(Minghui.org)

Name: Fang DaoheChinese Name: 方道和Gender: MaleAge: Around 81City: YakeshiProvince: Inner MongoliaOccupation: N/ADate of Death: Late September or early October 2022Date of Most Recent Arrest: October 2016Most Recent Place of Detention: Baoanzhao Prison

A Yakeshi City, Inner Mongolia, man died in late September or early October 2022 while serving a nine-year prison term for his faith in Falun Gong, a mind-body practice that has been persecuted by the Chinese Communist Party since July 1999.

Mr. Fang Daohe, around 81, was arrested either late on October 28, 2016, or early the following morning. Several other local Falun Gong practitioners were arrested around the same time. The police pried open the practitioners’ doors and raided their homes. Many practitioners had their computers, printers, cell phones, Falun Gong books, portraits of Falun Gong’s founder, and informational materials confiscated.

Mr. Fang was taken to the Daxing’anling Forest Police Department. The Yakeshi City Procuratorate indicted him on December 5, 2016, and he was tried in the Yakeshi City Court on July 6, 2017, along with six other practitioners. He was sentenced to nine years on December 28. His appeal was denied by the Hulunbuir City Intermediate Court on May 13, 2018. He was admitted to the Baoanzhao Prison on July 10, 2018.

On May 10, 2020, the prison education department launched a new round of persecution targeting Mr. Fang and 12 other practitioners being held there. Three inmates were assigned to monitor each practitioner around the clock. Guards Wang Wenbin, Ma Jiwu, and Pan Xijin threatened to extend the practitioners’ terms if they refused to renounce Falun Gong.

Under pressure, nine of the practitioners gave up their spiritual belief against their will. The guards put the remaining four in solitary confinement on June 12, 2020. It is unclear if Mr. Fang was one of the four. Those in solitary confinement were given only two meals a day, each one consisting of two steamed buns and some vegetable soup.

As soon as the four practitioners were let out of solitary confinement on August 10, 2020, the guards subjected them to another round of abuse and only gave them two tiny steamed buns a day.

Because the four practitioners held firm to their faith, the guards forced them to stand for long hours. The guards also intentionally gave the nine who’d “transformed” better food in front of the four practitioners who’d refused to give up their belief.

When the four practitioners were not deterred, the guards subjected them to other forms of abuse, including depriving them of sleep, electrically shocking them repeatedly, and tying up their wrists and ankles with straps.

Mr. Fang died around September 2022.