Crimes of Liu Chuan, Party Secretary and Director of the Jilin Provincial Department of Justice, in Persecuting Falun Gong

(Minghui.org) Falun Gong practitioners in 45 countries submitted another list of Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials who persecuted Falun Gong and practitioners to individual governments before Human Rights Day, December 10, 2024. Because these officials participated in this persecution, practitioners requested that they, along with their family members, be barred from entry and that their assets be frozen.

These 45 countries include The Five Eyes (United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand), all 27 countries in the European Union (EU) and 13 countries on other continents. The EU countries are Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, Poland, Sweden, Belgium, Ireland, Austria, Denmark, Romania, Czechia, Finland, Portugal, Greece, Hungary, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Luxembourg, Croatia, Lithuania, Slovenia, Latvia, Estonia, Cyprus, and Malta. The remaining 13 countries are located in Asia, Europe, and the Americas: Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, Switzerland, Norway, Liechtenstein, Israel, Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, Chile, the Dominican Republic, and Paraguay. This was the first time Paraguay has joined the list.

The CCP’s persecution of Falun Gong has continued for 25 years and the regime recently escalated its control overseas. According to a report published by the World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong (WOIPFG), the CCP highlighted a goal during a May 2024 meeting organized by the Ministry of Public Security, “Pay special attention to the cooperation between Falun Gong and Western politicians to sanction high-level Chinese leaders. Stop such behavior at all costs.”

Among the perpetrators listed was Liu Chuan, Party secretary and director of the Jilin Provincial Department of Justice and the first political commissar of the Jilin Provincial Prison Administration Bureau.

Perpetrator Information

Full Name of Perpetrator: Liu (last name) Chuan (first name)Chinese Name: 刘川Gender: MaleDate/year of Birth: June 1965Place of Birth: Tieling, Liaoning Province

Title or Position

Liu Chuan was the deputy director of the Jilin Provincial Government Petition Bureau, personnel director and deputy secretary of the Baicheng Municipal Party Committee, Party secretary of the Jilin Provincial Government Petition Bureau, Party secretary of the Legal Affairs Office of the Jilin Provincial Government, and executive deputy secretary of the Jilin Provincial CCP Committee.

Since March 2021, Liu has served as the CCP secretary and director of the Jilin Provincial Department of Justice and the first political commissar of the Jilin Provincial Prison Administration Bureau. He oversees the work of the Provincial Department of Justice and is responsible for the CCP Disciplinary Committee of the Department of Justice.

Main Crimes

There are at least five prisons in Jilin Province where Falun Gong practitioners are severely persecuted: Jilin Province Second Prison, Jilin Province Women’s Prison, Siping Prison, Gongzhuling Prison, and Tiebei Prison.

Jilin Women’s Prison

Under the control of the Central 610 Office and the Jilin Province 610 Office, the Jilin Women’s Prison has taken a lead role in brainwashing practitioners incarcerated in the province. In the isolated prison environment, the guards manipulate inmates to carry out some of the most insidious and despicable methods of torture on practitioners.

For example, they put practitioners who were menstruating on a torture bed and tied them up in five different directions using the “dragged by five horses” method (see image below). Other tortures include hanging, beating, being doused with cold water, and being shocked with electric batons, among many other insidious methods that have caused death, disability, mental disorder, and severe injury.

Torture illustration: “Five horses dividing the body”

Jilin Women’s Prison has been recognized by the Jilin Province’s Ministry of Justice and province-level CCP officials as a role model for its unscrupulous and cruel tactics in the persecution.

In 2021, Falun Gong practitioners in the eighth division of Jilin Women’s Prison were closely monitored by the inmates. They were forced to sit on small stools every day from 4 a.m. to 10 or 11 p.m. before they were allowed to go to bed. They weren’t allowed to brush their teeth, wash their faces, wash their clothes, or use the bathroom.

Ms. Fu Guihua, of Changchun City, Jilin Province, was arrested on August 15, 2019 and was later sentenced to 7.5 years. She was taken to the 8th division in Jilin Province Women’s Prison on May 27, 2021 and subjected to strict management. The inmates forced her to sit on a small stool for long hours every day and she was denied visits from her lawyers and family members. She was deprived of sleep and not allowed to drink water. She passed away two months ago.

Jilin Prison

Jilin Prison employed a wide range of torture methods on Falun Gong practitioners. These included forcing practitioners to sit on hard boards for long periods of time, being beaten, electric shocks, solitary confinement, stretching in strenuous positions for extended periods of time, being stabbed with needles, being gagged with soiled rags, being burned with boiling water, pinching their eyeballs and testicles, force-feeding, and sleep deprivation.

The guards specialize in torturing practitioners with lengthy terms, especially those who refuse to give up Falun Gong. After the practitioners became injured or disabled while in custody, they were taken to the prison hospital for further abuse instead of proper treatment. Many were forcibly injected with unknown drugs that led to ascites (a condition in which fluid collects in the abdomen). Practitioners with this condition look like they are seven or eight months pregnant, but it is accompanied by weight loss and general weakness. Others developed tuberculosis and their lungs were damaged.

Gongzhuling Prison

There are many cells in Gongzhuling Prison sent aside for practitioners, including a special solitary cell dedicated to torturing those who refuse to renounce Falun Gong.

The floor of this confinement room is about one meter lower than the floors outside the cell. The interior is extremely dark and humid, and the temperature inside drops to unbearably low temperatures in the winter. The windows are covered with black curtains while the walls and floors are soundproofed so that people outside cannot hear what is going on inside.

Inside the room are death beds with wrist and ankle cuffs to stretch practitioners in a spread-eagle position. Practitioners who refuse to “transform” are restrained on these death beds and stretched until they are unable to move. If they still refuse to renounce Falun Gong, they are simultaneously shocked with several electric batons. Their mouths are sealed with tape so that people outside the room can not hear their screams.

Other torture methods used at Gongzhuling include electric shocks, beating, sleep deprivation, solitary confinement, and long hours of forced labor.

Mr. Yu Chunbo, of Changchun City, Jilin Province, was arrested on November 12, 2020 and sentenced to 3.5 years in the Gongzhuling Prison around December 2021. He was ordered to write guarantee statements to renounce Falun Gong, and was tortured for many days in the guards’ office, because he refused to comply.

The guards and inmates slapped Mr. Yu’s face 90 times on February 24, 2022, shocked him in the anus with an electric baton, and struck his thighs, calves, back, and buttocks with steel rulers. They then rubbed salt into the wounds, before they resumed beating him, followed by the salt massage. This torture went on for two hours.

The perpetrators brought Mr. Yu back to the guards’ office on the second and third day. They scraped the scabs off his wounds with steel rulers, and then repeated the beating, salt massage, and electric shocks. He was tortured this way for two hours each day.

On the fifth day, the guards tortured Mr. Yu again. After he had a heart attack while he was being shocked, the guards gave him some quick-acting heart medication they prepared.

After that, Mr. Yu was forced to stand for at least 15 hours every day and given very little food for each meal. He was severely malnourished and had gastric perforation. He was then hospitalized for 27 days.

Mr. Yu was taken to a local hospital for emergency treatment on April 18, 2022. The authorities refused to allow his family to visit him, citing the COVID pandemic as an excuse. His deeply concerned family applied to the Gongzhuling Prison to release him on medical parole but it was denied. Mr. Yu continued to be detained and subjected to brainwashing sessions by the inmates.

The following are persecution cases that occurred during Liu’s tenure, which represent merely the tip of the iceberg.

Select Death Cases

Case 1: Women Dies After Being Tortured and Not Allowed to Practice Falun Gong

Ms. Xu Guizhi of Yushu City, Jilin Province struggled with deteriorating health after she was tortured in prison from 2019 to 2021. She was not allowed to practice Falun Gong after she was released, and she died two years later in January 2023 at the age of 69.

Ms. Xu was arrested by officers from the Zhengyang Police Station on December 6, 2018. She was tried in the Yushu City Court and sentenced to 2.5 years in prison on March 15, 2019. The guards in Jilin Province Women’s Prison beat and tortured her in an attempt to force her to renounce Falun Gong. Her health deteriorated as a result of the torture and she developed diabetes, became incontinent, and had difficulty walking.

After she was released in 2021, her family was terrified of the persecution and prevented her from from practicing. Her health continued to decline and she died as a result.

Case 2: 78-Year-Old Woman Dies from Cancer Developed in Prison

Ms. Wang Qingwen was previously sentenced to a three-year prison term for practicing Falun Gong. Although the authorities allowed her to serve time outside of prison, the police took her into custody and sent her to the Liaoyuan City Detention Center some time in 2021. She was later transferred to the Jilin Province Women’s Prison where she developed severe illness symptoms. She was taken to the police hospital in late October 2021 and died there on October 26, 2021. The authorities cremated her body the next day and sent her ashes to her hometown in Liaoyuan City, Jilin Province. She was 78 years old. The prison refused to give Ms. Wang’s family any details about her death. Some officials said she died of rectal cancer, while others said she died of lung cancer.

Case 3: Retired Professor Dies at 82 While Serving Three Years in Prison

Ms. An Fuzi, an 82-year-old retired college professor, passed away in May 2023 while she was jailed for a three-year term. A few months before Ms. An’s passing, the prison notified her family that she developed pleural effusion and asked them to cooperate with the authorities in her medical treatment. Her son and daughter, who both worked in South Korea at the time, asked to have virtual meetings or phone calls with her but their requests were denied. Citing the COVID pandemic as an excuse, the prison also did not allow her other family members in China to visit her in person.

Case 4: 31-year-old Man Dies while Serving 8.5 Years for Practicing Falun Gong

Mr. Jiang Yong, a Changchun City, Jilin Province resident, was arrested on June 28, 2021, and sentenced to 8.5 years in Gongzhuling Prison on the trumped-up charge of “subverting state power.” Even though he was in critical condition after holding a prolonged hunger strike to protest the persecution, the authorities refused to release him on medical parole, citing his refusal to renounce Falun Gong. He died on January 23, 2023, the second day of the Chinese New Year. He was 31 years old.

Case 5: Jilin Man Dies Three Months After Being Released on Medical Parole

Mr. Lin Xianchen, of Changchun City, Jilin Province, was arrested at home on August 22, 2018. He was sentenced to five years and fined 10,000-yuan by the Kuancheng District Court on August 21, 2019. The authorities took him to Jilin Prison on November 1, 2019, but waited 13 days to inform his family.

Mr. Lin was often forced to sit on a small stool from early morning until 12 a.m. On June 2, 2021, the prison informed his family that he had been hospitalized. He was confirmed to have liver cancer about two weeks later, on June 17. Despite his condition, the guards still kept him handcuffed and shackled.

The prison did not approve his medical parole until three months later. When he returned home on September 14, 2021, he was emaciated. In the first few days, he was still able to eat. But shortly after, he couldn’t eat anything. He was 70 years old when he passed away in December 2021.

Other Persecution Cases

Case 1: Ms. Jing Fengyun’s Buttocks Festered and Her Bones Exposed

Ms. Jing Fengyun, 70, was sentenced to four years in prison by the Kuancheng District Court on April 28, 2023. While serving time in division eight at the Jilin Province Women’s Prison, she was subjected to forced brainwashing and forced to sit on a small stool motionless for extended periods of time. As a result of the torture, her buttocks festered and were infected, and her bones were exposed. She also became mentally disoriented and struggled with mobility issues.

Case 2: Having Endured 12 Years of Hellish Torture, Former Teacher Becomes Incoherent While Serving Latest Term for Her Faith

While still recovering from the trauma of being incarcerated and tortured for a decade, Ms. Song Yanqun, a 52-year-old former teacher in Shulan City, Jilin Province, was sentenced again to 3.5 years in December 2020 for seeking justice for her faith, Falun Gong.

When Ms. Song’s father, in his 80s, went to the prison on February 27, 2023, to visit her, the prison kept him waiting from morning until 4 p.m., before letting him visit.

Ms. Song was carried out by two inmates. All of her hair turned gray. Her eyes were dull. Her limbs were shaking. Her speech was also slurred. She told her father that she was sent to the prison hospital and received regular shots. But when he asked her how long she was hospitalized, she said she didn’t know. When he asked her how old was her mother, she also answered “I don’t know.”

Case 3: Woman Becomes Mute Due to Abuse in Prison, Denied Medical Parole and Family Visits

Ms. Jin Min, a resident of Jilin City, Jilin Province, was sentenced on August 28, 2022 to a six-year term for practicing Falun Gong. She developed high blood pressure, and now cannot speak. When her family visited her, the guards told them she would get medical treatment if the family agreed, but doctors would treat her as a mental patient. If the family did not agree, she would be sent back to a strict management cell.

In the persecution, completely healthy practitioners are often sent to psychiatric wards for the purpose of discrediting Falun Gong and bringing great pressure to bear on those who resolutely adhere to their faith. Treatment in these facilities is inhumane to the extreme, often involving injecting practitioners with dangerous, mind-altering drugs which are known to damage the nervous system. During her previous imprisonment, Ms. Jin witnessed a practitioner who was fed some unknown liquid by guards begin twitching.

Her family didn’t agree to the treatment plan.