Ongoing Public Advocacy for Freedom Despite Life-Threatening Risks Posed by Transnational Repression and Espionage by the Chinese Communist Party
On September 30, 2025, the Higher Regional Court of Dresden will deliver its verdict in the case of Guo Jian, a German national of Chinese origin, who is accused of espionage, including against Chinese dissidents. According to the German Federal Prosecutor’s Office, the convicted Guo spied on Chinese opposition figures and dissidents in Germany during 2023 and 2024. In his role as an assistant in the European Parliament, he repeatedly passed on information in January 2024 about negotiations and decisions in the EU Parliament to his intelligence handlers. This included, among other things, details regarding the EU resolution adopted on January 18, 2024, concerning “The ongoing persecution of Falun Gong practitioners in China, notably the case of Mr Ding Yuande (2024/2504(RSP))”. By passing the resolution, the EU Parliament highlights the tragic yet courageous fate of my father Mr Ding Yuande and calls on EU member states to impose targeted sanctions against those responsible for the state-led campaign to eradicate the Chinese spiritual meditation practice Falun Gong. Since March 20, 2024, my father has been illegally detained in Shandong Provincial Prison—solely because of his belief in Falun Gong—where he faces torture, brainwashing, forced labor, and a life-threatening risk of state-sanctioned organ harvesting by the CCP, all without any legal basis. As the only child of Mr Ding Yuande and a human rights activist currently living in Berlin, I have also become a target of transnational repression and espionage by the Chinese Communist regime: "The Chinese dictatorial regime mocks the justice that the German rule of law grants us Chinese dissidents, who have been subjected to life-threatening transnational repression and espionage by Communist China. Communist China will never cease its state-led campaign to eradicate Falun Gong. As long as the Chinese Communist Party exists, it is entirely irrelevant who happens to be at the top of its power apparatus. This Chinese communist dictatorship continues to dream of the total subjugation of the free world under its communist and atheistic ideology." — Ding Lebin, Son of Mr Ding Yuande & human rights activist
Ongoing Public Advocacy for Freedom Despite Life-Threatening Risks Posed by Transnational Repression and Espionage by the Chinese Communist Party
#SOS: Please help free my father, Mr Ding Yuande, from unlawful imprisonment in China
(Berlin/Dresden) On September 30, 2025, the Higher Regional Court of Dresden will deliver its verdict in the case of Guo Jian, a German national of Chinese origin, who is accused of espionage, including against Chinese dissidents.
According to the German Federal Prosecutor’s Office, the convicted Guo spied on Chinese opposition figures and dissidents in Germany during 2023 and 2024. In his role as an assistant in the European Parliament, he repeatedly passed on information in January 2024 about negotiations and decisions in the EU Parliament to his intelligence handlers. This included, among other things, details regarding the EU resolution adopted on January 18, 2024, concerning “The ongoing persecution of Falun Gong practitioners in China, notably the case of Mr Ding Yuande (2024/2504(RSP))”.
By passing the resolution, the EU Parliament highlights the tragic yet courageous fate of my father Mr Ding Yuande and calls on EU member states to impose targeted sanctions against those responsible for the state-led campaign to eradicate the Chinese spiritual meditation practice Falun Gong. Since March 20, 2024, my father has been illegally detained in Shandong Province Prison—solely because of his belief in Falun Gong—where he faces torture, brainwashing, forced labor, and a life-threatening risk of state-sanctioned organ harvesting by the CCP, all without any legal basis.
According to Freedom House, Communist China ranks first globally in conducting transnational repression. For more than 26 years, Falun Gong practitioners abroad have faced life-threatening transnational repression, espionage, and systematic surveillance by the CCP.
An escalation of the persecution of Falun Gong began in October 2022, when Communist China launched a new global campaign to export this persecution abroad. Tactics include disinformation campaigns, death and bomb threats, misuse of foreign legal systems, and other forms of transnational repression.
As the only child of Mr Ding Yuande and a human rights activist currently living in Berlin, I have also become a target of transnational repression and espionage by the Chinese Communist regime:
"The Chinese dictatorial regime mocks the justice that the German rule of law grants us Chinese dissidents, who have been subjected to life-threatening transnational repression and espionage by Communist China. Communist China will never cease its state-led campaign to eradicate Falun Gong. As long as the Chinese Communist Party exists, it is entirely irrelevant who happens to be at the top of its power apparatus. This Chinese communist dictatorship continues to dream of the total subjugation of the free world under its communist and atheistic ideology."
— Ding Lebin, Son of Mr Ding Yuande & human rights activist
On December 10, 2024, International Human Rights Day, Mr Michael Heinisch-Kirch (4th from left), together with other renowned German civil rights activists from the former East Germany, including Mr Stefan Müller (2nd from left), held a vigil in front of the Chinese Embassy in Berlin. (Credit: Mr Heinisch-Kirch)
"I want to offer words of encouragement to the family Ding. I want to encourage the families who are currently being oppressed and are suffering from persecution and repression in China. It all seems a bit absurd because it appears as if the Communist Party is so powerful that it can continue the repression indefinitely. But history shows us that things can change quickly. Change can happen if we believe in it and if we take action."
— Michale Heinisch-Kirch, renowned German Civil Rights Activist & Holder of an Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
This was not the first time that the German Federal Prosecutor's Office had made allegations regarding the espionage activities of Chinese spies against Chinese opposition members in Germany. In June 2010, the German newspaper Der Spiegel published an article with the title “War of Espionage” (in German: “Krieg der Spionage”) about Chinese spying activities against Falun Gong practitioners in Germany.
Another report alleged that the suspect, Dr. Z., had confessed in a written statement to the German Court Celle at the beginning of the trial in late May 2011 that he had sent e-mail messages and addresses of Falun Gong practitioners in Germany to a top official in the 610 Bureau in China, as well as hundreds of pages of written reports about Falun Gong. The 610 Bureau is a security agency established by China’s communist regime for the purpose of coordinating and implementing the persecution of Falun Gong.
On June 8, 2011, Dr. Z. was sentenced by the Higher Regional Court of Celle, which reached the following verdict in accordance with § 99 and § 59 of the German Criminal Code:
The defendant is found guilty of secret service agent activity. He is therefore cautioned. The imposition of a fine of 180 daily rates of 150 euro each is reserved. The defendant is ordered to pay the costs of the proceedings. A probation order is also issued. The probation period is set at two years. As a condition of probation, the defendant must pay an amount of 15,000 euro to Amnesty International.
At the 18th meeting of the 60th Session of the UN Human Rights Council, I delivered an oral statement on the CCP’s new global strategy and intensified transnational repression against Falun Gong. On August 13, 2025, former Hong Kong Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying threatened Finnish Falun Gong meditators in a park in Helsinki, acting as though China’s persecution policy applies abroad, in direct violation of Finland’s religious freedom. Two days later in Malaysia, a Chinese group claiming links to a “China police station” unlawfully removed materials from a female Falun Gong practitioner who was meditating.
Since launching international campaigns in May 2023 to advocate for my parents’ freedom and to expose the CCP’s persecution of Falun Gong, I have personally experienced repeated attempts by the CCP to silence me across Europe:
- In June 2023, after meeting with several members of the Chamber of Deputies of the Czech Republic, who later publicly called for my father’s release, I was secretly followed by a Chinese operative on the Berlin S-Bahn the next evening.
- On August 1, 2023, while peacefully attempting to deliver protest letters—signed by compassionate citizens from across Europe—to the Chinese Embassy in Berlin, embassy staff attempted to interfere. Only after police of Berlin City intervention were we able to deliver the letters.
- On March 4, 2025, during the 58th Session of the UN Human Rights Council, the delegation of Communist China interrupted and tried to silence me as I delivered an oral statement on the Chinese Communist Party´s escalating global campaign to persecute and eradicate Falun Gong.
For further information about these and other attempts by the CCP to silence me and stop my advocacy for the freedom of my parents and an end to the ongoing state crimes against Falun Gong practitioners, please contact me for an interview.
E-Mail: [email protected]
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