Persecution at the Yinmahe Forced Labour Camp in Jiutai City, Jilin Province

I want to tell of some of the abuses I have experienced and witnessed at Yinmahe Forced Labour Camp. I am doing so to refute the Communist Party's false claim of "now being the best period of human rights in Chinese history."

Right after arrival at the labour camp, the authorities would force us to memorise policies and regulations for the inmates. If we refused, we would be severely beaten. They tried very hard to make us say we had committed a crime and to swear loyalty to the Party.

Their goal of "reforming" or brainwashing us amounts to transforming human beings into subservient robots. In order to achieve this goal, the officials resorted to savage beatings, electric shocks, sending us to the Strictly Controlled Division, tying us onto the Death Bed¹, long-term handcuffing, sleep deprivation, and toilet bans, among other methods.

When I protested, they separated me from other detainees and sent me to the Strictly Controlled Division, where two inmates named Ma Tinglin and Zhang Lixin were assigned to monitor me. I was handcuffed in a bed and forbidden to use the toilet. I relieved myself in a bedpan. One of the inmates emptied it for me, because I could not get out of bed.

The inmates were authorised to do anything they pleased with me. Ma Tinglin hit me, and Zhang Lixin beat me more frequently. He pinched my nose until tears ran down my face on numerous occasions. They slapped my face with shoe soles and burned my heels with cigarette lighters, saying it would cause agonising pain when I walked without leaving a scar, thus no evidence of torture. When I shouted, "Falun Dafa is good," they would cover my mouth. The division head shocked me with electric batons and burned two holes on my body. Guard Zhang Tai did the same thing. Political head Gao Ke shocked my face and beat me until my nose bled. My arms and legs were affixed to the four corners of the bed with rope and handcuffs that were extremely tight. My chest was also tied down with a rope, so that I could not make the slightest movement. Once an inmate turned the mattress upside down and tied me up in the bed, face down. They kept hitting my legs while saying, "This is not going to break your legs, but it'll separate your muscles from your bones."

Several days after this torture I felt searing pain in my legs. My severely swollen legs were hyperaemic [filled with blood]. I experienced horrific pain upon the slightest contact. The inmates removed my trousers and put hot towels on my legs, increasing the pain. After being tied up in bed for a long time and constantly beaten, I could no longer squat. The abusers eventually grew concerned since were I to become disabled from torture, the labour camp might be implicated, so they dragged me on the floor instead. One time they turned me over and handcuffed me to the bed. Two inmates held my thighs down and bent my legs back so that my calves touched my buttocks. They moved my legs rapidly back and forth and injured my legs again.

Political head Gao Ke told me one day that if I gave up Falun Gong and wrote a guarantee statement², I would be released from the Strictly Controlled Division and my sentence would be reduced. Moreover, I would be allowed to supervise the other inmates. I refused because I knew I had not done anything wrong by practising Falun Gong and by conducting myself according to "Truthfulness-Compassion-Tolerance." Failing to "reform" me, the authorities sent me to Division 7, where I was forced to do hard labour.

Fellow practitioner Sun Zhigang suffered a nervous breakdown when he was held in the labour camp for the first time. During his second incarceration, the Strictly Controlled Division officials saw he had not yet completely recovered, but still they insisted on mistreating him. He slept on the lower bunk, and his hands were handcuffed to the bed. He was only given three toilet breaks a day and forced to sit on a narrow wooden board all day long except for during meals. His hands were handcuffed to the head of the bed while he slept, and he was only given two small pieces of buns and two spoonfuls of vegetables for each meal. Working overtime, sleep deprivation, malnutrition, and physical restraint took their toll, and he again became mentally disordered. The officials refused him medical treatment. Instead, they continued to torture him until his condition deteriorated further. They claimed that Falun Gong practice had caused his condition. They sometimes refused to let him use the toilet and forced him to relieve himself in his trousers.

Practitioner Fan Dexiu was handcuffed to the floor in the solitary confinement cell. He lost toes from frostbite after two months.

The camp officials built a new dormitory in 2003 and laid green turf around it. They even bought some fitness equipment and put it out in the yard and in some prison cells. At first glance it is difficult to imagine the atrocities committed here, until one saw that a dozen large, welded metal cages were part of the arsenal they hid in a corner. Only detainees held in them and the guards assigned to monitor the victims knew their location.

The labour camp organised a song and dance show performed by the inmates, and it aired on the Jilin Province News Broadcast TV channel. In reality, they forbade Falun Gong practitioners from talking to each other. We were under constant surveillance--while working, sleeping and using the toilet. When inspectors came to the cafeteria, the officials put meat and other dishes on the table for the camera crew to film. Right after the inspectors left, the food was immediately removed and replaced with coarse buns and soup. The labour camp officials also held numerous "technical training classes" related to agriculture and machinery operation classes. Those who signed up for the classes had to pay tuition. The labour camp would award the "students" with sentence reductions. The camp heads held a opening ceremony and invited two journalists to the classes. As soon as the reporters had left and after the inmates had paid tuition, the classes would be cancelled. It was actually a way for inmates to buy sentence reductions.

Once, a group of medical professionals came to give us all physical exams. This looked suspicious to us, because the camp officials had always exploited our labour to the extreme and never cared about our health. Doctors drew our blood, when the lab results were available, they separated us into two groups. One group was labelled healthy and "qualified," and the other group was "disqualified." Those who were "qualified" were sent to a place called Qinglong Mountain. After the harvesting of organs from living Falun Gong practitioners was exposed, we realised that they had been looking for organs!

The camp started airing a TV series in 2003 entitled "Life Is Innocent." There were some parts showing something like a guard buying a birthday cake for a Falun Gong practitioner, which we all knew was a total fabrication. Even the guards knew what was going on, but they still made all the detainees watch it. When I exposed the lies in this broadcast as we viewed it, I was sent to the Strictly Controlled Division. It was there that I witnessed the brutal torture of fellow practitioner Sun Zhigang.

In 2002, practitioner Sun Shizhong from Songyuan City was beaten to death in Yinmahe Forced Labour Camp. As a cover-up attempt, camp officials turned down all visiting requests for more than three weeks following his death. The truth got out nevertheless, and due to public outrage, the local Procuratorate reluctantly issued arrest orders for several inmates that beat Sun Shizhong and for guard Lu Changtai, who was on duty during the beating. Political head Gao Ke was demoted to team head.

Labour camp doctor Wang knocked out many people's teeth and inserted a very thick tube into practitioners' noses and took it out, back and forth. He repeated the same procedure until the tube was stained with the practitioner's blood. Inmates had to buy him cigarettes and gifts if they needed medical attention. As long as they paid the officials, they would be excused from work, even if they were not sick. One time a practitioner's heart stopped beating after being savagely tortured. When doctor Wang saw him, he pointed at the practitioner and said, "If you want to get out, tell your family to bring me 10,000 yuan³, or you can die here and forget about leaving." After he left, someone wrote down what he had said. Some inmates who were present served as witnesses and co-signed the document. The paper was smuggled out to the practitioner's family, who appealed at the Judicial Bureau. Camp head Guo Junpeng learned about it and reprimanded doctor Wang. He transferred Wang and replaced him with another doctor. Once the practitioner was released on medical parole, however, the camp officials reinstated Wang to his former position.

One practitioner from Dehui City was released from the labour camp on medical parole. The doctor predicted that he could only live for three days, at most. It was obvious that the camp officials released him to shirk their responsibility for his death. The Communist Party's labour camp officials stop at nothing to exploit and to persecute innocent people. Practitioner Yang Lidong from Songyuan City died as a result of persecution at this labour camp.

Note

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.

2. "Guarantee Statement": A statement to declare that one is remorseful for practising Falun Gong and guarantees not to practise Falun Gong again, not to go to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong, and never again associate with any Falun Dafa practitioners.

3. "Yuan" is the Chinese currency; 500 yuan is equal to the average monthly income of an urban worker in China.

Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2008/1/14/170271.html