Issued by Clearwisdom Net

By a practitioner in Beijing

About 130 male Falun Gong practitioners are currently held at Qianjin Prison after being sentenced. They make up most of the male practitioners illegally sentenced from Beijing area. Ward 1, Ward 8, Ward 9 and Ward 12 are divisions especially designated to detain Falun Gong practitioners. The administration tactics in these divisions differ. A local court in Beijing sentenced me to prison, and the officials held me in Ward 12, Qianjin Prison. I experienced and witnessed the brutal persecution of practitioners firsthand. I want to share my experiences as a way to expose the crimes committed against practitioners at this so-called "Bureau-Level Civilized Prison" in Beijing

a. Strict isolation

Practitioners who have recently been brought to the prison and have expressed their determination to return to Falun Gong practice, or who are deemed "uncooperative" according to the guards' control methods, are immediately isolated. Each division has one special, solitary confinement cell. The room measures only five square meters (54 square feet). A practitioner locked in this room is forced to eat, drink, sleep and [sometimes] relieve himself in this space. Four inmates take turns monitoring the practitioner and make sure he does not have contact with anyone. The practitioner is compelled to shout, "report" each time he enters or leaves a door. The practitioners do not have freedom of speech or action; they don't have any holidays or breaks, and they are forbidden to take showers or wash their clothes.

When the persecution is acutely severe, the practitioners are forbidden to leave the room to use the restroom. The number of inmates assigned to monitor each practitioner doubles to eight. Practitioners' every move is restricted. Furthermore, the inmates assault them verbally and physically.

When all solitary confinement cells are occupied, practitioners are sent to places with worse conditions, such as a storage room or washroom. Some of these windowless rooms are only two square meters (21.5 square feet) in size. These spaces are extremely hot in the summer and freezing cold in the winter.

Every practitioner held at this prison was tortured with "small stools." The practitioner is forced to sit on a small plastic stool about 11 cm (4.3 inches) high and must sit up, look straight ahead, bend his legs and hold them close together, so his calves form a 90 degree angle with the floor. He also has to put his hands on his knees and cannot close his eyes or look around. He cannot speak or stand up without permission. He is required to hold this position between 5 a.m. and midnight, meaning the practitioner sits still for at least 19 hours each day. The buttocks' flesh and bone press on the hard stool surface, forming blisters within a few days that cause terrible pain when the practitioners sit. Sitting down again breaks the blisters, making them exude fluid. This fluid sticks to their underwear and makes it an ordeal to remove.

Some practitioners firmly refused to follow the officials' commands. They were held in solitary confinement for four months. They were made to sit on small stools until their buttocks had ulcerated and their underwear was blood soaked. The officials tortured these practitioners for at least 20 hours a day.

The guards exhaust their torture methods on practitioners who persist in their belief. They are afraid of taking responsibility, so they order inmates to verbally and physically attack the practitioners. Sometimes beatings take place when the guards are present. The practitioners are knocked unconscious. When other practitioners confront the inmates they scream, "So what if I hit you? Go ahead and sue me!" They have the officials' backing.

When practitioners try to stop the inmates from assault, the guards handcuff and shackle the practitioners. To shirk responsibility, the guards coerce every practitioner to write a statement saying he was never subjected to any physical or verbal abuse before their release.

This is one of the most often-used torture methods. Practitioners are permitted to sleep only two hours a day, and sometimes they are forced to stay up for several days without any sleep. According to prison policy, the time between 9 p.m. and 6 a.m. the next day is a legally protected rest time for detainees, yet practitioners are forced to sit until 3:00 a.m. and get up at 5:00 a.m. Over time, the practitioners often become dizzy and disoriented. The guards seize this opportunity to brainwash them.

Practitioners are compelled to study articles and watch videos that slander Master Li and Falun Gong. They are made to read through thick compilations of vicious fabrications and repeatedly watch slanderous VCDs for 12 hours a day. The practitioners have to accept the content and are never permitted to question the content of these materials. They also have to write essays to explain their "understandings" in line with the Communist Party's ideology. If the practitioner refuses to follow these orders, he is locked in solitary confinement or abused in other ways for two weeks or a month, until the guards are satisfied with the outcome of brainwashing.

This process is repeated once more before the practitioner is released. The officials call it "prison exit education."

The guards also require practitioners who are brainwashed to write articles to slander and attack Falun Gong. Usually, the practitioners are further required to "correct" or completely re-write the article more than three times, until the guards are satisfied. The guards then make the practitioner read the article at a Division Conference, which causes the practitioner great humiliation and anguish.

The officials suppress and retaliate against any practitioner who safeguards Falun Gong and whom they deem as disobeying their commands. The officials lock these practitioners in solitary confinement; force them to write self-criticism, and subject them to public self-humiliation by having them list so-called mistakes during division-wide meetings. If the guards think the self-denigrating statement is not "deep" enough, they hold many meetings and force the practitioner to repeatedly criticize himself until the guards are pleased with the results. If the guards think more than two practitioners in one class have "issues" [hold onto their belief], the entire class is placed under strict control--everyone's lunch break and free time is canceled and the whole class has to sit inside all day long; they cannot talk or walk without permission. Class 6 of Ward 12 was placed under strict control many times, once for three months.

Guard Chen Jun often held "condemn and attack meetings" and searched the dormitory to create an atmosphere of terror. He resorted to "strict control and attack" to suppres practitioners' protests to uphold their rights.

In an attempt to destroy the practitioners' will, the guards sometimes invite the practitioners' families to the prison for "special" meetings. They ask the family members of the practitioners, who are brainwashed with government propaganda, to pressure the practitioners to give up cultivation. The guards also spread rumors and create conflict and misunderstandings among the practitioners' family members to increase the pressure on practitioners.

The guards' devious urgings led to practitioner Xu Huaquan's wife divorcing him. Guard Chen Jun tried to deceive and incite hatred in practitioners Huang Jian and Ma Ang's wives and other family members. These officials are the primary culprits responsible for the deteriorating relationships and breakups in practitioners' families.

Practitioners are followed and monitored in everything they do, including restroom use, while the criminal inmates assigned to keep them under surveillance can roam freely.

The practitioners do not get credit [toward their release date] if they refuse to do slave labor, while the watchdog inmates receive full credit, regardless of whether or not they work. They are allotted credits even during holidays.

Inmates can talk face-to-face with their families; they can eat and sleep together in accordance with prison policy while practitioners can only talk to their families via a phone while separated by a glass partition. The practitioners are forbidden to eat or sleep together.

Inmates can take their personal belongings home at the time of release, such as books, notebooks and letters, while practitioners are forbidden from taking any item containing any writing, not even books they bought from the prison store.

Only those assigned to watch practitioners can take the position of class head or division head; practitioners are at the bottom of the prison hierarchy.

Inmates can earn sentence reductions as long as they earn enough points, even if they are placed under "strict control." Practitioners, on the other hand, must achieve "loose control" before they can qualify for sentence reduction. By the time they achieve loose control status there is not much left of their sentence. The discriminatory point system results in practitioners perpetually earning less points than inmates. Those who receive sentence reductions are almost exclusively inmates assigned to persecute practitioners. Practitioners who persist in their belief or practitioners who return to Falun Gong practice would be considered "incompletely brainwashed" and would never get a sentence reduction.

To my knowledge, only one practitioner received a sentence reduction since Ward 12 started holding practitioners. Not a single practitioner ever obtained a leave of absence from the prison. Sentence reductions and leave of absence policies are meaningless for Falun Gong practitioners.

The guards strictly limit practitioners' contact with the outside world. They permit only three immediate blood relatives to meet with the practitioner and forbid meetings between a practitioner and a family member who also practices Falun Gong. They prohibit the families from bringing anything, and guards pace back and forth during the visit; therefore, anything said during the visit can be overheard.

All of the practitioners' incoming and outgoing letters are inspected. The guards withhold any letter they deem suspicious. The guards also withhold practitioners' letters to the Procuratorate and Prison Administration Bureau in which the practitioners state persecution incidents and chronicle abuses. The officials try their best to prevent outside information from entering the prison, and the truth about the persecution from getting out.

Since 2003, Qianjin Prison officials have required all detainees including Falun Gong practitioners to learn tai chi. They demand that everyone be able to do tai chi. The prison holds periodic tai chi contests. The Communist Party has the malicious intention of destroying practitioners by interfering with the Falun Gong cultivation principle, only a "single cultivation way."

I also must point this out: the prison subjected all practitioners to two blood tests and physical exams in July 2005 and August 2006. At that time I couldn't understand why they were carrying out these non-routine exams, but now I know it was a part of a set-up to get ready for potential live organ harvesting.

The vast majority of incarcerated practitioners never changed their belief in Falun Gong, and the guards knew it quite well. This is why they forbade practitioners from seeing each other and ordered inmates to closely monitor the practitioners' words and actions. Practitioners broke through all barriers with righteous thoughts and by helping each other.

In February 2006, several pieces of paper with Master Li's recent articles were passed around among the practitioners. The papers made their way from one group to another. Most practitioners read the articles, which greatly encouraged their determination and confidence in resisting the persecution and safeguarding Falun Gong. Soon, some practitioners publicly stepped forward and said, "Falun Dafa is righteous!" and said they would continue Falun Gong practice.

As the articles continued their circulation, one practitioner after another stepped forward and said they would continue to practice Falun Gong. Most of the 40 practitioners held in the prison at that time affirmed their belief in Falun Gong. Some practitioners wrote solemn announcements and gave them to the guards. Even a few collaborators who had assisted the guards in "reforming" practitioners said they would return to Falun Gong practice. It was something unprecedented--righteous words safeguarding Falun Gong. Resistance to the persecution surged in all groups, and the inmates couldn't do anything about it.

The officials were shocked and terrified at Falun Gong practitioners' righteous thoughts and protests. In order to contain the protests, the guards pretended to ask for a meeting with practitioners' representatives while they secretly discussed how to turn the tide and suppress the division struggle.

Seven practitioners, including Huang Jian, who had been sentenced to 12 years in prison; Wang Yi, sentenced to 14 years; and Wang Yu, sentenced to seven years, represented all the practitioners held in the prison. They told the guards, "There is nothing wrong with Falun Gong practice." They requested an immediate end to the persecution of practitioner Wu Yichang and several others held in solitary confinement and called for guaranteeing practitioners' human rights in accordance with the law. The guards stated they were only following official documents from higher up, but were unable to present the documents when the practitioners requested them. Division head Meng Fanguo was furious. He pounded on the table and accused the practitioners of disrupting order and creating a riot. He also threatened the practitioners. That was the end of the dialog.

A large division of fully armed police officers arrived at Ward 12 at 8:00 a.m. on March 9, 2006. Two officers blocked the door to each group and viciously glared at the practitioners. They also soon barged inside the cells and carried the seven representative practitioners out. They announced that these practitioners would be isolated and interrogated for disrupting prison order. An atmosphere of terror shrouded the place.

Chen Jun, a division political head, held a meeting where he threatened he would make an example of the seven practitioners and vociferously boasted of eradicating Falun Gong within the division. Subsequently, a six-month "strict control" order was issued for the entire division. The seven practitioners were held and persecuted at Ward 8. Thirteen inmates closely followed each practitioner.

The practitioners' protest for those held at Ward 12. This incident sent a clear message to the wicked Party: Practitioners' righteous belief in Falun Gong will never waver! All of the Party's lies and acts of persecution will eventually end in disgrace and complete failure.

Practitioner Wu Yichang was held in solitary confinement for more than four months. Official Chen Jun ordered inmates to beat him until he lost consciousness. He also suffered from sleep deprivation and restriction of personal freedom for a long time and had become skeleton-like. Mr. Wu was later transferred to Ward 9, to be further persecuted.

Practitioner Xu Huaquan has a master's degree from Beijing University. He was held in solitary confinement and persecuted for several months. He was later on transferred to Ward 8, to be further persecuted.

Practitioner Tang Jichang has a disabled right hand and could not work. He was held in solitary confinement for several months.

Practitioner Liang Minghua was first held in solitary confinement where the inmates beat him. Chen Jun later handcuffed and shackled him because he tried to stop the inmates from beating him. He was locked in solitary confinement for three months and was forced to read a self-condemning statement during three Division meetings, which wounded him psychologically.

Practitioner Ma Ang was held in solitary confinement for several months. He went on a hunger strike to protest the persecution. Official Chen Jun lied to his wife and made her pressure Ma Ang, which almost resulted in divorce.

Practitioner Zhang Yanbin used to serve in the military. He said, "The Communist Party is so rotten!" The inmates reported him. He was sent to solitary confinement. Zhang Yanbin, Xu Huaquan, and several other practitioners refused to write Falun Gong-slandering articles. Official Chen Jun accused them of disrupting prison order and forced them to do a self-critique during several division meetings.

Practitioner Liu Fujiang was first held at Ward 1. He was savagely tortured for firmly practicing Falun Gong and resisting the persecution. He was sent to the Drill Division, known for its notoriously bad human rights record. Liu Fujiang was forced to repeat the same bodily movement 108 times a day as corporal punishment. He was completely deprived of freedom and dignity.

Chen Jun is a political instructor, extremely venomous toward Falun Gong. He used various cruel methods to torture practitioners. He verbally attacked Falun Gong during division meetings and unscrupulously insulted practitioners on numerous occasions. He ordered inmates to beat the practitioners and personally planned and carried out many persecution incidents.

Guard Meng Fanguo, head of Ward 12, personally participated in the persecution; he is very arrogant.

Guard Zhang Honghai, deputy head of Ward 12, actively persecutes practitioners in different ways. He is a hypocrite.

Guard Chen Hongbin, the former deputy head of Ward 12, was later appointed deputy head of Ward 8. He is cruel and spares no effort in persecuting practitioners. He personally carried out many incidents of persecution.

Guard Cheng Jianhui, deputy head of Qianjin Prison, in charge of persecuting Falun Gong. He is the prison's ringleader and therefore responsible for the persecution that goes on in the prison. He ordered the carrying out of many persecution incidents.

Chinese version available at http://minghui.org/mh/articles/2007/3/15/150840.html

The persecution of Falun Gong practitioners at this township started on April 25, 1999. The township's supervisor and the police station chief personally led the village CCP secretary, the accountant, and others to blatantly intrude into practitioners' homes. They forced practitioners to hand over books, prevented them from exercising according to Falun Gong, and monitored and tracked their activities. One practitioner said that the person that Gan Yong had sent to keep her under surveillance followed on her heels. Once he even followed her to a friend's home and sat down to eat at the banquet. If the practitioners being monitored were nowhere to be seen for a few minutes, local police station and township government agents "would run around everywhere."

The supervisor, the CCP secretary, and the chief of the police station Gan Yong intimidated practitioners into handing over their Falun Gong books. One practitioner explained to them, "Citizens have the freedom of belief. Falun Gong teaches how to be a kind person. Is there anything wrong with wanting to be a better person? What a big crime you have committed!" They would not listen to a single word. They continued to raid and rob at will. To snatch the book, they were not hesitant to twist an arm or push someone to the ground. Once they got the book they threw it into the coal stove to burn it.

Gan Yong threatened a practitioner who righteously protected the book, "You are unwilling to hand over the book and want to go on practicing. It will affect your husband's work and your son's future." Gan Yong and township head Huang repeatedly threatened this practitioner's husband. He ordered him to make sure his wife no longer practiced and to keep in contact with the government and local police station. Otherwise, he would be "dismissed from work and have to forfeit his wages!"

On July 20, 1999, Jiang Zemin ordered the persecution of Falun Gong across China. Texing Township followed closely, step by step, and became even more aggressive. The township head, Party secretary, and police station chief intruded into practitioners' homes and workplaces at any time. One practitioner said that after July 20, 1999, Gan Yong confiscated their Falun Gong materials. One time, while I was at work, he called someone to come over and videotape me at work and lobbed personal attacks. For a long time, no matter whether day or night, Gan Yong frequently harassed me at my workplace until he was transferred from Texing.

Texing Township officials monitored and tracked Falun Gong practitioners' steps unscrupulously. They claimed they would reward those who "rendered meritorious service" by monitoring and tracking with ten thousand yuan. One practitioner told how a police vehicle often stopped in front of her home. Confiscating a family's belongings became routine. Some practitioners' homes were ransacked dozens of times. During February 2004 of the Chinese lunar calendar, one practitioners' home was ransacked three times within 20 days. However, those confiscating a family's personal belongings often didn't have a search warrant nor did they follow any legitimate procedures or abide by any legal proceedings. One practitioner verified that after her illegal arrest on January 2004, the police unexpectedly called persons from the local residents' committee who didn't have a search warrant to confiscate her belongings. They took away a Falun Gong book, truth clarification materials, a tape recorder, and other things.

Officials in Texing adopted illegal methods to persecute Falun Gong practitioners without regard for the law. As early as April 25, 1999, officials there had begun to put those who went to Beijing to appeal and report the truth to the government into prison. After July 20, 1999, Gan Yong played hard-ball, putting Falun Gong practitioners into prison. A practitioner said that in July 2000, after Gan Yong intruded into her home and snatched her book, township head Huang asked what to do next. Gan replied bluntly, "Put her into the detention center!" The life of Falun Gong practitioners were in Gan Yong's hands. With just one of his wicked decisions, a Falun Gong practitioner might be imprisoned for years. Some Texing practitioners in recent years were illegally imprisoned four times; some were sent to a labor camp for two to three years and some for longer. They were incarcerated in all kinds and sizes of prisons in Luzhou City. Several of them suffered from ruthless tortures at the Zizhong City Nanmusi Forced Labor Camp.

The Luzhou City Brainwashing Center is located in the Shibaowan Forced Labor Camp. The practitioners who were detained there reported, "One person, one room. Only out for meals. Walk in line. No talking. Need to write the three statements to slander Falun Gong and Master Li. Forced to read the statements out in public. They would video record it and use the video to deceive the public. If you refused to write and refused to "reform," you could not leave." They used this forceful method to make practitioners give up their belief in "Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance." This brainwashing center, called "education in respect for the law" in fact devastates a person's spirit. They willfully deprive citizens of their personal freedom, infringe upon their legitimate rights and interests, deliberately ignore the constitution and do not follow any legal rules or regulations.

The local police station does not have a jail but they set up a private prison where they put practitioners for several months. According to the practitioners who were detained there: "Sometimes less than half a pound of food was provided per day. We were always starving. The food was rotten vegetables and leftovers. The container the food came in was the same one they used for pigs. Nevertheless, our families were told to pay 1,200 "yuan" in living expenses for us per month."

Texing practitioners also suffered a great deal financially. For example, practitioners imprisoned in the brainwashing center had to pay for the brainwashing and pay the local police station and the detention center. The detention center fee was 20 yuan a day. Gan Yong extorted money from one detained practitioner, whom he then released. When the practitioner made a legal appeal, the township leaders gave orders for her wages to be stopped. Another practitioner that firmly believed in Falun Gong in the brainwashing center also had her wages frozen. Some practitioners were fined 6,000 yuan and had their wages frozen for one year and eight months.

One practitioner even wrote in an appeal, "After I went to Beijing to appeal in February 2000, I was illegally imprisoned in the police station, detention center, and drug rehabilitation center. Then I was put into a forced labor camp for two years. I was sent to the Zizhong City Nanmusi Forced Labor Camp for further persecution. In addition, Texing Township officials fined me 9,000 yuan the first time and 6,480 yuan the second time." This practitioner stated, "The female supervisor and the local police station chief collected this fine from my workplace by forcing me to write IOU notes when I lost my freedom. Even worse, they deducted 15,800 yuan from the sale of a house that my daughter sold. They stated that this was a punishment to deter me from appealing in Beijing again. When I was released from incarceration in 2003, my daughter went to the government to ask for the money to be returned. They said they did not have any money and refused to deal with her. They eventually returned 5,000 yuan in 2004 and another 5,000 yuan in 2005 and claimed they did not know when the rest might be returned."

This practitioner also said she had not received wages since November 2000. "In 2003, at my family members' repeated requests, my workplace issued me payment of 200 yuan for monthly living expenses." The financial persecution severely aggravated Falun Gong practitioners' burden. This persecution not only impacted many practitioners but also persecuted tens of thousands of families and brought disaster to the family members, relatives, and friends and to the general public.

In 2004, Gan Yong met his former teacher (a Falun Gong practitioner) waiting for a bus in Yutang Township. He jumped up and grabbed him for no reason. He said wickedly, "Don't think that I won't beat you just because you are a teacher!"

As he spoke he slapped his teacher's face twice, twisted his hands, and lifted them up, hurting the teacher severely. Then he arrested his former teacher and imprisoned him for 20 days.

Chinese version available at http://minghui.org/mh/articles/2007/3/8/150376.html

Falun Gong practitioner Ms. Yu Cuilan was sentenced to 10 years in prison at the Luyuan District Court, Changchun City, Jilin Province on November 23, 2006.

Ms. Yu Cuilan was arrested by  the National Security Group of Changchun City Police Department while shopping at the Caishen Shopping Center near her house on May 19, 2006. She was taken to the Third Detention Center in Changchun. There, the guards would not accept her because of her ill health. She was subsequently taken to the Jilin Province Forced Labor Hospital.

On August 9, 2006, the hospital at the forced labor camp received a bill of prosecution from the procurator's office of the Changchun City First Auto Company. It had been forwarded by agents from the Changchun City Luyuan District Court. Trumped up charges compiled from so-called facts all dated way back in in 2000 or 2003. Ms. Yu Cuilan had gone through extended persecution for her righteous acts.

Since Ms. Yu had already been on a month long hunger strike to protest her unjust treatment and was too weak to walk, at around 5:00 a.m. on September 27, 2006, officers from the Luyuan District Court carried Ms. Yu on a stretcher to court. During the trial, Ms. Yu was not allowed to speak for herself and court officials answered questions in her place.

A second trial was held on November 23, 2006, in which Ms. Yu Cuilan was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Ms. Yu appealed this sentence.

On December 7, 2006, agents from the Changchun City Middle Court asked Ms. Yu to return the official judgment paper and declared that they would double check it with Ms. Cui's appeal.

Ms. Yu has been tortured so severely that she can no longer take care of herself. She can not even walk anymore and has become severely emaciated.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2007/3/12/150650.html