(Minghui.org) A 65-year-old retired accountant in Shenzhen City, Guangdong Province, was sentenced last year to 5.5 years for practicing Falun Gong. This is the third time that Ms. Nan Minmin has been sentenced, following two previous 5-year terms.

Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a spiritual discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.

Ms. Nan was arrested on May 29, 2020. She was tried on March 25, 2021 and later sentenced. She appealed the verdict, but the higher court ruled to uphold her original sentence in December 2021. Due to the pandemic, she is still held at the Longgang Detention Center, without being transferred to the Guangzhou Women’s Prison. Other details of her case aren’t clear.

Ms. Nan took up Falun Gong in 1996 and she credits the practice for curing her severe back pain. After the communist regime ordered the persecution in 1999, she has been held at the detention center six times and a local brainwashing center twice. She was twice sentenced to five years, in 2001 and again in 2008.

For her two previous prison terms, she served time in the Wuhan Women’s Prison in Hubei Province. In the prison, the guards tied her up on a hard board with hands and feet chained together and force-fed her. They also pulled her hair, poured boiling water over her head, whipped her head with a leather belt, and kicked her stomach with their military boots. The tying usually lasted 7 or 15 days. She wasn’t allowed to take showers or change pants, even when her pants were soaked with menses.

The guards arranged for two inmates to torture Ms. Nan in a small room. They tied her hands behind her back and hung her up by the wrists to the door or window frame, often for days. The torture caused Ms. Nan’s legs to become completely bruised with enormous pain. She was unable to squat or use the restroom.

Ms. Nan was once deprived of sleep and forced to stand during the night for nearly three months. She wasn’t allowed to wash her face, brush her teeth or take showers. Her lower body, from her feet to her thigh, was completely swollen. Her soles became wrinkled and the skin fell off in layers. Unable to stand up anymore, she bent over and her head almost touched the ground.

As she was unable to walk, the inmates still dragged her to the workshop and forced her to work without pay in a standing position, sometimes from 6 a.m. to 12 a.m. or even to 4 a.m. There was no break except for meal times.

Related report:

Persecution of Four Falun Gong Practitioners in Shenzhen City, Guangdong Province