Hebei Province Women’s Prison: Three Stages of Brainwashing Used on Falun Gong Practitioners

(Minghui.org) In Hebei Province Women’s Prison in the capital city of Shijiazhuang has two divisions, newly arrived inmates or those about to be released are held in Divisions 13 and 14. Falun Gong practitioners are severely abused in these two divisions.

In an attempt to force practitioners to renounce their faith, the prison employs three stages of brainwashing: the initial screening, the actual brainwashing stage, and the “strengthening” stage.

Initial Screening

Upon admission to the prison, Falun Gong practitioners are often held in the 14th Division, where the guards use former practitioners who have given up practicing Falun Gong to work on them. Those who refuse to “transform” after 10 or 15 days are sent to the 13th Division, the Education Division, for further brainwashing. They stay there for a period of time before being transferred to the Production Division.

The Brainwashing Stage

In the 13th Division, more than half of the inmates are minors. There are also former practitioners who specialize in doing “transformation” work, inmates with higher education who are assigned to organize cultural, educational, and political propaganda activities to praise the Chinese communist regime; and a small group of regular inmates who actively cooperate with the former practitioners to persecute those who remains steadfast in practicing Falun Gong. These inmates receive term reductions if they successfully force a practitioner to renounce Falun Gong.

Practitioners who refuse to “transform” are taken to the “conversation room” where a former practitioner and a regular inmate are tasked with brainwashing them. The practitioner is forced to go to the conversation room around 5 a.m. without washing up. They are forced to watch videos that defame Falun Gong and Mr. Li Hongzhi, the founder of the practice. They aren’t allowed to leave the room, other than using the restroom.

At the beginning, the former practitioner and ordinary inmate will try to persuade the practitioner to give up her faith. If this fails, they start to verbally abuse the practitioner and the founder of Falun Gong. If the practitioner still refuses to transform, beatings and physical abuse ensue.

One of the torture methods is to deprive the practitioners of sleep for several days and not allow them to sit down. When they become dizzy and drowsy, the former practitioner and inmate will force them to write a statement to renounce Falun Gong or sign a statement prepared in advance. If the practitioners refuses to comply, they may be beaten or poked in the thumb with the tip of a pen until it bleeds.

Once a practitioner cannot withstand the torture and is forced to sign the guarantee statement, the guards will come over to “comfort” them and try to “educate” them to completely abandon Falun Gong.

There are several “study rooms” in the 13th Division. Each room has a curtain to prevent other inmates from seeing what is happening inside. Practitioners who signed the guarantee statements and were deemed to be “stable” are taken to the study room. At 5 a.m. every day, they are taken to the rooms with a former practitioner and an inmate. Those who are deemed not being completely “transformed” are forced to watch videos defaming Falun Gong and write “thought reports” every day. Practitioners who have little education are forced to copy what the prison has prepared for them. They return to their cells at night after finishing the day of “studying.” Over time, some practitioners started to accept the brainwashing content.

The brainwashing process can last for a minimum of three months and could be extended to more than half a year. The guards closely follow each practitioner’s “progress,” with updates provided by the inmates. The practitioners are not transferred to the Production Division unless they record, to the prison’s satisfaction, a video of themselves denouncing Falun Gong. Some practitioners were forced to write the guarantee statements against their will in order to live a “normal” prison life, especially those who received lengthy prison terms.

The Strengthening Stage

After practitioners who have written the guarantee statements are transferred to the Production Division, they still have to write a thought report every month and they aren’t allowed to stay in the same cell with other practitioners or talk to other practitioners. Those who remain steadfast in their faith might be forced to watch videos defaming Falun Gong again, while being monitored by two inmates.

For practitioners with lengthy prison sentences, writing a guarantee statement isn’t enough for them to receive any term reductions. Sometimes the guards would require them to slander Falun Gong and its founder in front of others, or even for them to do so in a formal court proceeding, when their application for term reduction is heard by a judge. Only when the prison confirms that someone has truly turned against Falun Gong would the term reduction be granted.

Before a practitioner is released, she is again required to record a video slandering Falun Gong. If she refuses to comply, the guards will inform their local police or residential committee staffers to pick them up on their release date. These people will then harass the practitioner on a regular basis after she returns home.