A former dancer for Shen Yun Performing Arts, the prominent music and dance company of the Falun Gong religious movement, filed a lawsuit on Monday accusing the group and its leaders of trafficking vulnerable children to work for little to no pay.

周一，法轮功宗教运动的著名音乐和舞蹈团体——神韵艺术团的前舞蹈演员提起诉讼，指控神韵及其领导者诱拐弱势儿童，让他们从事报酬微薄甚至无偿的工作。

The 68-page lawsuit, brought by Chang Chun-Ko in Federal District Court in White Plains, N.Y., described Shen Yun as a “forced labor enterprise” that has exploited underage dancers through threats and public shaming to generate hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue.

这份长达68页的诉讼由张郡格在纽约州怀特普莱恩斯联邦地区法院提起，其中将神韵描述为“强迫劳动企业”，通过威胁和公开羞辱剥削未成年舞蹈演员赚取数亿美元的收入。

Shen Yun instills obedience in its dancers through a wide range of tactics, the lawsuit said, including by confiscating their passports, cutting them off from outside media, denouncing them as Chinese government spies if they question the group’s practices and subjecting rule-breakers to public critique sessions.

该诉讼称，神韵通过各种手段向舞者灌输服从意识，包括没收护照、禁止接触外部媒体，如果舞者质疑该团体的做法，就被指责为中国政府的间谍，并且让违规者接受公开批评。

Ms. Chang said she was recruited from Taiwan to join Shen Yun as a dancer at age 13, in 2009. She performed with the group until she left in 2020, when she was 24.

张郡格说，她在2009年13岁时从台湾被招募加入神韵，成为一名舞者。她一直随团演出，直到2020年离开，当时她24岁。

Ms. Chang sued under a federal law that allows victims of forced labor to sue their traffickers.

张郡格提起诉讼的依据是一项联邦法律，该法律使得强迫劳动的受害者得以起诉他们的贩运者。

The lawsuit comes three months after The New York Times revealed that Shen Yun’s performers had been working under abusive conditions for years. Ms. Chang, now 28, was among the former performers and instructors quoted in the article.

这起诉讼是在《纽约时报》披露神韵的表演者多年来一直在虐待条件下工作三个月后提出的。现年28岁的张郡格是文章采访的其中一位前表演者和舞蹈老师。

The New York State Department of Labor has opened an inquiry into the company’s labor practices, including its use of child performers, The Times reported last week.

《纽约时报》上周报道，纽约州劳工部已对该团体的劳资行为展开调查，包括雇佣儿童表演者等问题。

The lawsuit seeks an unspecified amount in damages.

诉讼要求的赔偿金额不详。

Ms. Chang is the only named plaintiff, but she is asking a federal judge to certify the lawsuit as a class action to represent a larger group of Shen Yun performers. Her lawyers are looking for other plaintiffs to join the suit.

张郡格是唯一已知原告，但她要求联邦法官批准将诉讼作为集体诉讼，以代表更多的神韵表演者。她的律师正在寻找其他原告加入诉讼。

Shen Yun performed more than 800 times on five continents in its most recent five-month tour. It puts on a two-hour dance and music show intended to spread the message of Falun Gong, a spiritual practice that is banned in China and whose followers have been persecuted by the Chinese government.

在最近五个月的巡演中，神韵在五大洲进行了800多场演出。该团体表演的舞蹈和音乐节目时长两小时，旨在传播法轮功的信息。法轮功是一种在中国被禁止的精神修炼，其追随者一直受到中国政府的迫害。

Representatives of Shen Yun and Falun Gong did not respond to a request for comment. They have previously denied any wrongdoing and said labor laws did not apply to their underage performers because they are students who tour with Shen Yun as a learning opportunity, not employees. Every student participates in Shen Yun voluntarily, they have said.

神韵和法轮功的代表没有回应置评请求。两个团体此前对有任何不当行为均表示否认，并表示劳动法不适用于他们的未成年表演者，因为这些表演者是以学习机会的名义随神韵巡演的学生，而非员工。他们表示，每个学生都是自愿参加神韵的。

“Sure, some people leave because it’s not for them, and that’s perfectly fine,” Shen Yun’s representatives said in a recent statement. “But the vast majority of students will tell you this is their dream come true, and the parents rave about the positive changes in their children.”

“当然，有些人因为不适合而离开，这完全没问题。”神韵的代表在最近的一份声明中说，“但绝大多数学生都会告诉你，这是在让他们实现梦想，家长们也会对孩子的积极变化赞不绝口。”

In a statement, a Washington-based lawyer for Ms. Chang, Times Wang, said the persecution of Falun Gong “does not justify the Shen Yun defendants’ use of forced child labor.”

张郡格的律师、常驻华盛顿的泰时·王（音）在一份声明中表示，法轮功遭受的迫害“不能成为神韵被告强迫儿童劳动的理由”。

In the same statement, Ms. Chang said she is suing to “make sure no other children go through what I went through.”

在同一份声明中，张郡格表示，她之所以提起诉讼，是为了“确保没有其他孩子经历我所经历的事情”。

Every year, hundreds of performers tour with Shen Yun, including a large number of teenage dancers and musicians. To train for performances, children travel from all over the world to enroll in school at the group’s headquarters in Cuddebackville, N.Y., northwest of New York City.

每年都有数以百计的表演者随神韵巡回演出，其中包括大量青少年舞蹈演员和乐手。为了接受表演训练，孩子们从世界各地来到位于纽约市西北方向的纽约州库德巴克维尔的神韵总部上学。

Like most Shen Yun performers, Ms. Chang grew up as a Falun Gong believer. She joined Shen Yun after her father died, and she was told that dancing for Shen Yun was a holy honor because the group was personally overseen by Li Hongzhi, the founder and spiritual leader of Falun Gong.

像大多数神韵表演者一样，张郡格从小就是法轮功的信徒。她父亲去世后，她加入了神韵。她被告知，为神韵跳舞表演是一种神圣的荣誉，因为神韵是由法轮功创始人兼精神领袖李洪志亲自负责的。

Mr. Li and his wife, Li Rui, are named as defendants in the lawsuit.

在这场诉讼中，李洪志和他的妻子李瑞均被列为被告。

Many children arrive at Shen Yun’s headquarters, known as Dragon Springs, with little ability to speak English and no network in the United States. After being separated from their families, they are plunged into “a system of coercion and control that extends to nearly every aspect of the dancers’ lives,” the lawsuit said.

许多孩子来到神韵总部龙泉寺，他们几乎不会说英语，在美国举目无亲。诉讼称，他们与家人分离后，陷入“一种胁迫和控制体系，这种体系几乎延伸到了舞者生活各个方面”。

神韵的年轻演员们在纽约市西北方向的一处戒备森严、占地400英亩的园区里生活和训练。

They cannot leave without permission, kept inside the compound by armed guards, according to the lawsuit. They are prohibited from reading unapproved news outlets or from contacting people who quit Falun Gong.

根据诉讼，他们未经允许不能擅自离开，往往被武装警卫关在园区里。他们被禁止阅读未经批准的新闻媒体，也不允许与退出法轮功的人联系。

Ms. Chang was once scolded by Shen Yun’s leaders for the contents of her private diary, the lawsuit said. She said she was allowed to call her mother once a week and was told her calls were being monitored, and that the dancers were encouraged to view Mr. and Ms. Li as their new parental figures.

诉讼称，张郡格曾因私人日记的内容而受到神韵领导人的责骂。她说，她被允许每周给母亲打一次电话，但被告知她的电话被监听，神韵还告诉她，希望舞者们将李洪志夫妇视为新的父母。

Even though Shen Yun is registered as a nonprofit, its core motive, the lawsuit said, is to generate revenue, including for the personal financial benefit of Mr. Li and his wife, though the suit offered no evidence of that beyond asserting that they have a bodyguard.

尽管神韵注册为非营利组织，但诉讼称，其核心动机是创造收入，包括为李洪志夫妇谋取个人经济利益，尽管诉讼没有提供证据，只是声称他们有一名保镖。

Ms. Chang is also suing International Bank of Chicago, a community bank, which the lawsuit accused of profiting from the trafficking scheme by ignoring “red flags” about the exploitation of Shen Yun’s child performers while opening accounts for them, including their meager pay.

张郡格还起诉了芝加哥国际银行，指控这家社区银行从人口诱拐活动中获利，因为该银行在为神韵的儿童演员开设账户时，无视他们受到剥削的“危险信号”，包括他们微薄的收入。

Representatives of the bank did not respond to a request for comment.

该银行的代表没有回应置评请求。

The bank’s founders are Falun Gong practitioners with close personal ties to Mr. Li, the lawsuit said. Its only branch outside of Illinois is in Port Jervis, N.Y., about a 15-minute drive from Shen Yun’s headquarters.

诉讼称，该银行的创始人是法轮功修炼者，与李洪志私交密切。银行在伊利诺伊州以外的唯一一家分行位于纽约州杰维斯港，距离神韵总部约15分钟车程。

For more than a decade, bank representatives were permitted to visit the guarded Dragon Springs compound to open accounts for new recruits, according to the lawsuit.

诉讼显示，十多年来，该银行的代表一直可以进入戒备森严的龙泉寺大院，为新招募的人员开设账户。

Those recruits typically enroll at Fei Tian Academy of the Arts, a boarding school inside Dragon Springs, which then feeds into Fei Tian College on the same campus. But the schools provided minimal levels of education so that dancers could spend most of their day training for the show, the lawsuit said, ensuring “an ongoing supply of forced child labor to Shen Yun without attracting scrutiny.”

这些新学员通常就读于飞天艺术学院，这是一所位于龙泉寺内的寄宿学校，之后进入同一园区内的飞天大学。但诉讼称，这些学校提供的教学很少，以便舞者可以将大部分时间用于为演出做准备，从而确保“神韵能持续拥有被强迫劳动的童工，而不引发关注”。

“These sham schools operate as a cover for the forced labor scheme,” the lawsuit said.

诉讼称：“这些冒牌学校是强迫劳动计划的幌子。”

While on tour for months at a time, students had no teachers. Ms. Chang was given a tablet and “told she could watch the sitcom series ‘Leave It to Beaver’ to learn English,” according to the lawsuit.

在长达数月的巡演期间，学生们没有老师。诉讼称，张郡格得到了一台平板电脑，“并被告知可以通过观看情景喜剧《天才小麻烦》(Leave It to Beaver)来学习英语”。

Ms. Chang said performers were sometimes given expired beef jerky and ramen noodles. Once, after becoming ill from the food, Ms. Chang was told that Mr. Li had given her the expired food “to cleanse herself from the inside out,” the lawsuit said.

张郡格说，给演员的食物中有时有过期的牛肉干和拉面。诉讼称，有一次，她在因吃这些食物而生病后被告知，李洪志给她吃过期食品是为了“从内到外净化她自己”。

Even though Fei Tian students receive free tuition, food and housing, Shen Yun performers were told that they must pay back the value of their scholarships if they quit the group, the lawsuit said.

诉讼称，尽管飞天艺术学院的学生学费、食宿都不用交钱，但神韵表演者被告知，一旦退出该团体，则必须等值偿还这些奖学金。

Shen Yun also tried to discourage students from quitting by seeking to discredit the people who spoke out against the group.

神韵还试图通过诋毁公开反对该团体的人来阻止学生退出。

After Ms. Chang was quoted in The Times, Gong Shujia, a professor at Fei Tian College, spread “false and defamatory” statements on his YouTube channel that she and her husband were agents of the Chinese government, and that the government had invested money in their dance studio in Taiwan, the lawsuit said.

诉讼称，在《纽约时报》刊登了张郡格的言论后，飞天大学教授龚书佳（音）在其YouTube频道上散播“虚假和诽谤性”言论，称张郡格和她的丈夫是中国政府的代理人，中国政府投资了他们在台湾的舞蹈工作室。

Mr. Gong, who goes by the pseudonym Zhang Tianliang and was also named as a defendant in the lawsuit, did not respond to a request for comment.

化名章天亮的龚书佳也是这起诉讼的被告之一，他没有回应置评请求。

The lawsuit said that even as Shen Yun has been the victim of ongoing persecution by the Chinese Communist Party, the group has adopted some of its persecutor’s practices.

诉讼称，虽然神韵一直是中共持续迫害的受害者，但该团体也采取了一些和中共一样的迫害做法。

Performers who broke the rules, such as by reading comic books, were sometimes berated onstage by Shen Yun’s leaders and forced to apologize during “mass criticism sessions.”

违反规定（如看漫画书）的表演者有时会在舞台上被神韵领导人斥责，并被迫在“大型批判会”上道歉。

After Ms. Chang left Shen Yun, the lawsuit said, she was diagnosed with clinical depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. Recently, the suit said, Ms. Chang learned that Shen Yun had organized mass criticism sessions targeting her.

诉讼称，张郡格离开神韵后被诊断患有临床抑郁症和创伤后应激障碍。诉讼称，最近，张郡格得知神韵组织了针对她的大型批判会。

Ms. Li, the leader’s wife, claimed the group had agents in Taiwan monitoring her, the suit went on, and that Ms. Chang “has recanted her allegations against Shen Yun and regrets making them — which, as this lawsuit shows, could not be further from the truth.”

诉讼称，神韵领袖李洪志的妻子李瑞声称，神韵委托了人在台湾监视张郡格，后者“已撤回对神韵的指控，并后悔做出这些指控——而正如这起诉讼所表明的，指控与事实相去甚远”。