An Account of the Brutalities at the Baoding Labor Camp: Economic Exploitation, Hard Labor and Torture Resulting in Disability and Death

(Clearwisdom.net) The Baoding Labor Camp in Hebei Province forces detainees to perform hard labor. For the female team, the work starts at 6:30 a.m. and ends at 2:00 a.m. the next day. As a result of the long hours of hard labor, many practitioners' hands have been injured to the point that they are disabled. Right now, the labor camp forces the male team to staple together pages of books. Even those who are sick are made to do this. They are forced to work a whole day, and they are not allowed to take a rest at noon-time. They cannot rest until after 10:00 pm. The book currently being produced is entitled, The Very Best Three on Their Way. All the books made at the labor camp are pirated copies. The camp stopped this work for seven days after the CCTV broadcast the news that pirating copies of books is very rampant in Hebei Province. They started again after the story blew over.

The labor camp makes enormous profits illegally and treats the detainees very badly. It also exploits the prisoners in other ways as well. The meals served at the Baoding Labor Camp get worse every day. The only food currently available for the whole day is eggplant cooked in water. Even when family members come to visit, they are not allowed to bring any food to their loved ones. There is a convenience store in the labor camp where prisoners can buy food to supplement their meals. The convenience store posts a notice saying that their prices are the same as those of the stores outside the labor camp. Actually, the prices are much higher than outside stores. For example, for instant noodles, regular stores sell them for 0.6 Chinese yuan, while the store at the labor camp sells them for one yuan. For eggs, a normal store would sell them for one yuan per jin (450 grams), while at the labor camp they sell them for five yuan per jin. This is nothing more than economic exploitation.

A practitioner named Di Wanqing, from Li County, Hebei Province, was severely tortured at the labor camp. The guards used all kinds of means to torture him, including beating him with ropes, shocking him with high-voltage electric batons, tying him to the "death bed" (1), and forcing him to stand facing the wall with a guard standing right behind him, kicking him. He endured this treatment non-stop for three days and nights. Another torture inflicted on Mr. Di was a torture known as "watching TV" (being tied up and forced to bend over a bucket of urine for several days straight).

Since Di Wanqing refused to renounce Falun Dafa, a guard named Li Dayong brought him to a room and said viciously, " I will beat you up until I force you to give in." Following that, he beat Mr. Di until he lost consciousness.

Di Wangqing went on a hunger strike to protest the inhuman torture and persecution at Baoding Labor Camp. He was force-fed several times. As a result of the long-term persecution, Mr. Di was close to death, with his entire body swollen and fluids accumulating in his stomach. The guards sent him to the hospital where he was diagnosed with an inflammation of the lungs characterized by difficult, painful breathing and an accumulation of fluids. The guards were afraid to shoulder the responsibility for his death and so sent him home. He died soon after, on May 1, 2003.

A guard named Li Dayong handcuffed practitioner Tian Jianxing in a spread-eagle position to an iron rail for seven days and nights. As a result, Jianxing Tian's legs and feet were swollen so badly he could not put on his shoes, and he could hardly walk by himself.

A practitioner named Li Jiangguo, 56 years old, was deprived of sleep for 13 days and was tied to the "death bed" (1) for one and a half months.

A practitioner named Ma Yuling was tortured several times by the guards. Four to five guards tied him with a rope and beat him severely. When they could not tie the rope any tighter, they forced a beer bottle under the rope so that the nylon rope cut deeply into Mr. Ma's flesh. For three consecutive days, they repeatedly tied him up until he lost consciousness from the pain. The skin where the ropes cut his flesh became necrotic in many places, and he lost the use of his arms. For one month, Mr. Ma could not take care of himself. Even then, the guards still used two high-voltage electric batons to torture him, burning him severely on his neck, back, face, genitals and mouth. The guards also instigated the criminal prisoners to beat Ma Yuling whenever they liked. Some criminal prisoners, in order to gain favor from the guards, used all means to torture him. However Mr. Ma still compassionately clarified the truth to them, in spite of enduring great pain, and so dissolved their evil thoughts. Finally, those prisoners lost the heart to beat him any more and apologized to Ma Yuling in private.

(1) "Death Bed" torture: A practitioner is tied to a bed with his hands handcuffed above his head to the bed rails, and his legs tied with thin nylon ropes. The rope is then tightly wrapped around the practitioner's body and the bed, from his legs to his chest. The rope is wrapped so tightly that the practitioner has difficulty breathing and eventually loses consciousness.