Germany: Falun Gong Practitioners in Munich Expose the Persecution in Chinese Labour Camps

On the 6th of November 2004, Falun Gong practitioners from Passau, Regensburg and Munich gathered at Marienplatz in Munich and held a series of activities, including exercise demonstrations, leaflet distribution, a poster display and an anti-torture exhibition. Mr.Thierack from the International Human Rights Society and Berlin practitioner Xiong Wei, who has just been rescued from persecution under Jiang’s Regime in China, also attended this activity.

This large scale persecution of Falun Gong, which Jiang’s regime has instigated for five years now, has seen countless people forced to give up their beliefs using a variety of methods such as torture, beatings, rape, brainwashing and even forced abortion. According to statistics from the Falun Dafa Information Centre, there are over 1100 Dafa practitioners who have been killed in this persecution. Many children whose parents practise Falun Gong have become orphans. Over 100 million Falun Gong practitioners have been forced to write guarantees to stop practising, sent to brainwashing classes and discriminated against by society. Hundreds of thousands have been sent to labour camps, mental hospitals and brainwashing centres, all done in attempts to force people to renounce their belief in Truthfulness, Compassion and Tolerance.

In the assembly Mr. Thierack from the International Society for Human Rights condemned China’s human rights situation and told everyone that a large part of Xiong Wei’s successful rescue was due to the petition signatures of the German people.

Mr. Thierack from IGFM making a speech at the assembly

Xiong Wei told the audience about the cruelty of the Jiang regime’s persecution of Falun Gong with her personal experience of two years of imprisonment in a Chinese labour camp. In her speech, she especially thanked the German Government officials, human rights organisations and the public for the efforts they made to rescue her, and she called for the whole society to work together to stop the persecution happening to Falun Gong in China.

Xiong Wei exposing the Jiang regime’s persecution of Falun Gong through her personal experiences

In the two years of her detention, Xiong Wei successively stayed at Haidian Substation Surveillance Centre and Brainwashing Class, Beijing Labour Camp Personnel Manoeuvre Department and Beijing Female Forced Labour Camp, suffering all kinds of torment and humiliation. When she was at the brainwashing class there were altogether twelve people who watched her, including five so-called “re-education assistants”, two security guards and some police officers. They alternated in three shifts and forbade her to sleep, sit or stand; they forced her to squat down holding her head. At that time she was having her period but she wasn’t allowed to use a sanitary towel, go to the toilet or have a drink. Her trousers were soaked with blood yet they still admonished her for making a mess. Five of the persecutors never stopped repeating lies to her. When they saw she was not listening to or believing them, they would swarm around her and shower her with kicks and punches.

Apart from being brain-washed, beaten and sworn at, Xiong Wei had to do lots of heavy forced labour, like wrapping up chopsticks. Everyone was demanded to do six thousand pairs per day. Sometimes she wouldn’t finish until about 2am. Another task was knitting. All knitted jumpers, mittens and scarves were for export. Due to staring at woolly jumpers being knitted for long periods of time, Xiong Wei and other practitioners saw double vision.

A realistic anti-torture exhibition, pictures exposing the evil persecution and Xiong Wei’s live commentary all helped people to know more about the Jiang Regime’s crimes in persecuting Falun Gong. People lined up to sign the petitions calling for an end to these human rights abuses. Lots of young people were anxious to sign our petition. There was also a little child who asked his mum if he could sign. Mum agreed without hesitation and the child wrote his name ceremoniously.

A German lady told Dafa practitioners that she had a gallery. Recently two Chinese people came to hold a picture show and she wanted them to know the truth. She took some Chinese newspapers from practitioners and she hoped that there would be plenty of people coming to the show who could read them.

There was an endless flow of Chinese tourists on Marienplatz for the whole day. They all saw the anti-torture exhibition and the posters. Quite a few people took pictures and a large number received leaflets.