NEW YORK, November 7, 2001 (Falun Dafa Information Center) - Sources inside China reveal that fifty-year-old Ms. Ren Tingling died in a concentration camp in Shandong province, China, this past March. Sources say the concentration camp had been set up specifically to engage in physical and psychological torture to force Falun Gong practitioners to renounce their faith. Shandong Province is the deadliest region in China for maltreatment of Falun Gong practitioners, as a total of 56 practitioners have now been confirmed to have died in police custody there since China began its persecution of Falun Gong in July, 1999.

Ms. Ren Tingling had gone to Beijing to make an appeal to the Chinese government regarding the mistreatment of Falun Gong, but was arrested and held in the Dong Cuin Detention Center in the city of Haiyang. Witnesses say Ms. Ren had been tortured so badly in the detention center that she could no longer stand up.

On March 16th of this year, the director of Haiyang City's notorious "610 Office," Shao Wenbing, gave orders that more than 160 steadfast Falun Gong practitioners be sent to the "115 Base" concentration camp to be brainwashed and "reformed," a process that typically involves prolonged torture resulting in either death or forced renunciation of one's beliefs. Ms. Ren was among those practitioners, but due to the mistreatment in the detention center, she was physically very weak.

At about daybreak on the day that she died, Falun Gong practitioners held in the same cell discovered that Ms. Ren was in agony and was shivering violently. The guard refused to allow her fellow practitioners to take care of her and forced them to go to the brainwashing session. Ms. Ren died that very morning. The police claim her death was due to cerebral hemorrhage.

The Haiyang City "610 Office," set up specifically to persecute Falun Gong, had given orders this past February to carry out a mass arrest of Falun Gong practitioners. The office and its agents have used all means to try to make them change their minds and give up their beliefs. In one psychological tactic, family members are called in to kneel and beg practitioners to give up their practice. Police in this area have also extorted thousands of dollars from practitioners and their families to ruin them financially. Witnesses say the Haiyang police often hang practitioners up off the ground by the wrists using handcuffs and then beat them brutally and burn their faces with cigarettes. Female practitioners also report being subjected to various forms of sexual abuse.

Every day, practitioners in detention must withstand such cruel tactics designed to break their will. Many refuse to give in because they firmly believe that holding to the universal virtues of Falun Gong, "Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance," is not a crime.

The deaths of 306 Falun Dafa practitioners due to torture while in police custody have been confirmed since the persecution began in July 1999, although government sources inside China disclose that the actual number exceeds 1,000. On November 4, 2001, Falun Gong practitioners in cities around the world held press conferences in front of Chinese Embassies and consulates to condemn Jiang Zemin's regime and the "610 Office" led by Luo Gan for their escalating persecution against Falun Gong.