(Clearwisdom.net) (Continued)
Part 1: http://www.clearwisdom.net/emh/articles/2005/7/15/62904.html
Part 2: http://www.clearwisdom.net/emh/articles/2005/7/16/62931.html
9. The "dedicated assignment" system (also called the "sandwiching routine")
The "dedicated assignment" system is used in the No. 3 Forced Labor Camp in Henan Province. In this system, two to four criminal inmates keep a close watch on each practitioner, following the practitioner everywhere around the clock, accompanying him during mealtime and sleep, and even when he uses the toilet. Those criminals severely beat practitioners if they don't obey the camp's rules. Encouraged by guards with the promise of sentence reduction, the designated criminals play the roles of persecutors of Falun Gong practitioners. According to records, after being released, most of the criminals who got involved in persecuting Falun Gong were arrested again and sent back to the No. 3 Forced Labor Camp. For example, Li Jinglin, who had been involved in a lot of persecution cases, was also the most active inmate in persecuting Falun Gong. Though he got a two-month sentence reduction, only few months later he was arrested and again locked up in the forced labor camp.
Meanwhile, the officials in the No. 3 Forced Labor Camp use a system that provides better treatment to those who renounce Falun Gong. Their sentences are reduced by at least three or four months, usually in the range of 5-12 months. Once, a person who went astray shouted out a Falun Gong-slandering slogan at a meeting in March 21, 2001. That individual got an 18-month sentence reduction.
As far as solid practitioners are concerned, the perpetrators at the forced labor camp torture them brutally, trying all kinds of methods to force them to give up their belief. The guards boast, "We would rather beat someone to death than fail to "reform" him; for those who are on a hunger strike, we would rather let them starve to death than release them." The forced labor camp links the rate of "reformation" with the guards' work evaluation and bonuses. So, in order to increase the rate of reform, guards use all manner of tortures to deal with the solid practitioners. The guards forbid them to sleep and periodically interrogate them. They torture practitioners physically and mentally and create an environment of terror. Yan Zhenye, the camp director, and the deputy director Qu Shuangcai told the guards that they can use all kinds of methods to deal with Falun Gong practitioners. Their orders are based on Jiang Zemin's secret order, "It is not a crime to beat them [Falun Gong practitioners] to death; it will be counted as suicide."
Meanwhile, the practitioners' courage and solid belief in Dafa have terrified the evildoers and deeply shocked the other criminals. In such a severe environment, some criminals even expressed their desire to learn Falun Gong. Some criminals have already started practicing and reading the Fa with us in the forced labor camp.
10. The March 10, 2001 Incident
On March 10, 2001, five practitioners from Division 2, Chen Zhanyong, Cui Yusheng, Liu Qingyuan, Jia Shuangyuan and I started a hunger strike to protest the persecution and to ask for the right to practice. Chen Zhanyong and I were force-fed. Guard Zheng Qi scratched our feet, armpits and ribs with a ballpoint pen. They covered my nose and tried to open my mouth by force. Guard Shi Baolong ordered others to force-feed us by any means they could find. They tried for a long time but failed. I heard that they would use an anesthetic, but for some reason they did not.
Chen Zhanyong, a very steadfast practitioner, is a person who likes a clean environment and clean things. When he was deprived of freedom in the Xuchang Forced Labor Camp, several guards and criminals could not make him give up Falun Gong, even though they pummeled him with their knees, pushed him against the wall and stomped on him. This time, guards found a very dirty criminal and ordered him to blow rice soup into Chen Zhanyong's mouth with a metal pipe.
Guards applied the torture known as "Roasting a whole lamb" on Jia Shuangyuan. This is how it works: The police tied the practitioner's four limbs tightly onto a horizontal pole, thus suspending him, and then punched, kicked, and hit the practitioner with a stick. Before he began practicing Falun Dafa, Jia Shuangyuan was arrested and jailed in a forced labor camp because he stole a cow. In the forced labor camp, after we clarified the truth to him, he was amazed by the practitioners' courage and high moral standards. He started studying the Fa with us, although he didn't yet know how to do the Falun Gong exercises. He was beaten unconscious with an electric baton and a metal rod by the 2nd Team leaders Song Naxin, Dong Mao, and the division leader Jin Xushan of Division 2. Criminal Wu Zhi carried him back to his cell.
Illustration: "Roasting the whole lamb"
After torturing practitioners and creating such a terrifying environment, guards would force practitioners to read anti-Falun Gong books and write essays. Practitioners are forced to write "understandings" and a guarantee statement. If one refuses to do so, guards would hang him up and beat him with an electric baton and rubber club. They forced those who were compelled to reform to write to their families, and called this "giving abiding love to those practitioners." They forced practitioners to swear, sing and perform calisthenics; the purpose of these things was to destroy the practitioners' will.
Jia Shuangyuan was beaten unconscious twice because he refused to write political essays and because he read the Fa. Guards Song Naxin, Dong Mao and the political head of Division 2, Zhang Qiang, along with six or seven other criminals, beat Jia Shuangyuan with chairs for 1-2 hours. Once Jia Shuangyuan had to lie in bed for two days as a result of the beating.
When torturing Jia Shuangyuan in one room, the head guards, Yan Zhenye and Shi Baolong, even talked to me about "civilized management; the Chinese Communist Party's warm and gentle reformation being like a spring breeze" in another room right across the hallway.
The Xiaolongkou Farm, the No. 3 Forced Labor Camp in Henan Province, is where a widely-known murder took place - within 40 minutes, even before the policemen from out of town who escorted a criminal inmate here had left, the criminal was beaten to death. When talking to me about this "achievement," Yan Zhenye was even proud of it.
After the hunger strike on March 10, 2001, I was transferred to Team 2 from Team 1.
11. The March 21, 2001 Incident ("3-21 Incident")
The most ruthless persecution I experienced in the No. 3 Forced labor Camp in Henan Province was the "3-21 Incident" on March 21, 2001.
In a meeting slandering Falun Gong that was held on March 21, 2001, as soon as a person who turned against Dafa said something slanderous, all nineteen of us fellow practitioners spontaneously and at the same time shouted out, "Falun Dafa is good!"
The guards sprang on us, and we were then pulled out of the auditorium. The camp authorities forced Dong Wuyi and other criminal prisoners to beat us until we bled. Three of us lost consciousness. Afterwards, we were "tightened with the police rope" and pulled back to each team's "classroom" for further torture and forced to write "self-examinations." Later on, Feng Shulin, another practitioner whose name we did not know and Chen Zhanyong, who didn't write the essays, had their terms unlawfully extended by a year. The shortest extended term for the nineteen practitioners was three months. I had my term extended for eight months.
One day, under police instruction, the criminal prisoner Dong Wuyi from Team 2 of Division 2 suddenly grabbed my hair and fiercely struck my lower body with his knee. The pain nearly made me faint. After that, I suffered urinary problems for over a month, and for a long time my lower body felt numb and sore.
Right after that, I was tortured with the "tightened rope" torture and pulled to the Division 2 office on the third floor. Yao Peng, the political head of Division 2, commanded a criminal prisoner to drag me to Team 1, the "Hitler Group."
After I was dragged up there, they released me from the rope. Then they held a criticizing and denouncing meeting in the classroom. Prisoners were forced to yell a sentence slandering our Master.
Then I was pulled to the "chat room" for "tightening the rope." Because I refused to kneel, guard Zheng Qi commanded prisoners Kang Jingwei, Ba Dong and seven to eight persons to beat me. I suffered kicks to my head and my back, and I felt as if my intestines were punched out. As a result of the beating, I suffered incontinence and my nose was bleeding.
The prisoners tied me up with fellow practitioner Chen Yong. Guard Zheng Qi issued a special order to tie me with both arms crossed behind my back and palms facing each other. The No. 3 Camp invented this torture ("bend over with hands folded at the back"). It hurts even more when someone steps on the legs to force the knees to bend, holding up the chin and setting the back straight. Even though I was stripped of everything but a T-shirt when suffering the "tightened rope," the pain would make me sweat profusely in no time.
Under instructions from Yan Zhenye, the labor camp director, the political head of Division 2 Yao Peng, team leader Xu Jinshan and Education Section leader Shi Baolong, police officer Zheng Qi tried to get me to turn against Dafa. When he saw that I was silent, he turned to scold the prisoners of Team 1 and forced them to slap my face. Over a hundred prisoners in a line slapped me and rapped my head. Fellow practitioner Chen Zhanyong came out to protect me without concern for himself and shouted out, "If you want to beat someone, then beat me! Don't beat him!" But Chen Zhanyong's voice was silenced, and he was beaten out of my sight. Then the guards twisted Chen Zhanyong's arms. It hurt so much that he could not help but to cry out. This is how they tried to force me to give in. Facing this, I felt terrible, but I knew from the bottom of my heart, "Falun Dafa is good!" and "Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance is good!" How could I give it up!
By noon I was tortured again with the "re-tightened rope," where they loosen the rope for an instant, then tighten it again. This is even more painful, because the arms feel numb when tied for long so that they no longer hurt [the pain comes from the cut-off circulation and then the blood rushing through the veins again]. Then they pushed my head down and yanked my arms up. This torture is known as "flying an airplane."
When I went back to the cell, I was forced to kneel until I agreed to write up the "self-examination." Guard Zheng Qi said with teeth clenched, "If you don't write, the whole class will not be allowed to eat. If you don't cooperate this afternoon, nobody will be allowed to sleep tonight."
This extremely cruel threat was often used on steadfast practitioners. Fellow practitioner Yao Sanzhong, who had been in Division 1 and was tortured to death, had been tortured with the "re-tightened rope" four times back and forth, and his face was beaten and swelled up badly.
12. Distort the persecution; confuse what is seen and heard; disguise the truth and deceive the public
One day, the No. 3 Forced Labor Camp was suddenly placed under martial law. Usually, all prisoners ate their meals on the square. This time, however, food was sent to the workshop or cells. We knew that something happened, but the camp authorities strictly concealed the information. Later we learned that on April 25, 2002, Falun Gong practitioner Li Jian was killed under the persecution.
Since the "reformation rate" resulting from the savage persecution was high, the government declared this camp a "model." Officials who came to visit from all over the country formed a continuous stream. To disguise the labor camp's inside story of the brutal persecution of Falun Gong practitioners, whenever outsiders came to visit, the camp head and guards would threaten everybody so that nobody would tell the facts, "Whoever dares to tell the truth, we will skin you!" They also used deception to conceal the facts.
The authorities forced us to work usually over 12 hours daily, yet they forced us to state to the outsiders that we only worked for six hours. The task for everybody each day was to weave at least four plaits, yet we were only allowed to say we wove two. We were quite hungry, yet we had to say that we were full. We had to polish 300 pieces of gems, yet were only allowed to say to the outsiders that we were only required to polish 100 pieces. They even made use of some prisoners to deceive the outsiders, saying that no beating was allowed in the forced labor camp. In 2001, when officials from the Bureau of Justice came to inspect the labor camp, the authorities improved our food for three days.
On June 29, 2001, when head of the 610 Office Luo Gan came to a forced labor camp in Shanxi Province to personally orchestrate the persecution of Falun Gong, a deputy minister of the Ministry of Public Security came to inspect the No. 3 Labor Camp. The camp authorities were afraid that we would disclose their brutal persecution, so they sent me, along with Chen Zhanyong, Cui Yusheng, Jia Shuayuan, Liu Qingyuan, Yao Sanzhong, Li Yuhan, Bai Hongmin, Ma Luping and other steadfast practitioners by truck to Xiaolongkou Farm, the original location of the No.3 Forced Labor Camp over ten kilometers away, to pull weeds. This lasted three days. After we returned to the camp, the guards ordered the prisoners to all say the same things and deceive us, telling us that nobody had come for an inspection.
The head of the Bureau of Justice in Henan Province visited the camp several times. Xuchang Television Station staff followed the visitors to videotape the "life-giving spring breeze and rain" in action. Before their visit, the camp authorities prepared everything. They arranged for those from Division 3 who were already forcibly brainwashed and "reformed" to give a joint performance in uniform in classrooms, dining rooms and on the playground. By contrast, they hid us steadfast Falun Gong practitioners or temporarily sent us to other divisions.
To deceive the public and distort the bloody persecution, the camp authorities built a garden with people's tax money, hanging high a sign reading "Administer in a Civilized Manner. Rigorously Follow the Law." They implemented an "establish" movement, first to establish a unit "directly under the province," later to establish a unit "directly under the minister." By persecuting Falun Gong, they received political advancement and monetary gain.
The camp was named as one of the "bases for brainwashing and reformation of Falun Gong practitioners" in Henan Province. The Ministry of Justice allocated a special funding of 15 million yuan to persecute Falun Gong, in order to reward their "outstanding achievement." The police held a large gathering to show off their "contributions." They built a four-story pink building, the so-called "Falun Gong Reformation Base" that is used to forcibly brainwash practitioners.
