(Minghui.org) Seven Falun Gong practitioners in Tangyuan County, Jiamusi City, Heilongjiang Province, were harassed between December 2019 and November 2020. Most of them were targeted in the “Zero-out” campaign, which was ordered by the central Political and Legal Affairs Committee (PLAC) as a coordinated effort to force every Falun Gong practitioner on the government’s blacklist to renounce their faith.
Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a spiritual and meditation discipline whose practitioners abide by the principles of Truthfulness, Compassion, and Forbearance. It has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999. The PLAC, an extra-judiciary agency overseeing the public security and judiciary branches, has played a central role in defining the persecution policy.
Below are the details of the harassment in Tangyuan County.
Ms. Jiang Hong
Ms. Jiang Hong, 56, was harassed by a group of police officers and residential committee staff members on December 21, 2019. They asked what she had been doing lately and left shortly afterwards.
Ms. Yan Fenghua
Ms. Yan Fenghua’s husband received a call in mid-December 2019 and was asked about their current situation and address. He refused to answer the questions. A few days later, another officer called him and asked if he was home. As he still refused to talk to them, four officers went to Ms. Yan’s child’s store and attempted to get her address from there. Her child didn’t comply either.
Mr. Li Wenyi
Mr. Li Wenyi, 59, was repeatedly harassed between December 2019 and September 2020 and pressured to give up Falun Gong.
A staff member from the residential committee first called him on December 16, 2019 and asked for his address.
Three officers showed up at his home at 6:40 p.m. on December 21. They left after confirming that Mr. Li wasn’t home.
The officers returned at around 4:30 p.m. on January 2, 2020 and asked him whether he still practiced Falun Gong.
Between late August and early September 2020, the residential committee staff members harassed Mr. Li five times and told him to sign statements to renounce Falun Gong. He refused and clarified the facts about Falun Gong to them.
On September 13, the residential committee staff members came again and said they were conducting a census.
At 6:40 p.m. on September 16 and 11:50 a.m. on September 19, the officials returned and ordered him to sign the renunciation statements again.
As Mr. Li insisted that he wouldn’t sign the statement, the residential committee staff members found his wife at her workplace on the morning of September 20 and ordered her to persuade Mr. Li. She also refused them.
Ms. Cheng Mei
Ms. Cheng Mei, 50, received a call from her father on July 16, 2020. He told her that the police chief had called him and told him to sign statements to renounce Falun Gong on her behalf. He said that he'd refused to comply.
Mr. Wang Yunfei
A group of residential committee staff members went to 52-year-old Mr. Wang Yunfei’s workplace, a heat supply company, in late August 2020. Upon finding that he wasn’t there, they ordered his manager to ask him to come immediately. After he came, the officers asked him whether he still practiced Falun Gong and demanded to know his address.
The police later came to Mr. Wang’s workplace three times and told his manager to persuade him to sign the statement renouncing Falun Gong. The police threatened Mr. Wang that his children or family members’ schooling or careers would be affected if he didn’t renounce Falun Gong. They said his company must also follow the Communist Party’s order to persecute Falun Gong.
As Mr. Wang refused to comply, the residential committee staff members looked for him every day at his workplace. They also called his family and went to his home once every week. Sometimes they videotaped him or took his pictures during the harassment.
The residential committee staff members also called his sister and asked to meet with her, but she refused them.
Ms. Li Yanrong
Ms. Li Yanrong is 56 and has two daughters. On November 6 and 7, 2020, Liu Dawei, the village Party secretary, found her older daughter’s boyfriend and asked him to persuade Ms. Li to give up Falun Gong. They threatened to arrest her three days later if she didn’t sign the statement to renounce Falun Gong.
On November 23, the police arrested Ms. Li’s two daughters when they went out. One officer said to them, “We’ve already prepared your detention notice. We know that it’s illegal to detain you, but we still have to do so. You can go ahead and sue us when you come out. If you win the case, the government will compensate you for us. But we will still have to detain you in the future if needed.”
Around 9 p.m., the police agreed to release the two young women. But they threatened to arrest them again the next day if they still couldn’t find Ms. Li.
As Ms. Li’s daughters couldn’t find their mother the next day either, they were taken back to the police station again during the day and released in the evening. The police threatened to arrest them again and kept calling to harass them. Both of them were so traumatized by the experiences that they became ill. Now they don’t dare to stay at home, fearing being arrested again.
The authorities also called Ms. Li’s younger sister, Ms. Li Yanli, and asked her to turn her sister in. She refused to comply or meet with the police at the police station.
Ms. Li Shuyun
Ms. Li Shuyun, 54, was harassed at home at around 8 p.m. on November 26, 2020, by four residential committee staff members and police officers who ordered her to sign a statement renouncing Falun Gong.
A year ago, on August 2, 2019, a group of officers came to her home. Her daughter opened the door for them. They searched around and took away a painting that had “Truthfulness, Compassion, Forbearance” written on it.
