That The Church of Almighty God (CAG) is heavily persecuted in China, with thousands of arrests and many documented cases of torture and extra-judicial killings, is now an established fact, recognized inter alia by official United Nations and U.S. State Department documents. Hundreds of CAG members have escaped to South Korea, where they are seeking refugee status.

In September 2018, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) coerced, or persuaded with threats, relatives of some CAG refugees to go to Korea and ask that the asylum seekers “return home,” i.e. go back to China where they would not go “home” but to jail. Ms. O Myung-ok, who runs a small anti-cult and pro-CCP organization in Korea, recruited a number of local professional demonstrators and organized false “spontaneous demonstrations” in Seoul. The “demonstrators” claimed that there is no religious persecution in China and that CAG asylum seekers in Korea should be deported back to China. The operation was denounced as a hoax by international NGOs and ended in disgrace. Not a single CAG refugee returned to China as a consequence of the demonstrations.

The CCP is now doing it again. More relatives of CAG refugees, in fact in a number higher than before, are being confused and coerced to get prepared to go to Seoul, where new false demonstrations will be arranged, possibly on a larger scale than before.

It is a scandal that CCP agents are allowed to bring their nefarious activities to South Korea, a democratic country.

We urge Korean authorities to grant asylum to the believers of The Church of Almighty God who, should they return to China, would face arrest, detention, and torture, and to prevent Chinese intelligence and their Korean accomplices to continue harassing refugees in South Korea.

July 16, 2019

CAP-LC Coordination des Associations et des Particuliers pour la Liberté de Conscience

CESNUR – Center for Studies on New Religions

Citizen Power Initiatives for China

EIFRF European Inter-Religious Forum for Religious Freedom

EMISCO – European Muslim Initiative for Social Cohesion

Gerard Noodt Foundation for Freedom of Religion or Belief

FOB – European Federation for Freedom of Belief

FOREF – Forum for Religious Freedom Europe

HRWF – Human Rights Without Frontiers

LIREC – Center for Studies on Freedom of Belief, Religion and Conscience

ORLIR – International Observatory of Religious Liberty of Refugees

Stefanus Alliance

Soteria International