Witnessing the Death of Ms. Li Baojie at Masanjia Forced Labour Camp

I am a Falun Gong practitioner from Liaoning Province. Many years ago, I was arrested by the Chinese police for talking to people about Falun Gong. I was sent to the Masanjia Forced Labour Camp, where I was forced to do slave labour.

In 2005, I witnessed another Falun Gong practitioner – 33-year-old Ms. Li Baojie from Panjin City – being tortured to death at the forced labour camp.

Gross Mistreatment of Practitioners

I personally saw a real living hell at this labour camp. In order to force practitioners to give up their belief in Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance [the guiding principles of Falun Gong], the guards tortured them with brutal means, including electric shock, hanging by handcuffs, beatings, solitary confinement, death bed torture, sleep deprivation, etc.

In the coldest days of winter, they would lock practitioners inside cold, damp, dark and dirty toilets. They brutally force-fed practitioners who were on a hunger strike to protest the persecution, inserting rubber tubes into their noses for 24 hours a day.

Witnessing the Torture and Death of Ms. Li Baojie

In the spring of 2005, there was a reorganization at the Masanjia Forced Labour Camp. Practitioners who refused to “reform” [forcibly renounce Falun Gong] and do slave labour were assigned to Section No. 1, the so-called “Strict-Discipline Section.” Those who did not renounce their belief but did slave labour, were assigned to Section No. 2, and Section No. 3 consisted of those who did “reform.”

At that time, I was imprisoned in Section No. 1. The guards didn't allow us to meet with family or buy food. They didn't even allow us to go to the canteen to eat, completely isolating us. Even the use of toilets was limited in frequency and duration.

Practitioners in Section No. 1 went on a hunger strike to protest the mistreatment and refused to wear their prison uniforms.

On the third afternoon of our hunger strike, the guards started to force-feed us. That morning, Ms. Li Baojie told the guards that her heart did not feel right and she needed to lie down to rest a little. The guards reluctantly agreed.

In the afternoon, captain of the guards Li Mingyu incited some criminal inmates to carry Ms. Li from the bed to the ground. She then sat on top of Ms. Li, with seven or eight guards assisting her. They stepped on Ms. Li's arms, legs and feet with leather boots.

Doctor Ding Taiyong (male) and Cao Yujie (female) pinched Ms. Li's nose to prevent her from breathing and used a uterine dilator to open her mouth. Ms. Li already had heart problems. Under the stress of the guards' abuse, her whole body turned purple in a short while and her limbs stopped moving.

The guards then stopped their force-feeding and turned her body upside-down, thinking that they could expel the force-feeding liquid this way. Seeing that Ms. Li's body had no response, Ding Taiyong dragged her away by her upper body, as if he was dragging an object on the ground.

The next day, the guards said that Ms. Li had been released on bail for medical treatment. However, I later learned that she had actually been tortured to death.