(Minghui.org) A Qinhuangdao City, Hebei Province, resident, was admitted to prison on January 15, 2024 for her faith in Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.
Ms. Meng Zhaohong was arrested on May 9, 2023 for talking to people about Falun Gong. She was held at a police hospital before her prison transfer, as the local detention center refused to admit her due to her poor health. The judge of the Funing District Court sentenced Ms. Meng to an unknown term following a hearing on August 22, 2023. Her appeal was denied by the intermediate court.
Ms. Ding Yue, Ms. Meng’s daughter, who currently resides in California, U.S.A., sought help from her Congressman, Kevin Kiley, to help secure her mother’s release. Congressman Kiley wrote to U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on July 13, 2023, urging the State Department to take action to rescue Ms. Meng and Ms. Yuan Xiuhua, another Falun Gong practitioner arrested at the same time as Ms. Meng.
In response to Congressman Kiley’s letter, Philip Laidlaw, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Bureau of Legislative Affairs in the State Department, replied on August 18, 2023, expressing their shared concern about detained Falun Gong practitioners.
Mr. Laidlaw said that they were deeply concerned about the communist regime’s “ongoing campaign of repression against the Falun Gong movement and its millions of practitioners, their advocates, and human rights defenders working on their behalf.”
He affirmed that “freedom of beliefs, including religion” remains the State Department’s top priority. He pointed out that China has been consistently listed as a “Country of Particular Concern” under the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 for its brutal suppression of religious freedom.
Arrest and Sentencing
Ms. Meng, a 66-year-old retired nurse, and Ms. Yuan were arrested at a local fair on May 9, 2023, after being reported for talking to people about the persecution of Falun Gong.
Officers from the Anziling Police Station took the women to a dark, damp basement in the Qinhuangdao City Police Department and interrogated them. An officer slapped Ms. Meng in the face for more than 20 times. Her neck and ear still hurt when her lawyer visited her. The officer didn’t wear his police uniform or a police badge.
Ms. Meng kept urging the police to stop persecuting law-abiding citizens like her. She refused to answer their questions or sign any paperwork. The police ordered Ms. Meng to hold a bag containing Falun Gong books and have her picture taken. She refused to give them any chance to fabricate evidence against her. Ms. Yuan was also tortured during interrogation.
The police later took the women to the Qinhuangdao City Police Hospital for physical exams. Ms. Meng was found to have tuberculosis and coronary artery sclerosis. Ms. Yuan had extremely high blood pressure.
Both the Qinhuangdao City Detention Center and the Qinhuangdao City Lockup refused to admit the women based on their exam results. The police then took them back to the hospital, where they remained in adjacent rooms on the fourth floor.
The Qinglong County Procuratorate delivered the two practitioners’ arrest warrants to their hospital rooms on May 23. In late June, personnel from the procuratorate went to the hospital again to order the women to sign paperwork. Both refused to comply.
The Funing District Court held a hearing of their joint cases on August 22, 2023. Their lawyers entered not guilty pleas for them. Judge Lin Shuangquan convicted them at a later date. But the lengths of both women’s prison terms aren’t clear.
Ms. Meng’s lawyer visited her at the hospital on November 28, 2023 and told her that the intermediate court just scheduled a hearing of her appeal case (date unknown). Ms. Meng prepared a defense statement and submitted it to the higher court, which still ruled to uphold the original verdict. She was transferred to the Shijiazhuang Women’s Prison on January 15, 2024.
According to an insider, Ms. Meng demanded to file a motion to reconsider her case in the prison. When her lawyer visited her on April 29, 2024, the two-hour meeting was closely monitored by two prison guards, who also took photos of the motion the lawyer had prepared. Upon seeing one sentence that said Ms. Meng was unfit for incarceration, the guards claimed that she was perfectly healthy and had no illness. Ms. Meng also prepared a motion herself, but the guard didn’t allow her to use that version.
The authorities also suspended Ms. Meng’s pension, with the excuse that she failed to turn in her annual renewal paperwork.
Past Persecution
Ms. Meng took up Falun Gong in July 1996. Because she remained firm in her faith after the persecution started, she was repeatedly arrested and detained. In addition to her latest sentence, she has served two labor camp terms and another prison term, for a total of over eight years.
Ms. Meng was first arrested in July 2000 for going to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong. She was given one year of forced labor and served time in the Shuanghe Forced Labor Camp and Heilongjiang Province Drug Rehabilitation Center.
After she was released, she lived away from home to avoid further persecution. She was arrested again in November 2001 in Daxing’anling Prefecture while putting up informational materials about Falun Gong. At the Jiagedaqi District Detention Center, she was beaten, kicked, force-fed, restrained in a metal chair and forced to labor without pay.
On February 10, 2002, Ms. Meng was transferred to the Shuanghe Forced Labor Camp to serve another two-year term. She was force-fed with saline water, which damaged her esophagus and caused her stomach to bleed.
Ms. Meng’s next arrest was in July 2008 shortly before the Beijing Olympics. She was sentenced to four years in December that year. She suffered relentless torture at the Heilongjiang Province Women’s Prison. By the time she was released on July 22, 2012, she weighed less than 80 lbs, her hair had turned gray, and she had trouble keeping her balance while walking.
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