Behind the Dark Curtain of Transformation At the Nanshan Branch Office, Shenzhen Department of Public Security

The Nanshan District branch office of the Shenzhen Department of Public Security, Shenzhen City, Guangdong Province suddenly began making trouble for Falun Gong practitioners in May, 2000. Without any legal procedure they have been making mass arrests and detentions of Falun Gong practitioners, and have sentenced them to labor camps. Torture, humiliation and psychological persecution escalated to an uncontrolled state. Furthermore, they used all kinds of methods to cover up their evil deeds. In order to gain "honor," they presented a so-called "Nanshan Experience" in Guangdong Province, and published forged "Falun Gong Practitioners' Repentance Statements" to fool those who did not know the truth. Practitioners laugh at these scandalous efforts, and we know that the day is not far away when everything will become clear.

The Persecution Against Falun Gong Also Affects Everyday People

The victims are not only the Falun Gong practitioners and their family members. The violation of human rights by the Nanshan public security branch office has been spreading to the society. Many uninvolved people are also affected, and social order has been severely disrupted.

On June 20th, when Ma Lifang and Zeng Yingxia were arranging for the children in their self-owned kindergarten to have a meal and take a nap, police came in and raided the place. The police forced parents to take their children home. The two teachers were sent to the Nanshan Detention Center, and the kindergarten was sealed off. The innocent children had to discontinue their education.

On July 19th, when artist Tang Haiming was teaching an art class, the police took him away in front of his students and sent him to the Nanshan Detention Center. Since then the artist has been unemployed, and the students have been deprived of their schooling.

On the 29th and 30th of August, the police attempted to arrest Mr. and Mrs. Liu Xifeng, but failed because the couple escaped with their son. The police then wanted to make a forced entry into their home. The landlord refused to give them the key due to lack of legal procedure, so the irritated police took the landlord to the police station. Furthermore, all the residents in that building more than 40 people of all ages -- were taken to the Security Office of Nantou for interrogation and were kept until midnight. After being released, most of the residents moved, leaving the whole building almost empty. This incident caused severe financial loss to the landlord.

Senior Citizens, Infants, Women, and Children Tortured; Human Ethics and Nature's Law Trampled

A practitioner couple who worked in the Nanshan helicopter airport was arrested at their workplace and their home respectively. Their parents are already in their sixties and seventies. Unable to bear such trauma, the elderly parents fainted several times, and their lives were in a critical condition. However, the police disregarded their condition. They even used the wellbeing of the old couple as leverage to coerce the practitioners to comply with the so-called "transformation" -- either go home and take care of the elderly couple and the high school kid after you've shown repentance, or stay in the prison or labor camps.

A couple who lived in Shekou District, Li Weijun and Wang Shaona, were arrested in February this year on their way to Beijing to appeal. Li Weijun was sent to Shekou Detention Center. Wang Shaona had been pregnant for 6 months. In order to imprison her, police forced her to abort. How ridiculous it is that an unborn child must suffer because the parents practice Falun Gong.

Shen Xiaofeng lived in China with her 4 year-old daughter while her husband was working in Hong Kong. On June 21st, she was arrested at a friend's home. Her daughter was also locked up together with her in a police station. After two days detention, they were transferred to the Nanshan Police Station to be detained for another three days. In the end, the police separated the mother from her daughter, sending the mother to the prison, and leaving the girl in the police station. The residency committee and the police station were even attempting to send the child to an orphanage. Fortunately, her father rushed back from Hong Kong just in time so the child was not sent to the orphanage. This 4-year-old girl had been locked up for seven days.

In this kind of cruel persecution and out-of-control massive arrest, detention and sentencing, how many families have been torn apart, how many children have lost their parents, and how many elderly people have lost their children? People are calling out for a return to conscience, ethics, and humanity.

Modernized "White Palace House," Contemporary "Dregs Cave"

People familiar with the Chinese novel Red Rock all know that those two places refer to the places of Fascists' cruelties. The Nanshan Detention Center is the place for the Nanshan Branch Office of the Shenzhen Department of Public Security to brutally "transform" Falun Gong practitioners.

First they take practitioners from their workplace or home and take them to the police station, lock them up for a day, and then ask them whether they have changed their mind about practicing Falun Dafa. Those "transformed" will be released after writing a repentance statement; those who stick to the practice will receive 15 days detention and forced mental "transformation" by being threatened with unemployment or losing their housing or children's school registration, or being sent to labor camps, etc.

On the 15th day of detention, as long as the practitioner still says "practice," he or she will be detained for another one to six months. Their families will be in a shambles -- senior citizens will have nobody to take care of them, couples are forced to separate, children will stray in the street. The director of the section of political security of the detention center, He, once shouted at the husband of a practitioner: "Divorce her! If she still doesn't write the repentance statement, you should divorce her!"

This is how they have been following Jiang Zemin: to destroy Falun Gong's reputation, to crackdown Falun Gong financially, and to alienate Falun Gong from everyday people. Not only this; they also ask the other inmates to torture Falun Gong practitioners. Those who do not comply with "mental transformation" are sent to labor camps.

By saying that the Nanshan Detention Center is the updated version of "White Place House" and "Dregs Cave," we mean that it has combined the torture of the 30's and 40's with the method of "let the masses fight the masses" used during the dark days of the Cultural Revolution:

1. Mass criticism: this is a style inherited from the Cultural Revolution. The Nanshan Detention Center uses the form of a "criticism meeting" [where people denounce each other] to torture practitioners.

2. Pouring cold water in winter weather: This is a vicious method thought up by Li Yanzhi, a guard of a women's prison cell. Practitioners are dragged into the restroom in the freezing cold winter days and cold water is poured on their heads one bucket after another. Neither changing clothes nor going to bed is allowed. Practitioners can only sleep on the floor or in the restroom. This is the basic torture used in the Nanshan detention center. Many Falun Gong practitioners have experienced this.

3. Sitting on the name: This was also invented by the vicious policewoman Li Yanzhi. She writes the name of the founder of Falun Gong on a piece of paper, puts it on the floor, and force practitioners to sit on it. If the practitioner refuses, 5 or 6 people will pick the practitioner up and push her onto the paper. If the practitioner still doesn't comply, she will be beaten and kicked.

4. Guilt by association: As long as one practitioner does not eat food, all the inmates in that cell are not allowed to have a meal. Last December, practitioner Zhang Yuping went on a hunger strike for six days. Li Yanzhi punished all the inmates of the same cell by canceling 2 out of 3 meals per day. The inmates were so hungry and vented all their resentment on Falun Gong practitioners. They beat practitioners like crazy, which served the purpose of making "the masses beat the masses." Those who do not participate in persecuting Falun Gong are punished by not providing any vegetables or other dishes with their rice. Those who have sympathy towards Falun Gong practitioners are not allowed to purchase anything. In early July, one inmate (her name omitted here because she is still locked in the Nanshan Detention Center) who refused to participate in persecuting Falun Gong practitioners was punished by being forbidden to buy any basic necessities for three weeks.

5. Whipping

6. Forcing practitioners to smell the toilet.

7. Slapping the face with slippers.

These methods above are all commonly used in the Nanshan Detention Center to punish practitioners. Many practitioners have experienced them.

8. Piercing the body with needles. Other Inmates pierce practitioners' bodies with thin needles, saying it's "to have better ventilation."

9. Shackling.

Cheating and Self Deceiving

On the one hand they expanded the persecution in scale and severity, on the other hand they make up higher "transformation rates" so as to get awards and praise from higher authorities. They shamelessly published forged "Falun Gong practitioners' repentance material" on newspapers to fool those in the public who do not know the truth. These "repentance statements" that appeared on the newspapers of Shenzhen City were actually fabricated. Their ugly behavior has made some practitioners step out to prove their innocence with their own acts, to reveal the plot of the swindlers, because there is no place for them to appeal.

Ye Yanhui, 23, was arrested on June 20th while taking a rest at home. She was imprisoned and forced to write so-called "repentance statement." When she saw that her essay had been modified and published in a newspaper (she was called "Xiao Yanzi" in the paper), in order to validate Dafa and clear up rumors, she went to Beijing to appeal on October 5th, 2000. She was arrested at the Shenzhen Train Station and has been detained in the Nanshan Detention Center.

Lu Zhaohui, whose "repentance statement" was modified and published on a newspaper to deceive people, has made a formal statement to the public security authorities, saying that his so-called "repentance statement" was written under pressure, and has been declared void. Now, he has been forced to wander outside away from home.

Zhan Xian, who was detained for three months and was considered a "transformed" practitioner, threw himself into the current of clarifying the truth to people after he was released.

More and more Dafa practitioners from Nanshan have stood up again. They use all kinds of possible ways to validate Dafa, to clarify the truth to people. On Tiananmen Square during the national day holiday there were Nanshan practitioners; in the lanes and streets of Shenzhen Nanshan practitioners are distributing flyers. Some Nanshan practitioners are traveling around the country promoting the Fa and clarifying the truth.

The so-called Nanshan experience is nothing but willful arrest, detention, sentencing and torture. It is nothing but ruthless violation of human rights and law.