April 22, 2003
(Clearwisdom.net)
The author of this article has been illegally detained at the Masanjia Forced Labor Camp, Shenyang, Liaoning Province since October 1999 because she practiced Falun Gong. In the Camp, the torture she suffered caused her to almost become blind, and she lost her hearing from being beaten. She was shocked by electric batons, heavily beaten up, shut up in a closed cell, and forced to perform hard labor. The following is the personal experience of this Dafa practitioner inside the Masanjia Forced Labor Camp, and some of the facts of persecution she witnessed against other Dafa practitioners.
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I am a Dafa practitioner from Liaoning Province. I started practicing Dafa in May 1997. On September 27, 1999, I went to Beijing to appeal. At a little past 11 a.m. on September 28, while resting in a hotel, police officers forcibly entered and illegally interrogated. The same afternoon, I was held against my will at a detention center where I continued to practice the Falun Gong exercises. Directed by police officers, the cell head asked me to stop my practice and even attempted to stop me several times while I was practicing the Falun Standing Stance exercise. Later the criminal inmates twisted my arms behind my back and pushed me to the floor. Even so, I still continued to practice the exercises.
At the end of September, four people from the local City Public Security Bureau and the township government escorted me back from Beijing and illegally detained me at the Public Security Bureau. Police officer Xia tried to persuade me not to practice Falun Gong anymore but I refused. Then I was detained and I practiced Falun Gong exercises in the detention center. Finally, a police officer said that if I promised not to go to Beijing anymore I would be released. I refused to their terms and the Public Security Bureau then sent me to the notorious Masanjia Forced Labor Camp and I was illegally sentenced to three years of detention.
When I entered the camp, the first group of Falun Gong practitioners detained there were all in the Women's Second Detention Center. The head asked us to recite the cell rules together; I refused and started reciting "Lun Yu" [statement of comments in Zhuan Falun, the main book of Falun Dafa teachings] and other Dafa articles. Su Jing, the warden, shocked my neck with an electric baton, and shocked Cui Yaning from Jingzhou and other Dafa practitioners. Then she shouted and forced all of us squat down. I once again began reciting Dafa articles, and Dafa practitioners in other rooms followed. The police officers started to deal with those of us who started the reciting. The police called me up and they asked if it was me who took the lead. I did not say a word. On the afternoon of the third day, before supper, several Dafa practitioners and I who started the reciting were isolated from other practitioners. I was sent to the Women's First Detention Center to live with general criminals, and was forced to work 15 or 16 hours or longer a day on a sewing machine. Several days later, Zhou Qing, the First Detention Center head, together with seven or eight police officers brought us ten Dafa practitioners to a classroom and Zhou started reading newspaper articles defaming Falun Gong. One Dafa practitioner started reciting "Lun Yu," and then we all recited together. Then Zhou and other police officers beat us up fiercely while shouting. One of them grabbed my hair and pushed me to the ground, I tried to escape with all of my strength and kept on reciting "Lun Yu."
Upon returning to the workshop, I did not begin the work. The group leader forced me to stand up; I kept on reciting Dafa articles. The group leader instigated the shop manager to kick and punch me heavily, and then I was detained in a mini-cell. In late November 1999, I was sent back to the Women's First Detention Center. I still kept on practicing Dafa exercises, and was badly beaten up by those criminals. Each time I was beaten up, my face would become totally injured and full of bruises. The worst incident was when over ten criminals surrounded me and kept on kicking me repeatedly. I felt that my brain was gone and I became empty. My nose was bleeding heavily after being punched. Being slapped in the face left me seeing flashing stars and my ears were ringing and bleeding. Not long after I fainted, they poured water on me to wake me up.
I survived that torture but I could not see clearly anymore. My hearing also deteriorated, it was like my ears were blocked or something. The kicking left me unable to bend down for more than 20 days. It's painful for me to go up or down stairs and to turn over during sleep, and I had to sleep between two criminals. Even in this situation, I had to move the 20 kg garbage can with another person from the third floor to the garbage field. I endured it and my lower back felt like a steel plate was there. The two criminals who beat me most violently received their karmic retribution instantly. They were painful all over and it was very hard for them to walk. If they had not beaten me, they would have been fine, however they are in a lot of pain. They learned that their beating me caused their pains, and they dared not beat me anymore.
Actually criminals do not like to beat us. The police group leader coerces them. If they did not beat us, their terms would be extended. One criminal told me: "I felt like crying and was scared when you were beaten up, I dared not look at you." Others said: "By beating you we are protecting you from being beaten up by other criminals." As a rule, criminals are not allowed to be nice to Falun Gong practitioners, are not allowed to talk with us about Falun Gong, or they will be punished. So criminals dare not talk with us and have us isolated and constrained. Walking, working, eating, sleeping, going to a bathroom were all supervised by assigned criminals. Dafa practitioners are not allowed to talk with each other.
During that period of time, Dafa practitioner Su Juzhen from Huludao City recited Dafa articles while the criminal group was reciting the cell rules. Wang Yanping, the brigade head, called Su to the guardroom and stripped her, then hit her all over with an electric baton for a whole night. When she came to the workshop, I found her face including her mouth was covered with big blisters; her eyes and face were swollen and bruised. It was too horrible to look at. On the second day I was badly beaten up, since I insisted on practicing Falun Gong exercises, Wang Yanping locked me in the guardroom and handcuffed me to a radiator. I could only stand up; I could not sleep, and was watched by two criminals. At that time, I started a hunger strike. The group leader ordered the criminals to send me some salted sugar water, but I refused to drink. Enraged Wang hit my neck with her high-voltage electric baton. I was quivering from the shock and lost control of my bladder, I urinated in my trousers.
In early January 2000, some of the Dafa practitioners were "transformed" in the Women's First and Second detention centers of the Masanjia Forced Labor Camp. Back then I was in the third group of first brigade of the Women's first detention center which was made up of all Dafa practitioners. We were all determined in our belief in Dafa. Since the evil could not find any loopholes, they resorted to the last trick. One morning, several collaborators [former Falun Gong practitioners who have gone astray due to brainwashing and torture] called all the determined Dafa practitioners to a room, they said: "Today we will give each of you one share of our De (virtue)" They slapped each of us on the face. I said something and they slapped me in the face over ten times. The second morning they beat up the determined Dafa practitioners in each one's room, I was also slapped in the face twice, as well as Tian Li and Li Xiaoyan. One young collaborator spit into Pan Qi's face. Pan Qi is a student from Dalian Medical University. The other two collaborators pushed Pan Qi onto a bed and did not allow her to move and did not let her go even though it was work time. Later under the order of a patrol, Pan Qi was allowed to return to the workplace.
Between May and August of 2000, Su Juzhen, myself, and a few other Dafa practitioners were sent to the first brigade of the Women's Second Detention Center for a forced "reformation". First, the collaborators came to talk to us about their misunderstanding of Dafa and did not allow us to sleep. After that failed, they forced me to squat down to torture me. From 10 p.m. to 2 a.m., no moving and no standing up were allowed. We were supervised by the cold-blooded collaborators. After a few days, seeing that I was still determined, collaborators asked police officers to hit me with electric batons and sarcastically called it a "stick warning" [a term from Zen Buddhism given by monks]. On the morning of May 25, Wang Naiming, the head of the first Brigade of the Women's Second Detention Center called me to the office. Wang said: "Today I'll test you. See if you can pass." Three police officers, Zhang, Wang and Huang, each held an electric baton in hand. My mind was clear. They forced me to hold the electric batons with both my hands. Seeing no response, they forced me to put my palms on the power poles of the electric batons while another one pressed an electric baton on my neck. Three electric batons hit me concurrently. I told myself that I was not afraid of this because I am a Dafa practitioner. At that moment, I wanted to use the bathroom, after I returned, I thought I would be shocked once again, but I found Pan Qi was there. She was shocked also. That time, they shocked me for over ten minutes with electric batons.
On the afternoon of May 27 2000, group leader Zhang Xiurong called me to the office. Zhang shouted to force me to take off my shoes and stockings and sit on the floor. Then she shocked my foot arches, legs, upper body, hair, and lips with an electric baton. At the same time she shouted: "Won't you say you you'll quit!?" She ordered me to stand up to receive her beating. At that moment, Teacher's words clearly appeared in my mind:
"I am rooted in the universe, "If anyone can harm you, he or she would be able to harm me. Put simply, that person would be able to harm this universe." (Zhuan Falun)
I felt I was full of power and the police officers' electric batons did not work well. She replaced her electric baton but it still did not work well. Still angry and not satisfied with me, she threw down the electric baton, and insanely pulled me back and forth by my hair, and slapped my face fiercely. This torture lasted for over 40 minutes. It stopped when suppertime came. Then they forced me to stand with my waist bent at 90 degrees, with both my arms hanging down in parallel without touching my knees. I was not allowed to bend my legs, sometimes both hands touched the floor, that was very painful. I was forced to stand in that position for one hour and sometimes for a whole morning.
Su Juzhen was very determined in Dafa. Zhang Xiurong handcuffed her hands behind her back, and then hung her upside down on a steel bed. That was when Zhang Xiurong told me that I would be tortured in a similar way if I did not give up. My heart was full of pain seeing Su Juzhen tortured in that way. I tried my best to control myself so I would not burst into tears. Su Juzhen was also shocked by electric batons many times. Few could endure the electric shocks and physical torture; many gave up under such heavy pressure. The reformation rate of the Women's Second Detention Center was the highest in the country because of their cruelty. Many officers including the Jiang's regime's leading officers in persecuting Falun Gong came to the Women's 2nd Detention Center to "visit and learn experiences." Several police officers from a forced labor camp in Hubei province came and practiced their torture techniques for a week over there. For their cruelty in the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners, the Masanjia Forced Labor Camp was awarded by Jiang's regime as a "2nd Grade Group Hero." Police officers who were group leaders got their bonuses according to the reformation rate they achieved and how brutally they had tortured Falun Gong practitioners.
Though I was very determined in Dafa, I was once deceived by the lies spread by the collaborators. I declare here that the "reformation" materials about me are null and void. On August 30, 2000, I was sent back to the Women's 1st Detention Center and was allocated to the Second Brigade. Since I used Dafa to judge my behavior and was able to read Teacher's article "Eliminate Your Last Attachment(s)," I realized my mistake. On September 2, 2000, I submitted a declaration to the group leader to say that the "reformation" materials were null and void, and I practiced Dafa exercises in the afternoon of September 4 when there were daily group exercises. The group leader, Zhao Guorong dragged me to the office by my ears. In the office, Zhao ordered patrols bring out ropes, handcuffs and electric batons, and ordered me to take off my shoes and stockings and sit on the floor. They bound my feet together, and Zhao Guorong handcuffed me. Then Zhao shocked my arches, legs, upper body, and the inner side of my arms for a long time while asking me if I would keep practicing Dafa. As painful as it was, I said: "I will practice!" Then police officers shocked my arms more viciously with electric batons, which caused huge blisters on my arms. Pus and fluid ran from the blisters for about a month before it healed, but it left scars on my arms that are still visible now.
(to be continued)
