurring nationwide, although it is most intense in northeastern China. The crackdown is especially affecting elderly believers. At least 63 percent of the 102 victims of these detentions are over 60 with some in their 80s and 90s. At least three have died since their latest arrest.

• Escalation matches growing transnational repression: Many of these detainees have been under long-term surveillance by Chinese security forces, resulting in harassment, but not arrest—until now. During the first years of Xi Jinping’s rule, anti-corruption purges at the top of the security apparatus and the success of Falun Gong practitioner outreach efforts created a lull in arrests in some locales. The current intensification, however, comes in parallel to increased transnational repression targeting Falun Gong practitioners outside China—a campaign triggered in large part by a 2022 speech by Xi. The patterns evident in these cases indicate that the security forces’ enhanced focus on Falun Gong is also occurring within China’s borders.

• Urgent need for action: From among this sample of detainees, 65 have already been sentenced to prison terms of up to nine years. They and others remain at serious risk of torture, mistreatment, abuse, and even death in custody. The FDIC urges the international community to take note of this increased persecution, raise Falun Gong prisoner cases in meetings with Chinese officials, and for the U.S. Senate to pass the Falun Gong Protection Act. 

Background and Context

For over 25 years, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has been persecuting practitioners of Falun Gong, a meditation and spiritual practice founded on the principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance. Chinese citizens who persevere in their faith or share information about Falun Gong or rights abuses face rampant detention, torture, and extrajudicial killings.  

In the early years of the persecution, few could have imagined that Falun Gong would survive—or that the CCP’s violent campaign would still be ongoing 26 years later. Yet, that is the reality today. Moreover, in recent years the regime has redoubled its efforts to monitor, detain, imprison, and “transform” Falun Gong practitioners in China and to surveil, harass, silence, and malign believers around the world.

Despite the Chinese regime’s ongoing brutality and large-scale arrests of Falun Gong practitioners, there have been ups and downs in the scale, scope, and focus of the persecution. Specifically, CCP security forces periodically launch reinvigorated campaigns to harass and arrest practitioners in an attempt to force them to renounce their faith and disrupt their circulation of information that exposes the regime’s propaganda, rights violations, and violent history or teaches Chinese citizens how to circumvent CCP censorship. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, many regions of China recorded an uptick in the number of Falun Gong practitioners being detained. At the same time, during the first years of Xi Jinping’s role as head of the CCP, practitioners in some locales experienced a lull in the intensity of security forces proactive pursuit of Falun Gong believers. A 2017 report by Freedom House found cracks in the crackdown, noting that: 

President Xi Jinping has offered no explicit indication of a plan to reverse the CCP’s policy toward Falun Gong. But the purge and imprisonment of former security czar Zhou Yongkang and other officials associated with the campaign as part of Xi’s anticorruption drive, together with Falun Gong adherents’ persistent efforts to educate and discourage police from persecuting them, have had an impact. 

As the FDIC has been closely monitoring reports of persecution emerging from China, earlier this year, researchers noticed a rise in cases of arrests involving elderly Falun Gong practitioners and those who had avoided arrest for over a decade, but now faced detention and sentencing to jail. This research brief presents the findings of a more systematic effort to document this phenomenon. 

The analysis draws on a sample of cases recorded by Minghui.org (a website that documents the persecution and Falun Gong practitioners’ experiences from a network of contacts in China and abroad) and Weiquanwang(a website that aggregates reports of abuse from human rights defenders across China) and that were published between February 5 and April 5, 2025. This sample was compared to similar cases during the same period from 2022 to 2024. Given the tight censorship imposed by the CCP on information about rights violations—especially against Falun Gong practitioners—the data is far from comprehensive. Nevertheless, it is possible to draw insights and inferences from available information and patterns.  

The patterns evident from this sample of relevant cases indicate that Chinese security forces are increasingly activating prior knowledge of Falun Gong practitioners’ names and locations to proactively arrest them. This intensification correlates to an increase since 2023 in transnational repression cases targeting Falun Gong practitioners outside China. That escalation followed a 2022 speech by Xi Jinping in which he lamented the regime’s failure to suppress Falun Gong and urged security forces to “eliminate” Falun Gong globally once and for all. 

10 Emerging Trends from Recent Arrests

1. Over 50 Falun Gong practitioners were arrested within two months after a 10-year gap since their last detention.

Between February and April 2025, at least 53 cases were reported of Falun Gong practitioners arrested since 2021 who had previously been jailed in the early 2000s but escaped detention for over a decade. They have now been detained again after an average gap of 16 years. Over half of these practitioners (28 people) have already been sentenced to prison terms of up to nine years and two have reportedly died due to persecution. The apparent shift by security agencies from surveillance and harassment of these practitioners to arrest and sentencing is a key indicator of increased repression. 

• Sample case—Mass arrest in Jilin Province: In Jilin City, Jilin Province, seven Falun Gong practitioners were swept up in a mass roundup on June 4, 2023 orchestrated by the local “610 Office,” the National Security Brigade and district police. Over 30 practitioners were detained in all, based on a predetermined list of targets. Among those later sentenced to prison after sham trials, Ms. Yin Fuying (70) received a nine-year sentence, Ms. Jiang Ruihua (71) three years, and Ms. Li Wenhua (61) four years. Strikingly, each of these veteran practitioners returned to custody after an interval of more than sixteen years since their last forced labor camp or prison sentences, despite their advanced ages and decades-long hiatus from detention. Their families, many of whom never received formal notice of the verdicts, may remain unaware that these women have now been sent to serve lengthy terms for peacefully practicing Falun Gong. This case was reported by both Minghuiand Weiquanwang. 

2. The number of Falun Gong practitioners arrested after a 10-year gap has risen since 2022.

Chinese security forces’ monitoring and detention of Falun Gong practitioners even a decade after a prior prison sentence is a not entirely new. However, analysis of such cases during comparable time frames (February to April) shows a persistent rise since 2022. Notably the number of these types of detentions nearly doubled from 2022 to 2023, and have remained at a higher level since.  

3. Dozens of other Falun Gong practitioners were detained for the first time within two months. 

Between February and April 2025, at least 49 cases were also reported of Falun Gong believers being arrested since 2021 who have been practicing for years, but had managed to avoid arrest (or had only been detained for a few days or weeks). They have now been arrested and two-thirds of them (37 people) have already been sentenced to prison terms of up to 8 years following questionable legal proceedings. At least one has died.

• Sample case—59-year-old dies from abuse in detention. Ms. Dong Yusu, a 59-year-old resident of Dongfeng County in Jilin Province, died on December 15, 2024, while awaiting trial for peacefully practicing Falun Gong. Arrested on August 8, 2024, alongside seven fellow practitioners during studying Falun Gong teachings together at a private home, she was detained at Liaoyuan City Detention Center, where she suffered abuse that caused systemic edema and respiratory distress. Although eventually released on bail and hospitalized, her condition never fully improved. She was facing trial by the Longshan District Court at the time of her passing, according to Minghui.org.

4. Chinese security forces are carrying out large-scale coordinated arrests. 

In 39 cases, more than one-third of the sample, the detention in question occurred when police and security bureaus arrested multiple local Falun Gong practitioners at the same time. In one June 2024 case in Yunan Province, 30 believers were detained within a few days and nine were subsequently sentenced to prison. These coordinated detentions of practitioners involved those believed to be involved in distributing information about Falun Gong, rights violations, and the CCP. They also included raids on homes when believers were quietly gathered in private to read spiritual texts together.

• Sample case—Mass arrest in Shandong Province: In Laizhou, Shandong Province, three elderly Falun Gong practitioners—Lin Hongjie (74), Xie Qingcai (70) and Fang Ruiqin (74)—were handed prison terms on May 20, 2024, of eight, five, and three years respectively for gathering at a private residence to study Falun Gong teachings. Their sentences follow a forceful raid on May 8, 2023, when more than thirty officers from the local police and the “610 Office”, arriving in over ten vehicles, stormed their regular study site and arrested at least five adherents, including the three senior citizens. None of the three had any prior detention history. This group sentencing case was highlighted by both Minghui.org and Weiquanwang.

5. Surveillance technology and reports to police by fellow citizens are leading to Falun Gong detentions. 

In 11 cases, victims were detained after surveillance technology in public places detected them speaking to someone about Falun Gong or distributing information about the practice, rights abuses, or the broader history of the CCP’s brutal rule. In 19 cases, victims were detained after a fellow citizen reported upon them to police for talking about Falun Gong, handing out leaflets, or sharing anti-censorship technology. Local Chinese officials have long been known to offer monetary rewards to people who report Falun Gong practitioners. Several cases also mentioned “grid members” reporting the incident, a reference to the carefully constructed grassroots “grid-based management system” of neighborhood surveillance enhanced by the CCP in recent years that includes both human monitors and technology. In some instances, like the case below, both low-tech and high-tech surveillance contributed to the practitioner’s arrest.

• Sample case—Wuhan man caught on camera, jailed for four years: In late January 2025, Minghui.org reported that Mr. Zhang Sifeng, a 70-year-old former engineer from Huayuan Electrical Engineering Company in Wuhan’s Jianghan District, was sentenced to four years in prison for distributing a flash drive detailing the Chinese Communist Party’s persecution of Falun Gong. On the morning of May 12, 2024, Jianghan District Domestic Security Division agents—alerted by a tip and surveillance footage—raided his home shortly after 6 a.m., arrested him on the spot, and transferred him to the Jianghan District Detention Center. A formal arrest warrant followed on May 26, and he was subsequently moved to the Hanyang District Detention Center before his indictment in October 2024. A veteran practitioner, Mr. Zhang had already endured two one-year forced-labor sentences and multiple stints in “re-education” centers prior to this latest conviction. Weiquanwang also reported his case. 

6. Chinese police are arresting Falun Gong practitioners simply for studying spiritual texts in private.  

An analysis of the act that triggered the detention of this subset of Falun Gong practitioners from February to April 2025 reveals that a large proportion—over half of believers (59 out of 102)—were taken into custody simply for exercising their right to religious freedom by studying Falun Gong teachings in the privacy of their own home or at a friend’s. The fact that the regime’s security forces would be aware of their actions points to the intrusiveness of surveillance being deployed against this community and the aggressiveness with which the security agencies are arresting believers. In an additional 32 cases, Falun Gong practitioners were arrested for talking to people about the practice and persecution or sharing materials about Falun Gong, the CCP, or anti-censorship technologies. 

7. A large majority of arrested Falun Gong practitioners in this sample were women. 

From among these 102 cases, in 72 percent (73 people) the victim is female, while in the remaining 28 percent (29 people), the victim is male. In addition to the almost certain torture faced by all Falun Gong practitioners taken into police custody, female are at particular risk of various forms of sexual abuse. 

• Sample case—Four women in Sichuan reported by grid-based management system, sentenced to prison: In March, Minghui.org reported that on March 6, 12, 17, and 18, 2024, four women from Sichuan—including Tang Xingxiu and Jia Xingrong—distributed informational pamphlets about Falun Gong in various public locations in Chongzhou, Sichuan. They were reported by local grid managers and a shop owner to the authorities. On March 19, Chongzhou police forcibly entered their homes without warrants, confiscating personal belongings as alleged ”evidence” and detaining them at the Chengdu Detention Center. Around a year later, the Chongzhou City Court sentenced four female Falun Gong practitioners to prison terms ranging from 2 to 4.5 years, according to Weiquanwang.

8. Elderly Falun Gong practitioners are being disproportionately affected by recent arrests.

The average age of the 102 detainees in this sample is 64 while at least 74 percent (65 people) are over 60 years old. Seven of the detainees are over the age of 80. The higher age of these detainees puts them at even greater risk than other Falun Gong practitioners of dying in custody or as a result of abuse in detention. 

• Sample case—80-Year-Old Beijing woman sent to Tianjin prison: According to Weiquanwang, in January 2025, 80-year-old Beijing resident Wang Kuilan was sentenced to five years in prison for practicing Falun Gong. She had been reported for speaking to people about the practice in Tianjin in August 2023. Police raided her home, confiscated personal items, and arrested her shortly after. Although initially released on bail, she was later taken back into custody. Minghui.org reported that her family only learned of her sentencing after being informed by a court-appointed lawyer. Upon visiting her at the Tianjin Women’s Prison, they found her in poor health, needing a wheelchair.

9. Security forces are targeting veteran Falun Gong practitioners and first-time detainees all across China. 

From among this sample of cases, at least one arrest occurred in 19 out of China’s 31 provinces, autonomous regions, and major municipalities. The largest number of cases were recorded in Jilin, Liaoning, and Shandong. These regions in Northeastern China are typically where the regime’s persecution against Falun Gong is especially intense, as Falun Gong was first introduced to the public in Jilin and quickly garnered a large number of believers. 

10. Nearly half of the Falun Gong arrests in this sample were documented by at least two sources. 

The Minghui website specializes in obtaining information on right violations faced by Falun Gong practitioners in China, drawing on a broad network of correspondents and sources inside the country who circumvent the CCP’s online censorship to relay cases of harassment, detention, sentencing, and death. Similarly, Weiquanwang has a network of sources in China, including grassroots activists and lawyers. However, it collects cases of persecution affecting a wider population of victims, such as free expression advocates, Christians, Uyghurs, Tibetans, and others. Within this sample, all 102 cases were documented by Minghui, but 49 cases—nearly half—were also reported upon in some capacity on Weiquanwang. This dual documentation allows for cross-verification of details and reinforces the credibility of the reported detentions. 

• Sample case: 65-year-old imprisoned for the first time for practicing Falun Gong, possessing flyers. Mr. Jin Xiaofeng, a 65-year-old resident of Shenyang City, Liaoning Province, was sentenced on March 31, 2025, to three years in prison and fined 10,000 yuan for practicing Falun Gong. On July 13, 2024, plainclothes officers arrested Mr. Jin and fellow practitioner Ms. Zhao Guiping without presenting a warrant, confiscated over 500 Falun Gong flyers from his car, and raided his home. At their trial in February 2025, the defense argued for acquittal, citing that no Chinese law actually bans Falun Gong. However, the judge and prosecutor repeatedly interrupted the defense and rejected crucial evidence. Both Mr. Jin and Ms. Zhao are now in declining health due to the psychological toll of the persecution. Their case has been reported upon by both Minghui and Weiquanwang.

Conclusion and Recommendations 

Almost 26 years after the CCP launched its violent campaign to wipe-out Falun Gong, the practice survives in China, with millions of people persisting in their faith and the meditation exercises that have enhanced their mental and physical well-being. Seemingly frustrated by the failure to crush Falun Gong, police and other security forces across China are detaining and imprisoning vast numbers of practitioners. 

Tracking and analyzing these cases is a time-consuming exercise. Nevertheless, detailed examination of even a small sample of cases yields important insights on the scale, trajectory, and nature of the persecution in present-day China. The above analysis—focused only on 102 cases from February to April 2025 that involved first-time detentions or veteran practitioners’ new arrests after at least a 10-year gap—offers a meaningful data point for assessing recent trends in the regime’s persecution of Chinese citizens who practice Falun Gong. 

Notably, the above findings point to a renewed and more aggressive approach by security forces to not only harass, but also detain known Falun Gong practitioners. Among other actions, police are targeting those who are simply reading Falun Gong religious texts in the privacy of their home and elderly practitioners above the age of 60. They are making use of expanded surveillance technology, grid management systems, and monetary rewards to Chinese citizens to detect and arrest those who practice—or share information about—Falun Gong.  

Available data indicates these trends have increased since late 2022, when Xi Jinping reportedly made a speech to leaders in the security forces urging them to intensify their efforts to crack down on Falun Gong. While those remarks are reported to have particularly prioritized targeting Falun Gong’s founder and practitioner-founded initiatives overseas, it would appear that security forces within China are also intensifying efforts to weed out—and specifically to detain—Falun Gong believers in different parts of the country. 

If these trends continue, many more Falun Gong practitioners across China—including hundreds or even thousands who have escaped arrest over the past decade—are at risk of detention in the coming months as police more systematically seek out known believers not only to harass them, but also to take them into custody. Once in detention, they will be at high risk of torture, long-term imprisonment, and even death. Urgent international action is needed to minimize these risks and save lives. 

The Falun Dafa Information Center calls on the United States, European Union, and other governments to: 

• Publicly condemn the CCP’s persecution of Falun Gong—including its recent intensification and targeting of elderly believers—and call for the release of all practitioners
• Raise concerns with Chinese counterparts about the detention and abuse in custody of Falun Gong practitioners, including individuals named above. 
• Impose sanctions on Chinese officials for their role in severe human rights violations against Falun Gong practitioners, especially those from northeastern China where the persecution is most intense.
• In the United States, the Senate should vote on and pass the Falun Gong Protection Act, which passed the House of Representatives in May. This legislation would clarify U.S. policy on Falun Gong, increase transparency, and enhance accountability, especially surrounding forced organ harvesting from Falun Gong prisoners of conscience. Other parliaments should introduce and adopt similar legislation.