Cao Xuewen from Wuchang City, Heilongjiang Province Describes His Persecution Experiences

Name: Cao Xuewen
Gender: Male
Age: 58
Address: Niujia Town, Wuchang City, Heilongjiang Province
Occupation: Farmer

Date of Most Recent Arrest: 2002
Most Recent Place of Detention: Brainwashing Centre in the Wuchang City Audit Office
City: Wuchang
Province: Heilongjiang
Persecution Suffered: Detention, extortion, brainwashing, beatings, forced to stand still for extended periods of time

Mr. Cao Xuewen was arrested by the police three times and persecuted in a brainwashing centre two times. He was also forced to become homeless once. His firsthand account is below.

I started Falun Gong practice in January 1997. My health was very bad ever since I was young. Later, I developed other diseases such as serious asthma, numbness in my hands, and haemorrhoids. After I began to practise Falun Gong, all my diseases went away. I felt very good both mentally and physically.

Such a good cultivation practice was persecuted by Jiang Zemin's [former leader of China and instigator of the persecution] regime. On November 16th, 2000, I went to Beijing to appeal on behalf of Falun Gong. When I arrived at Tiananmen Square, the police arrested me and took me to the Qianmen Police Station. Later, I was transferred to the Wuchang City Liaison Office in Beijing. The next day, the policemen in the office stole my 82 yuan¹. When I was jailed in Beijing, officers from the Niujia Town Police Station went to my home and extorted 1,000 yuan from my family. The director of the Niujia Town Police Station, Mr. Zhou, came to Beijing to pick me up. He took me to the Jinshan Detention Centre and I was jailed there for 45 days. I started a hunger strike to defy and protest the persecution. After one of my relatives bailed me out, the director of the detention centre, Wu Hongzhang, came to my home and extorted another 460 yuan from my family for the meals that I ate in the detention centre.

On April 11th, 2001, Liu Xiaoling and Fu Yanchun from the Wuchang City 610 Office (an organisation of special agents just for persecuting Falun Gong) obtained the support of the Political and Judiciary Committee of the town, the police station, and the Party secretary of the village. They told the villagers to knock on the doors of Falun Gong practitioners in the middle of the night, and they arrested more than 20 practitioners at once. All of the practitioners were taken to the brainwashing centre at the Wuchang Party School. A meeting was held to defame and criticise Falun Gong. In the evening, two of the practitioners who defamed Falun Gong in the meeting were sent to the emergency department because their former diseases recurred. After paying 330 yuan for our meals, we were released from the centre. After I arrived home, I felt extremely sad since I had said something against my conscience in the meeting. I posted a declaration in public right away to make it known that what I had said, which was against my true thoughts, was null and void. I was then harassed at home many times by officers from Niujia Town Police Station. I had no choice but to become homeless for half a year.

In the autumn of 2002, Ren Zhong, police chief of the Niujia Town Police Station, sent several officers to arrest me at home. They took me to the brainwashing centre at the Wuchang City Audit Office. Before my arrival, many practitioners had already been jailed there. Iron bars were put on each of the windows, and steel gates were installed at the main entrance. A plate with the words "Law School" was on top of the gates. Guards were on duty 24 hours a day. The sound of the steel door closing was very loud and frightening.

Zhu Xianfu, the head of the 610 Office, was in charge of planning. Mo Zhenshan was in change of communication. He called police stations in the surrounding towns and ordered them to arrest Falun Gong practitioners. Fu Yanchun was in charge of brainwashing. A guy named Shi visited every town to defame Falun Gong with falsified pictures and materials. Sometimes, they went out together to arrest practitioners. They would not let anyone go, even their old neighbours.

In the brainwashing centre, practitioners were inundated with propaganda that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) had forged. Fu Yanchung told lies all the time and picked on the practitioners. He yelled at and tortured us. He used handcuffs and electric batons to interrogate us and pressured us to write articles defaming Falun Gong. Sometimes he pretended to be compassionate and other times he raged. The mental stress and physical harm that Falun Gong practitioners endured there were beyond description.

Brainwashing attempts to "transform" [forcibly renounce Falun Gong] practitioners who follow Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance into people who smoke, fight, and cast blame on others. A practitioner was only considered "transformed" when he had signed a guarantee statement to renounce practising Falun Gong. Those in charge extorted a large amount of money from the "transformed" practitioners and also demanded that the practitioners thank them for their so-called "transformation."

In May 2003, police chief Ren Zhong and Fu Yanchun from the 610 Office fought for the potential benefits that they could obtain from the practitioners. They finally agreed to split their ill-gotten gains. Practitioner Chen Jing had 3,000 yuan extorted from him by Fu Yanchun, and my wife had 3,000 yuan extorted from her by Ren Zhong. After my wife paid the 3,000 yuan, I was released after seven months of imprisonment.

Related article:

http://www.clearwisdom.net/html/articles/2001/12/12/16726.html

Note

1. "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://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2010/12/2/233185.html