Surviving Extreme Torture - A Lotus Flower that Never Withers

This is the true story of a remarkable elderly woman, a story that I witnessed. Maybe it will change the way you look at life.

Chibi is an ancient and well-known city that has picture perfect scenery. Before July 20, 1999, at sunrise and sunset you could see many groups of people from all walks of life gathered together to do the gentle and slow moving Falun Gong exercises. They were peaceful and solemn and added to the charm of this ancient city. People in the city became healthy and relaxed because of practicing Falun Gong. They were kind, unselfish and noble from believing in "Truth, Compassion, Tolerance." New practitioners showed up everyday.

Freedom of belief is everyone's fundamental right. One should not be mocked, hated, or treated poorly because of his beliefs. Who would have imagined that Jiang Zemin would launch an incomprehensible and brutal suppression of Falun Gong on July 20, 1999. He was unhappy that he couldn't capture the hearts of the people like Falun Gong could. Therefore, he established the "610 office" [an agency specifically created to persecute Falun Gong, with absolute power over each level of administration in the Party and all other political and judiciary systems]. They have sought to destroy Falun Gong.

This 610 office and the maliciousness that it brings with it has spread to every corner of China over the course of four years. It has also clouded the beautiful city of Chibi.

There is an admirable woman called Liu Xiolian living in Chibi County. She is 62 years of age. A tough life and overwork caused her health to degenerate gradually over the decades of her life. She developed various illnesses. Although she worked hard all of her life, she still could not lead a comfortable life after becoming older.

In 1996, Ms. Liu came across Falun Gong. She received a lot of benefits and became healthy after practising Falun Gong. She had lost the ability to see from her right eye in 1958. Only fifteen days after she began to practise Falun Gong, she could see from her right eye again.

Ms. Liu's bad temper disappeared. She became kind, benevolent and open-minded. As a result of good health, she also became very happy. The principles of "Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance" transformed her mind and body.

After July 20, 1999, Jiang's regime spread many falsehoods throughout the whole country, causing confusion for many people. At that time, Ms. Liu asked herself: "Have I been cheated?" The answer was no. "Teacher Li did not charge me one penny, but gave me a healthy body and helped me to understand why I should become a better person. Practising Falun Gong is not wrong, nor is Master." Therefore, Ms. Liu went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong and Master. As an ordinary citizen, she just wanted to tell the government that "Truth-Compassion-Tolerance" is not wrong. Ms. Liu, however, did not know how brutal the persecution awaiting her would be!

She was arrested for peacefully expressing her views on Tiananmen Square. They kicked her private areas very hard. This was completely beyond her expectation. The cruel reality also told her that she would not be able to find justice here. The only thing to be encountered was an vicious beating and cursing from a policeman!

Three days later, she was taken to Haicheng, Liaoning Province. Each Falun Gong practitioner detained there could only have one steamed bun and a bit of porridge per day. There were no vegetables, no cooking oil and no salt. One could be tortured at any moment. The police stripped the Dafa practitioners, leaving each one with only underwear and placing them outside at the coldest time of the year, the temperatures dipping down to as low as minus 20 to 30 degrees centigrade.

On January 17, 2001, the police from Chibi city escorted Ms. Liu back from Haicheng. On the way, the police shackled her to her son, who was not a Dafa practitioner. Mother and son were thus forced to suffer this humiliation together.

Suffering Atrocious Beatings in a Detention Centre

At the beginning, Ms. Liu was detained in the No 2 detention centre of Chibi city. A temporary worker named Ye Jun was assigned to torture her. Every morning, Ye Jun beat Ms. Liu's head, chest, abdomen and other areas of her body. Her nose was smashed in once during a beating. After beating her up, Ye Jun would punish her by making her kneel down for over four hours. She was tortured like this for a week continuously and then transferred to the No 1 detention centre due to the upcoming Spring Festival holiday. Liu suffered numerous tortures there.

On January 18, 2001, Cai Jinping, the director of the Political and Security section of Chibi Police Department, visited the No 1 detention centre to interrogate her. In reality he came to beat her up. Director Cai instructed Ye Jun to beat her until she was exhausted and then leave. Ms. Liu's body was covered with injuries and hurt everywhere. She lost her sight for a brief period and could not even crawl.

After Ye Jun left, Director Cai closed the door. Then he sat down to smoke a cigarette. Ms. Liu could only lay on the ground, with no energy to move after being beaten so badly. Director Cai told her to take off her clothes and said, "Let me have a good look for fun." Ms. Liu incredulously said to Director Cai, "What do you want to do?" Director Cai said wickedly, "I will do what I want to do. I am a cadre. Don't you listen to the Party? You should do what the Party asks you to do." Ms. Liu said to him, "I am more than 60 years old now. My age is similar to that of your mother. You said that you are a cadre and also a party member. You say that party members should serve people wholeheartedly, investigate the facts, and solve both big and small problems of the people. Today, you came here to investigate me and solve my problem. Why did you put the investigation aside and direct others to beat, curse and torture me? By forcefully taking off my clothes, your action is no different from humiliating your mother."

Director Cai became enraged. He came over to take off Ms. Liu's clothes and had to stop when he heard someone coming.

Torture by Injections

June 28, 2002 was a day that Ms. Liu will never forget . It was also the day that Cai Jinping, Deng Dingsheng (Deputy director of No.1 detention centre), Qian Yulan (Deputy director of No.1 detention centre, in charge of women's cells), Song Yuzhen (Supervisor of women's cells) and others feigned "concern" towards Ms. Liu.

That day, Qian Yulan, the deputy director of the detention centre, came to the cell and said to Ms. Liu, "You will be paralysed because of practicing Falun Gong. So the cadre decided to inject some medicine into you." Ms. Liu did not want any injections and said to him, "I became disabled because the brutal torture you imposed on me, not because of practising Falun Gong." Then, they had two outside-cell prisoners (i.e., the prisoners' families paid a certain amount of money to the detention centre to avoid having them detained in a cell and to allow them to move freely inside the walls of the detention centre) shackle her. Next, they put her into a car. Director Deng himself drove the vehicle. There were all together seven people in the vehicle, including Cai Jinping, Qian Yulan, Song Yuzhen, and two other prisoners.

They escorted Ms. Liu to the Women and Children's Hospital opposite the detention centre. Three doctors came up to ask what was wrong with her. Ms. Liu said that she wasn't sick, but had been beaten by the police. Cai Jinping shouted to the doctors viciously, "Don't ask!" The doctors answered, "If we don't know what your sickness is, how can we write prescriptions to treat you?" The police began to quarrel with the doctors. The doctors here did not want to do anything to hurt people.

As a result, the police took Ms. Liu to the People's Hospital in the city. Deputy Director Qian and the two outside-cell prisoners stayed in the vehicle to monitor Ms. Liu while the others went into the hospital to talk to the doctors. Half an hour later, Ms. Liu was taken into the hospital. The doctors began to prepare an injection after they asked about her illness. The police cuffed her four limbs with handcuffs and shackles and locked them to the four corners of the patient bed. Ms. Liu could not move. Cai, Deng, Qian, Song, and the two prisoners pressed her down and covered her eyes, so that she could not see or call for help.

In this way, some kind of drug was injected into Ms. Liu's body against her wishes.

In order to vent their hatred against Ms. Liu because she wouldn't cooperate with their persecution, the police asked the two prisoners to throw Ms. Liu onto the ground and then dragged her all the way back to the detention centre. Ms. Liu shouted, "I am a Falun Gong practitioner. I am innocent, but they beat me cruelly!" Many people on the street came to see what was happening. Some said that Jiang Zemin is too vicious. Why does he treat good people as enemies?

The unknown injected drug began to work that night. Her ears, eyes, nose and mouth began to bleed. Her eardrums hurt so much that they felt as if they would explode. She was throwing up and having loose bowels. She was discharging blood at the beginning, and hard bloody lumps smelling like raw fish five days later. She had extreme pain when using the restroom. She could drink a little bit of water, but could not eat anything. Fellow practitioners cared for her, but Ms. Liu lost consciousness many times. All her fellow practitioners in the prison and even other prisoners cried out of sympathy. They looked after her non-stop.

After this, the police understood how difficult it was to end Ms. Liu's life. They thought that if they freed her she would definitely die in her home. Even under such circumstances, the police did not forget to try to make some money. They sent a message to her family, saying that Ms. Liu would die soon. Her spouse was tricked into paying 3000 Yuan [500 Yuan is the average monthly income for an urban worker in China] and write a statement in order to take her home. On August 28, 2002, the detention centre let her go home on the grounds of her being sick.

Taken Away Again and Subjected to the Torture of "Five Horses Separating the Body"

The police thought that Ms. Liu would die for sure. The hard blood clots discharged from her body were a response of her internal organs from being damaged severely by the unknown drug that was injected into her body. She became very strong again after practising Falun Gong. People have said that they have never heard of such cruel torture like that which Ms. Liu had suffered.

Her husband and daughter, though very angry, dared not say anything after seeing her being tortured to such a state. Ms. Liu's family members are all peasants. Facing such inhuman torture, they had to keep silent, fearing that Ms. Liu would suffer more if they said anything or took any action. Seeing that Ms. Liu would die soon, they began to borrow money in order to prepare for her funeral.

However, she did not die. She struggled to stand up and to go to outside to expose this inhuman persecution against Falun Gong, and people listened to her suffering with tears.

The police department heard the news that Ms. Liu did not die, but she was exposing the evil things they had done. The next day after she struggled to stand up, the local police came and abducted her again. She was transferred to the No.1 detention centre on October 17. Ms. Liu was put back into that horrific place again, facing those prison police who intended to kill her by injecting poison into her body.

December 6, 2002 was a day of shame for Chibi city. On this day, the detention centre head Deng Dingsheng and many other police, plus four outside prisoners - 18 people in all - brutally tortured this 62-year-old woman.

Deng Dingsheng remembered an ancient method of torture called "five horses separating a body." They asked the four outside-cell prisoners to hold the four limbs of the old woman while Deng Dingsheng was holding her head. These five people were like "five horses," yanking and pulling her body in five different directions simultaneously. Right away, her vagina was torn from the pressure. Her joints became disconnected, crackling as the vicious people pulled and pulled. The police, however, were laughing loudly. They treated Falun Gong practitioners' lives like they were nothing. All of the office staff came out to witness this, as if it was something humorous. Some of them even joined in. The others took turns beating her while she was being pulled, wielding shackles as heavy has 25 pounds. They beat her for almost the entire day. Ms. Liu suffered many broken bones and other severe injuries over the course of the day and fell unconscious due to the immense pain.

Ms. Liu regained consciousness after an unknown period of time. Seeing that she did not die, Deng Dingsheng thought up another vicious idea. He said that Ms. Liu's neck was too long to look good. Then he grasped her head and violently shoved her neck down hard. Ms. Liu fainted again from the pain.

The miraculous thing was that she still did not die. Deng Dingsheng locked her up using a 25-kilogramme shackle for a week, and she was denied water for two weeks which was enough to kill her.

Seeing that this old woman did not waver at all in her belief of "Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance," the police used all sorts of methods to try to force her to renounce Falun Gong on April 29, 2003. Although she suffered so much, Ms. Liu would rather die than sell out her conscience. She said to the police, "Truth, Compassion, and Tolerance is right. A Dafa practitioner has a resolute heart. No one can transform me. You are dreaming."

On that day, a group of policemen headed by Deng Dingsheng began to viciously beat her again. Her four limbs, feet, hands, chest, and hips all suffered more broken bones. The police thought that she had died and therefore tossed her body near the pond in a garden, but the old woman regained consciousness again.

The killers went completely crazy. While the old woman was lying on the ground, they stepped on her, trampling her four limbs. The broken bones jutted out through the flesh.

However, the old woman still did not stop breathing after such a long period of brutal torture. Soon after, the detention centre notified Ms. Liu's family to pick her up. When she was released, the prison police said, "If she does not die, she will be like a bomb that we created ourselves." They feared that what they did was too heinous and the public's outrage once the people found out what happened.

Below is a list of people involved in torturing Ms. Liu

Deng Dingsheng, deputy director of the No. 1 detention centre
Cai Jinping, director of political and security section
Qian Yulan, deputy director of No. 1 detention centre
Song Yuzhen, supervisor of the women's cells, No. 1 detention centre

The unbending old woman is still alive after repeatedly being brutally tortured. She is recovering gradually. Her bones are returning to their original state slowly. Like her name, she is like a lotus flower that never withers, symbolising the sacred purity and the resolve of human beings' pursuit of truth.

Endnote:

Cultivators don't participate in politics, nor are Dafa practitioners against the government. However, we will expose this ridiculous and brutal persecution. In order to stop this illegal suppression, we must expose the evil for the sake of those who are suffering torture right now and those 830 who were killed because of following "Truth-Compassion-Tolerance."

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2003/12/14/62500.html