HONG KONG - Chinese police recently detained 35 Christians in Inner Mongolia for "illegal religious activity" and may send 15 to labour camps, a Hong Kong-based human rights group said on Wednesday.
Twenty of the Christians detained on Saturday in Dongsheng city were released after they paid a fine of 200 yuan (US$24.15) each, the Information Centre for Human Rights and Democracy said in a statement.
The remainder likely will be sent to labour camps, the centre said.
They include Li Haihe, Xu Fan, and Wang Yulan, whose husband was sentenced last year to three years' of labour reform for the same offence.
"When we called the city's Security Bureau, an officer in charge told us Wang Yulan would be sentenced to labour re-education because the offence she had committed was more serious than that of others," the centre said in a statement.
Christianity and Catholicism first began to blossom in China in the late 1970s and the number of followers has been growing steadily, the statement said.
The Hong Kong-based rights group estimated there were now over 40 million Christians and 15 million Catholics in China.
China's constitution enshrines freedom of religion but worship is confined to state-controlled churches.
The U.S. State Department's annual human rights report this year condemned Beijing's crackdown on underground Christians.