(Minghui.org) Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a spiritual practice that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999. For refusing to renounce their faith, many practitioners in China are wrongfully imprisoned and tortured.

At Jilin Province Women’s Prison, the 8th Ward is dedicated exclusively to persecuting Falun Gong practitioners. There are currently over one hundred practitioners confined there. Prison guards incite other inmates and former practitioners who have given up their belief under pressure to coerce practitioners to renounce their belief. One inmate threatened, “We have a death quota, so it’s okay to beat you to death.”

The prison guards are very careful not to physically abuse practitioners themselves, but incite the inmates to do so. When inmates beat Falun Gong practitioners, the guards pretend that they do not see it, even though there are surveillance cameras everywhere. Practitioners are forced to watch videos that defame Falun Gong every day. In addition, they are required to write “thought reports” that must meet the prison’s specifications.

Any time of the day, there could be a meeting to denounce Falun Gong. Every practitioner is made to speak. Those who refuse are forced to sit on a small stool for a prolongued period of time, a form of torture widely used on practitioners in Chinese prisons. The torture victim must sit with her legs pressed together, hands on her knees. She is not allowed to look around, move, or shift positions for 7~8 hours a day. People sometimes develop open, bleeding, infected sores on their buttocks as a result of this torture.

In some persecution cases, practitioners are not allowed to use the toilet, or wash or bathe for days, or even months. Sometimes they are not allowed to use feminine hygiene products. Practitioners are often not given enough food and are subjected to verbal abuse by other inmates and prison guards.

Officials periodically assess practitioners, trying to force every one of them to denounce Falun Gong publicly. If anyone does not obey their order, she is locked in a small room that has no furniture or light, where she can only sit on the cold concrete floor. She is not given drinking water. To keep her from sleeping, she is forced to call out numbers every few minutes, 24 hours a day. Some practitioners’ legs became severely injured after two months of this solitary confinement. 

A prison guard named Qian Wei is particularly vicious. She has instructed inmates to torture practitioners by pushing their heads into a tank of water and forcing them to stand on the concrete floor in bare feet in the middle of winter and then pouring cold water on their feet.

Torture Illustration: waterboarding