According to the police, Mengyang town, Sanyi town, Shiwa village and Yihe village of Pengzhou city, Sichuan Province, are disaster areas. Starting on around July 22nd, each practitioner was paired up with a person to watch him or her closely. Eleven practitioners have been detained in the government yard of Sanyi town since this June. During the day, practitioners pulled weeds and swept the yard; at night they slept on benches or on the ground. After July 25th, some practitioners were released but five people are still being detained.

These practitioners were threatened and tortured. They were surrounded by all kinds of injustice, maltreatment, beating and verbal abuse, yet they still treated people very kindly, without any hatred. They truly were benevolent and tolerant.

It was getting dark, and three guards began to interrogate a male practitioner who was old enough to be their father. This old man wanted to use the restroom but they instead told him to stand up straight with his two feet together. Their commanding and fake manner was so ridiculous and pitiful that it is practically not even worth mentioning. Later teased by a female co-worker, they let the old man out to use the restroom. During the break they made the following comments during their conversation:

-Most practitioners are elderly women.

-Not many are young people.

-They do not utter a word nor do they weep while being beaten.

-Smart guys [like us] should follow the government's decision.

-Who's willing to beat them?

It seemed that they felt that they had no other option but to beat the practitioners, since it was their job.

These men used a bamboo strap that was 2 meters long and 1 cm wide to beat that old man, in addition to verbally abusing him. He was beaten down to the ground, and at that time the loud beating attracted many people. As soon as they beat this old man down to the ground, they quickly ordered him to get up on to his feet. The old man lifted his head up with great difficulty and then, with one hand on the ground, raised his upper body...

Some so-called smart and earnest local governments seemed to have exerted rare acumen in implementing the instructions made by the high level government. The following table was a good example:

Daily report of Falun Gong practitioners in Sanyi town

Village

Date Time Reporter Daily report

Here "Reporter" referred to the Falun Gong practitioner and "Daily report" was usually marked as "OK". A report with the red stamp of the Shifo village government had the names of 8 practitioners manually recorded in it.

In the nearby Nanxing town of Guanghan city, the environment was a bit different, and there were practitioners of all kinds, i.e., some 'co-operative' with the ban and others firm in their practice. The government in Guanghan city released some practitioners around July 30th. A policeman in Pengzhou city admitted that Falun Gong is a headache for them and he said that even practitioners' closest relatives were not able to persuade them to quit. He further admitted that he himself had almost decided to learn Falun Gong as well.

Not knowing the truth, many ordinary people in the Chuanxi rural area were frightened by the persecution initiated by the government. There were some people who had long believed in Buddhism and who later got to know some of the truth of Falun Dafa. But in general, most people did not know the truth and they only wanted to do something to ensure the safety of their relatives.

After several hot and dry days, on the morning of July 27th thunder could be heard. Later in the evening lightning flashed, but the rain didn't start to fall until 11:00pm. The temperature suddenly dropped after the rains. The incessant rain on August 2nd reminded people of the coming fall. Ordinary people said that the weather was a bit abnormal this year. It was cold when it was supposed to be hot while it was hot when it was supposed to be cold.

There was a young woman in her 20s who had a 9-month-old baby and was the daughter-in-law of the Xu family in Xinglong town, Guanhan city. Upon her return from appealing in Beijing, she was detained for 15 days in the Guanhan detention center. Later, at the end of July, she was again detained by the Xinglong town government and badly beaten. She was still in detention by August 5th. A witness said that her breast was all wet because she was still lactating.

By noon of September 1st, those five practitioners illegally detained for an extensive period in Sanyi town, Pengzhou city, were still being deprived of their freedom. According to a government employee, they were sweeping the streets.

A Practitioner in Mainland China

October 2000