(Minghui.org) On May 24, 2012, visiting day at Hebei Women's Forced Labor Camp, Mr. Zhou Xiangyang, along with an attorney, came to visit his wife, Li Shanshan. Zhou Xiangyang, a Falun Gong practitioner, had just been released from Gangbei Prison in Tianjin after a one-year detention. The labor camp had made visiting procedures extremely difficult for Ms. Li, in order to hinder any visits. This situation went on for six months.
Hebei Women's Forced Labor Camp, located on Shitong Road, Shijiazhuang, is a location where Falun Gong practitioners are persecuted. Since 2006, thousands of Falun Gong practitioners have been detained there. Guards at the camp are enticed with benefits by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to carry out persecution of Falun Gong practitioners. They insult, beat, and abuse practitioners in attempts to force them to renounce their beliefs. Many practitioners have been injured and disabled, and some have suffered mental collapse as a result of intense persecution at the labor camp.
Zhou Xiangyang, along with an attorney, came to the camp on May 22, and asked to meet with his wife, Li Shanshan. Two guards surnamed Zhang (Badge No. 1356073) and Li (Badge No. 1356071) said that neither of them were allowed to visit Ms. Li. They mentioned the illegal requirements, that they had to have proof of not practicing Falun Gong from the local police station. When asked who made such rules, the guards answered that they didn't know.
That afternoon, Mr. Zhou and his attorney went to Hebei Forced Labor Bureau, where an officer surnamed Hao met with them. Hao said that they had to have a statement saying that they did not practice Falun Gong. The attorney said, "According to Procedural Law and Law of Advocacy, attorneys are required to have 'three warrants' when doing investigation. I have all three warrants. Why are there additional requirements?" Officer Hao said that it was a provision in a 2010 document of the Hebei Provincial Committee. He said that it was a secret document, so he could not give any details, and others could not find the document. Zhou Xiangyang and the attorney later went to the Hebei Department of Justice. A person surnamed Wu from the Supervision Commission listened to the attorney, and said he would report to his supervisor, Secretary Li, who would give the attorney a reply on the morning of May 23.
On May 23, when the attorney called Wu, she said that she called Officer Hao in the Forced Labor Bureau, and explained the situation, and she also reported to Secretary Li. Wu told the attorney to follow the requirements of the Forced Labor Bureau. The attorney said that the requirements were illegal, and that it is the right of citizens to meet with their family members. The attorney stated that Forced Labor Departments and related departments had no right to set up additional conditions to deny citizens of their rights.
On visiting day, May 24, there were many family members near the gate of the camp. Guard Zhang (Badge No. 1356073) again asked for the statement of 'Not practicing Falun Gong'. Mr. Zhou said, "There are no such laws. We went to the forced labor camp, but they could not show any documentation either. Meeting with family members is a right, and your requirements are illegal. As this is part of the Department of Justice, there should not be any further illegal requirements. My wife is here, and I do not even know why she was arrested. She is detained here, and you don't allow me to meet with her. I don't know her situation at all."
The attorney pointed out, based on the law, the additional conditions for meeting with family according to so-called internal documents of the provincial committee, are illegal. He said that it violates citizen rights, and is another way of persecuting Falun Gong practitioners and their family members. He said that the Department of Justice was hindering the implementation of the law, and is misconduct of office.
Many people waiting to see their family members said that the camp was much too brutal. There was also another attorney from a law firm in Hebei Province on site, who came for administrative reconsideration for a petitioner. In discussion, the attorney clearly said that visitation was the most basic right, and it was illegal to deprive this right to anyone.
Ms. Li Shanshan, from Fengrun, Tangshan, graduated from the Department of Foreign Languages at Hebei Normal University. She had been detained for 15 months due to petitioning for the release of her husband Zhou Xiangyang. She stayed loyal to Mr. Zhou and waited for seven years, petitioning for him repeatedly. In order to rescue Zhou Xiangyang, whom she had recently married less than a year prior to his incarceration, she wrote a public letter which over 2,000 people in her hometown signed.
Zhou Xiangyang was an engineer for the No.3 Survey and Design Institute in Tianjin. He was arrested in May 2003, and subsequently sentenced to a nine-year term. On August 9, 2004, he was taken to Gangbei Prison in Tianjin. He was shocked with electric batons by guards at night and injuries covered his body. He was prevented from sleeping for over 30 days and nights consecutively. He was also detained in a small solitary cell many times, shackled to the ground. He was once detained in a single room and shackled to the ground for over four months by guard Zhang Shilin. He then started a protest hunger strike which he continued for over a year. In April and May 2009, Mr. Zhou was sent to Xinsheng Hospital and the prison hospital twice, for emergency aid. Due to being extremely weak, on July 28, 2009, he was released for medical treatment.
On October 29, 2011, while trying to rescue her husband from being tortured in Gangbei Prison in Tianjin, and from dying due to a year-long hunger strike, Li Shanshan was arrested by police from the Domestic Security Bureau in Tangshan. She was detained in the No.1 Forced Labor Camp in Hebei, and then transferred to Hebei Women's Forced Labor Camp in Shijiazhuang.
