The Atrocities Committed Behind the Walls of the Nanmusi Female Forced Labour Camp

The Nanmusi Female Forced Labour Camp has committed atrocities by cruelly torturing good, innocent women. Now the labor camp is using even more terrible means to persecute female Falun Dafa practitioners, including violent beatings, forced labour, forbidding practitioners to use the toilet, a torture method known as the water dungeon, and hanging practitioners up by handcuffs for extended periods of time. In an even more depraved way, the camp guards have stripped female Dafa practitioners naked and tried to force them to perform oral sex acts on each other in an attempt to sexually abuse and degrade them.

At the end of January 2002, we were sent to the Nanmusi Forced Labour Camp in Zizhong, Sichuan Province. The local policemen who escorted us had stolen from our bank accounts two month's worth of food costs as well as the full cost for sending us to the labour camp. They transferred any remaining money to the labour camp itself. After deducting a physical exam fee, a labour camp uniform fee, a so-called "rental of living necessities" fee (for bed sheets for example), and other expensive costs, the labour camp deposited what was left of our money into an account. They searched our belongings after putting them down onto the rain-soaked ground, and they also stripped us of our clothing and subjected us to a full body search.

It was New Year's Eve when we first arrived at the Camp. Wanting to extort some money, the labour camp policemen asked us to pose for pictures. We were not in the mood to have pictures taken, but they repeatedly asked us to do so. At the time there were twenty-nine Falun Dafa practitioners in the Fifth Squadron, and we were forced to take a group picture together. After the picture was developed, a policeman asked each one of us to give him four yuan (1) in order for us to get a copy of the picture. At the time a fellow practitioner's sister was visiting her, and the practitioner asked her sister to take the picture home with her to show to their family as evidence. Several days later the labour camp conducted a mass search and asked us to turn in the pictures. They sought out the practitioners who had failed to turn in the picture, and punished them. They even dared to say, "There was no arrest or detention at all. We have not detained any Falun Dafa practitioners at this forced labour camp. None whatsoever."

In order to help people who did not understand the truth about Falun Dafa and the persecution, we treated all people with benevolence. We explained our actions with rationality and taught others to be responsible for their families and society. We taught them to get rid of hatred and to understand the true meaning of life. Our sincerity and benevolence touched the hearts of those in the labour camp. Many people asked us for Falun Dafa books and practised the Falun Dafa exercises with us. A squadron leader asked us to demonstrate the exercises for her. After seeing me demonstrating the exercises, she said she wanted to read the book. Fellow practitioners and I decided to give her the only copy of Zhuan Falun (2) we had--the one we acquired after going through many difficulties--to her. We helped to create an environment in which we could practise the exercises and study the book in the bedroom and in the exercise yard. Every afternoon after work, many other inmates came over to study the book with us.

Afterwards, the authorities escalated the persecution against Falun Dafa practitioners. For the sake of their job security and to receive bonuses, some policemen coerced some inmates into torturing Falun Dafa practitioners in order to shorten their terms or earn more merit points, to torture Falun Dafa practitioners.

On a cold winter day, the labour camp policemen asked Falun Dafa practitioners to knit wool clothes and to wash a big basin full of their family members' clothes. They punished Falun Dafa practitioners in the following ways: They made them face the wall and stand for a long period of time without rest; they poured cold water onto practitioners; they beat practitioners with brooms and bamboo sticks; they punched and kicked practitioners; they transferred practitioners' money to the labour camp's accounts without permission; steadfast Falun Dafa practitioners were dragged and slammed against the wall; practitioners were locked up in solitary confinement; practitioners were not allowed to eat; they made practitioners stand still for a long periods of time; practitioners were confined in water dungeons; they forbade practitioners from using the toilet; they tied practitioners to a large tree or dragged them into a sewage ditch; they tied practitioners with ropes and dragged them to a workshop several hundred meters away and threw them on the ground.

In April 2000, the labour camp held a big meeting. In the meeting, where close to two thousand people attended, Director Wu slandered our Teacher and Falun Dafa. Many Falun practitioners stood up and shouted, "Falun Dafa is an upright teaching! Restore our Teacher's name!" As a result, they were brutally beaten up by policemen of the Patrol Guard Team as well as others throughout the camp. These practitioners were subjected to extreme tortures.

The first one to stand up, an elderly practitioner named Luo Zhiyu, who had been on a hunger strike for a month, was beaten the worst. Several policemen dragged her out of the meeting room and beat her up all the way to the Second Squadron. They knocked her down several times, grabbed her and kicked her down to the ground. The policemen didn't stop beating her until they were tired. They handcuffed the badly wounded Luo Zhiyu, who was vomiting blood and could barely stand, with her back to a large tree for a whole day. The handcuffs cut deeply into her flesh.

Huang Huiji from the Second Squadron grabbed me by the hair, dragged me to a dirty, smelly sewer, and threw me down and onto a hard and sharp ridge, which injured my lower back. He handcuffed me, with my hands behind my back, to a large tree for several hours. Then, along with the help of others, they dragged me from the ball field to the Second Squadron (about one hundred meters). Because of their violent kicking, my lower back and my two kidneys were severely injured, and I vomited blood and passed bloody stools for more than a month. During this period of time, Falun Dafa practitioners in the Sixth Squadron all received inhumane tortures. The policeman also denied Falun Dafa practitioners any visits from their relatives and friends, and prevented Falun Dafa practitioners from answering phone calls or corresponding with others through mail.

The policemen also increased practitioners' working hours and workload. For example, while in the Fourth Squadron, I was forced to glue crystal rhinestones that were the size of needle head. I worked busily from 7 a.m. to 12 or 2 a.m. (except for the few minutes for the meal break). If I glued 1,000 crystal rhinestones on one day, the next day I would be asked to glue 1,100. The rhinestones I received from them were stored and sealed in plastic bags. They would not let you count the quantity of the rhinestones, and only told you how many you had gotten from them. If the finished pieces did not match with the number they indicated, they would make us pay them to make up for the difference. One crystal rhinestone cost them the equivalent of five cents [rhinestones made of lead crystal are expensive but preferred because they reflect light and sparkle very well], yet they asked us to pay fifty cents for one missing stone. One time, after counting the stones in a plastic bag, I discovered that I was short 300 stones. The Second Squadron forced Falun Dafa practitioners to buy expensive tools. They charged us over five yuan for a cheap knitting needle. They gave practitioners undersized yarn, then asked practitioners to spend their own money to buy yarn of the correct size.

The forced labour camp broadcast lies about Teacher through a loudspeaker and posted newspapers on the bulletin boards defaming Falun Dafa. We initiated a hunger strike and work strike to protest, and have the defamatory materials removed. The policemen then brutally punished Falun Dafa practitioners and extended their sentences. Disciplinary guards Hu and Li wouldn't let us eat. After we held a hunger strike for nine days, the guards came and threatened us and searched for our handwritten Falun Dafa books.

After returning from their trip to Beijing to hear a report given by the Massanjia Forced Labour Camp, Director Hu and others gathered Falun Dafa practitioners in the Seventh Squadron. On June 20, 2000, Falun Dafa practitioners in the Fourth Squadron were all rounded up on the squadron's drill grounds. We practised the Falun Dafa exercises and recited Teacher's words together. A disciplinary guard called the section head, Li Ziqiang. Li then brought several patrol guards with him and they came with electric batons. Seven to eight men attacked the unarmed Female Falun Dafa practitioners, who had been on and off a hunger strike for over a month. Zhou Ming from Deyang City was handcuffed with her back to a tree and beaten up, and she lost consciousness on the spot. They left her down on the ground and after a while she regained consciousness. Li Ziqiang handcuffed Hung Qian, a young woman in her twenties from Chengdu City, to a tree with her hands behind her back, and stuffed her mouth with socks while beating her with an electric baton. The policemen then confiscated our handwritten copy of Zhuan Falun. Disciplinary guards and inmates searched our bodies and took away our money orders (used specially in the forced labor camp) and after deducting the money to compensate for the cost of the crystal rhinestones, they then returned the remaining money back to us. The Falun Dafa practitioners who had been beaten had injuries all over their bodies, and they still had to carry large and small bags of materials for work.

The forced labour camp launched a new round of persecution. Every day they forced Falun Dafa practitioners to watch TV reports, video programs and read newspapers containing false news stories, and to study "transformation" materials in order to try to brainwash them. Practitioners were punished if they refused to study or listen. Under the baking sun of June, practitioners were forced to undergo military drills including standing at attention, sitting, and marching like soldiers. Practitioners were not allowed to drink, use the toilet, shower, wash their clothes, or sleep. The policemen also forced us to wear a signs with defamatory slogans attacking Falun Dafa, and if we refused, they would beat us violently or tie us up. Falun Dafa practitioner Chen Wenqun was handcuffed behind her back and then shackled by her hands in an excruciating position to a tall fence in a small room, with her feet not touching the ground for several days.

The patrol guards and policemen tortured practitioners using nightsticks, electric batons, spiked clubs, bamboo sticks, steel clubs, as well as beat and kicked them. The head of the squadron, Zhang Xiaofang coerced drug-addict inmates to beat practitioner Li Fengqi (from Leshen) with steel clubs, which flayed the skin and flesh off from both her hands. The elderly squadron head, Li (who was in her fifties), used the tip of a fountain pen to poke practitioners' critical acupuncture points. She also said, "With the Party backing me up, I could beat you to death, cremate or bury you, and I wouldn't even be breaking the law!"

After practitioners Luo Zhiyu and Chen Wenqun were force-fed, they were sent to a mental hospital for further persecution, but the mental hospital refused to accept them. They then received even crueler persecution. Falun Dafa practitioners who were illegally detained in the Seventh Squadron joined together to resist the evil. Every day, the practitioners ate together and practiced the exercises together. About a dozen personnel from the following units--the management head, Li Ziqiang; Yang from the Patrol Guard Team; the head of the squadron, Zhang Xiaofang; Li Jun, Li Kunrong and other staff members, Qin (who later worked as the deputy team leader of the Seventh Squadron); the Civilian Disciplinary Committee (which was created from among drug-addict inmates)--all used nightsticks or electric batons to beat Falun Dafa practitioners.

The policemen used three electric batons to shock Zhang Yuchun, a practitioner from Chengdu City. After becoming exhausted from beating up practitioners, the policemen dragged the practitioners into a small room and handcuffed them, hands behind their backs, to an iron rail. Fellow practitioner Zhang Siqing from Chendu City, Sichuan Province was handcuffed this way, and it was not until she eventually lost consciousness that they let her down. They then further punished her by making her squat on the ground with her weight on her toes and one foot in the front of the other, for about an hour. The look of suffering on her face is still vivid in my mind today.

When we recited Teacher's words, Li from the Civilian Disciplinary Team took off her shoes and then used them to slap our faces, then she punched us. She made us--both elderly and young practitioners alike do squat exercises, up and down, with some of us having to repeat this exercises for more than a thousand times. They used different means to torture practitioner Luo Xiaoyu (from Chengdu City), until her feet became so swollen that she could not walk. She was injured all over her body, but as soon as she recovered a little, she was made to stand still and squat up and down under the hot sun. If she failed to do so, two drug-addict inmates would then lift her arms and forced her to squat up and down. The two drug-addict inmates would not stop until they were exhausted. They then forced her to stand motionless under the sun to the point that her clothes were soaked with sweat.

In July 2002, the forced labour camp sent for the vicious "assistant educator" group from Masanjia Labour Camp. Elderly, steadfast practitioners were isolated on the third floor. Young practitioners and practitioners whose minds were wavering were kept on the second floor. They then forced steadfast practitioners to squat like soldiers--without resting their legs--for long periods of time. In addition to this, practitioners were forced to put their hands behind their heads and do several hundred to over a thousand squats, to the point where they were physically exhausted and no longer could stand. They also forced practitioners to remove their socks and shoes and made them run on the cement ground paved with many small pebbles. Practitioners were not allowed to stop running or take a rest. If they stopped running, the Civilian Disciplinary Team members would drag them and force them to run, until practitioners were exhausted. Practitioners then went upstairs to rest, and within less than two minutes, the guards blew the whistle to signal a lineup on the drill ground and to report for the head count. Otherwise, they would begin defaming Teacher, attacking Falun Dafa, or punish practitioners.

This is how Falun Dafa practitioners were tortured to the point that they couldn't climb up into their beds, couldn't squat down to defecate, and could hardly walk. Once when we were supposed to assemble in the drill field, an older practitioner named Luo Zhiyu, whose legs were injured from this torture and who thus had a hard time walking, fell down the stairs and injured her feet again. The guards then forced us to stand at attention under the sun, like soldiers, and they prevented us from using the toilet. Some practitioners passed out, yet they claimed that practitioners had heatstroke, and every day they forced us to wait in line to drink a large bowl of medicine to alleviate the heatstroke.

Presently, the forced labour camp is using even more cruel and despicable means to persecute practitioners. Because the labour camp torture practices have been exposed to the outside for not allowing practitioners to use the toilet, now every night when practitioners lie down to rest, after ten to twenty minutes they wake the practitioners up to use the toilet; and as soon as practitioners lie down again, they again would wake practitioners up to use the toilet. Practitioners are unable to rest at all during the night. The camp practice of depriving practitioners from drinking water was also exposed to the outside, therefore during the cold winter they forced practitioners to drink big glasses of water, and prevented practitioners from using the toilet. If practitioners urinated in their pants, the guards tried to force practitioners to lick their urine, or they forcefully pressed practitioners' heads down to the floor to lick the urine, or forced practitioners to take off their clothes to wipe the floor. The guards would not allow practitioners to wash the dirty clothes; instead, they threw the clothes directly in the trashcan, so the practitioners were freezing cold. If any practitioner tried to wipe the floor with a mop, she would be fined--twenty yuan per incident--as well as humiliated and beaten.

Many steadfast Falun Dafa practitioners were in solitary confinement for a long period of time. They were not allowed to contact anyone. They received even crueller persecution. Last year a practitioner was tortured to death in a toilet in the Seventh Squadron in the Nanmusi Forced Labour Camp; nobody knew what her name was or how she died. It was said that she was well when they took her in that morning, and she was shouting, "Falun Dafa is good." The policemen did not allow any practitioners to approach her, and they took her straight to the toilet to brutally torture her. That afternoon, they suddenly locked all the Falun Dafa practitioners in a room and told the practitioners not to look out. A practitioner who was near the bathroom heard the prison doctor say that they could no longer save her. From a door-slit they saw policemen drag the practitioner out of the Seventh Squadron. Later the policemen warned practitioners, "Do not say anything, do not think about it and do not talk about it. They just sent her out for medical treatment. Then they transferred her to another location."

The policemen also handcuffed and hung steadfast practitioners to a tall fence, or forced them to stand still for long periods of time. Even when they ate their meals, the practitioners were not allowed to sit. What is more despicable was that the guards stripped steadfast Dafa practitioners naked and tried to force them to perform oral sex acts on each other. If practitioners refused to commit these acts, the guards would forcefully push practitioners' heads down and attempt to force them to perform the act.

The extremely evil deeds committed by the Nanmusi Female Forced Labour Camp are beyond description. They have brutally tortured good, innocent people. They resorted to all sorts of despicable means to persecute Falun Dafa practitioners. The perpetrators will not be able to pay back the horrendous crimes they have committed.

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

The book, "Zhuan Falun", comprises the principal teachings of Falun Dafa.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.ca/mh/articles/2004/6/3/75980.html