An Account of the Brutal Crimes Committed by Wanjia Forced Labour Camp (Reenactment Photos)

On January 30, 2001, CCTV broadcast the Tiananmen self-immolation incident. That night, more than 200 male prison guards, headed by the deputy director of Wanjia Forced Labour Camp, Shi Yingbai, and brigade leader Zhang Buo, descended on the five sections of the camp where Falun Gong practitioners were illegally detained (each section containing about twenty Falun Gong practitioners who refused to give up the practice). They took all the practitioners to the corridor while beating and cursing at them. Some practitioners were thrown out into the corridor by a group of three guards, one grasping the hair and the other two holding the practitioner's thighs. The sound generated by electric batons, the prison guards' cursing and threats, and the sound of brutal beating, all mixed together. The prison guards tried to force Falun Gong practitioners to confess to fabricated charges. Over ten Falun Gong practitioners were put into confinement cells. The guards stopped only when all the confinement cells were filled up. One confinement cell is 2.5 meters long and 1.3 meters wide (8.2 ft. x 4.3 ft.), and each cell can hold two to three people.

The prison guards launched another round of comprehensive persecution against Falun Gong practitioners on May 24, 2001 after they were given the order from Director Lu Zhenshan. Female Falun Gong practitioners detained in Brigade Twelve were put into groups, with each group containing 9 people. They were taken to the males' brigade to be beaten, threatened, and tortured. Practitioner Xie Jinxian, who is still detained in Wanjia Forced Labour Camp, was beaten unconscious. The prison guards poured water on her to wake her up, and then beat her again. Li Xiaoyan was hung up by handcuffs until her eyes became glazed over. It took a while for her breathing to return to normal after she was taken down and thrown onto a bed. Cao Xiudi was beaten to the point of being disabled, as the muscles on the area of her right thigh were damaged. Practitioners were dragged to the confinement cells. The head of Section Nine, along with another male prison guard, handcuffed Liu Guixiang to a metal chair designed for torture, and beat and kicked her. Liu Guixiang's nose began bleeding profusely. Several other Falun Gong practitioners were beaten and kicked by these guards.

On May 27, a prison guard ordered Li Lan to sit on the floor in the centre of the confinement cell, but Li Lan refused to do so. Then Liu Chungang began to punch Li Chunlan in the face. Nobody knew how many times he struck her. He was so exhausted he couldn't breathe normally. Then he tied Li Lan with a rope and threw her down on the concrete outside of the confinement cell, saying, "We'll see how I am going to punish you after a while." After he came back from running errands outside, he handcuffed Li Lan to a metal chair and shackled her feet. Her feet, legs, and body could not move. Sometimes her hands were handcuffed in front, and sometimes they were handcuffed behind her back. Later, Liu hung up Li Lan from the door of the confinement cell.

On May 28, prison guard Li Min tied Li Lan with a rope and hung her up, cramming an extremely filthy rag into Ms. Li's mouth. Prison guard Liu Lun shocked Li Lan on the neck, lips, and hands with an electric baton. Then he took Li Lan to another cell and allowed guard Li Min, who was drinking alcohol, to tie her and hang her up again. There were deep depressions on Li Lan's body and arms from being tied too tightly. Her body and arms soon turned purple and she lost consciousness. In the end, prison guard Li Min pushed Li Lan into the metal chair and handcuffed her hands behind her back. The handcuffs were so tight that they cut into her flesh. Someone suggested loosening them a bit. Li Min, however, said, "I think this is good." Guards Li Min and Liu Chungang often tied, hung up, beat, and cursed at Falun Gong practitioners in this manner. Li Min even grabbed big moths and put them into practitioner Lu Guixiang's mouth, laughing loudly. Prison guard Da Liangzi beat and cursed practitioner Tan Guizhen and intimidated her to a state of mental collapse. He even said, "Who is the law? I am the law."

Falun Gong practitioners were detained in small and dark confinement cells. There, they seemed to have been separated from the world. The male prison guards intimidated, beat, and cursed them, forced them to sit in a metal chair, or hung them up. They were forced to sleep on the floor and were often denied the use of blankets. Suffering both mentally and physically, life was almost unbearable. Some Falun Gong practitioners also lost large amounts of weight due to the torture.

In the midst of the brutal persecution, Falun Gong practitioners held a hunger strike and requested their unconditional release. Prison guards along with some male prisoners then dragged them out of the confinement cells and held them in the metal chairs, some grasping their hair, some grasping their arms, and some holding their legs. About five prison guards conducted the force-feeding. Sometimes it was difficult for them to put the feeding tubes into the practitioners' nose as their nasal passages were so swollen from being force fed. Then they inserted a tube with a steel tip into their nose. When they pulled out the tube, the steel tip would bruise the nasal passages and cause bleeding. Such force-feeding tortures were carried out twice a day, every day. Falun Gong practitioners were force-fed corn porridge with a lot salt in it. Everyone was force-fed twenty large tubes of this mixture. The prison guards intentionally force-fed more than was necessary. With their stomach too full, practitioners began to vomit, as the porridge was extremely salty. Their stomachs were uncomfortable due to the excess of food. To intensify their discomfort, the prison guards stripped off the practitioners' cotton-padded jackets and shoes and opened the windows to expose them to the cold.

From mid-October to the beginning of January, Falun Gong practitioners were forced to sit in the metal chairs for two and a half months just because they practised Falun Gong. At night, they were sometimes released from the chairs after 10:00 p.m., and sometimes they were not released at all. At the beginning of November, Lin Xiuru, Li Lan, Zhou Lei (Zhou Lei is still detained in Wanjia Forced Labour Camp), Hu Aiyun, and Lu Shiping were all forced to sit in metal chairs in the big cell outside the confinement cells. Prison guards tied the practitioners' hands behind their backs and stuffed dirty underpants and socks into their mouths, so as to prevent them from talking and speaking the truth. Li Lan was suffocated to the point of tears flowing from her eyes. Lin Xiuru was almost suffocated to death as her neck was bent backward. The prison guards then used wide tape to cover the practitioners' mouths, circling their heads several times.

At the end of October, the weather was already very cold. Prison guards often stripped off practitioners' coats and shoes, either throwing them away or hiding them while practitioners were forced to sit in the metal chairs. They opened all the widows and placed these Falun Gong practitioners either near the windows or at the door where the wind blew in, exposing them to the cold weather day and night. Sometimes it was so cold that the practitioners felt that they were about to die from exposure. Zhou Muqi and Jia Cuiyan once placed a metal chair in an iron cage in the confinement cell and then squeezed Lin Xiuru onto the chair (the iron cage was about 1.5 meters high, 1.3 meters long, and 0.5 meters wide. -- 4.9 ft. by 4.3 ft. by 1.6 ft.). They decided to put Li Lan in another iron cage. Since they could not unlock the cage, they tied up Li Lan with a rope and then forced her into the chair. Zhou Muqi was as strong as a man, and she often used the back of her hand to hit the faces of Falun Gong practitioners. When the bones on the back of her hands hit a practitioner's face, it would immediately cause their nose and mouth to bleed. Zhou sometimes closed the windows and the doors, and beat Falun Gong practitioners using both her fists with full force. Practitioners were beaten to the point of dizziness. Prison guards Wang Zhonghua, Zhang Li, and Hu often verbally abused Falun Gong practitioners.

At the beginning of December, one practitioner did the sitting meditation on the floor of the confinement cell. Zhou Muqi maliciously grasped her hair, pulling her up and then pushing her down. She dragged the practitioner by the hair to the outside area. When she was half-way outside, Zhou intentionally loosened her hand. As a result, the practitioner's head hit on the floor with a bang. All people present were scared by the loud banging sound. Zhou Muqi's hands were full of hair and there was hair left on the floor as well. Prison guards often denied Falun Gong practitioners use of the toilet, causing them a lot of pain as a result of having to suppress the need to relieve themselves. Some practitioners often had to relieve themselves in their pants. Since they sat in the iron chairs for so long, their buttocks were bruised, which caused intolerable pain. Their legs were so swollen every day that they looked like wooden sticks, stiff and unable to bend. Their feet were so swollen that they looked like huge steamed buns and they could not put on their shoes. The skin on their feet was stretched so thin that it looked transparent, and their hands could not form fists because they were so swollen as a result of being handcuffed. Sometimes their hands were numb and sometimes they could not move them properly.

There was one Falun Gong practitioner who was forcibly detained in the confinement cell like this for over eight months, and was only allowed out for two days. During this period, her family members were not allowed to visit. She was not allowed to buy any food, and she only had a bath once in eight months. The food there was of low quality and she was not given enough. Because of such a long period of being verbally abused, intimidated, physically punished, and tortured, this Falun Gong practitioner developed symptoms of severe hypertension and heart disease. She could not stand up for more than five minutes after she was freed from the confinement cell, and she felt that her heart could not endure it any longer. Sometimes, she had such a severe headache that she felt as if her head was going to explode. She often felt dizzy and her whole body was swollen.

At the end of July 2002, under orders of director Lu Zhenshan, Brigade Twelve was completely supervised by male guards. The female guards cooperated with them. They began to viciously beat Falun Gong practitioners and punish them by forcing them to squat or to "Ride an Airplane" (1) whenever they felt like it. At the end of September, they tried to force Falun Gong practitioners to write the "Three Statements." If they refused to write, the practitioner would be dragged to another small cell, hung up, and shocked with electric batons, or sent to the concentration training section for even more severe persecution. At that time, there were about 40 guards coming in and out, most of them holding big electric batons in their hands. One could hear the sound generated by the electric batons day and night. Some practitioners' faces were beaten to the state of being distorted. Some practitioners were beaten to the point of being unable to walk. Some had wounds caused by the electric batons, that ulcerated and festered.

When practitioners were dragged to the small cells that were low and dark, where the floor was scattered with hair, and the air was filled with the prison guards' cursing and intimidation, their lives were truly a living hell. The former deputy head of Section Five handcuffed Falun Gong practitioners' hands behind their backs and hung them up (the rope was tied through the middle of the handcuffs). They then shocked the practitioners with electric batons on the head, neck, face, lips, and the bottoms of their feet. They sat down to continue shocking the practitioners after they became tired from doing it while standing. Then they left and came back again after about twenty minutes, finally releasing the practitioner. The prison guards held the practitioner's arms and shook them with full force. The practitioner felt intense pain as if the arms were being pulled off. Then they hung them up and shocked the practitioner again, and released the practitioner after a while. Then they shook their arms again and hung them up again. After they repeated this cycle over and over, they moved the practitioner to another cell and repeated the cycle yet again.

When subjected to the electrical shocks, a practitioner's heart jumped violently. The electric current went through the whole body, causing the practitioner's whole body to twitch. The areas shocked were extremely painful. Li Xiaofei, the head of Section Five, beat Falun Gong practitioners on the mouth maliciously while holding their hair. Bitter shouting could be from other small cells too. Falun Gong practitioner Song Ruixiang was drenched with water and shocked again and again for a period of over 70 hours.

On April 9, 2003, Falun Gong practitioner Ms. Bao Liyun's hands were handcuffed to the upper levels of two sets of bunk beds by prison guards. Then Yao Fuchang ordered four prisoners to push the beds in opposite directions. This stretched Bao Liyun's body. After Ms. Bao shouted in pain, her whole body began to shake and her mouth opened wide because of the excruciating pain. Then Yao Fuchang ordered people to cover her mouth with wide tape. They repeatedly moved the beds to stretch Bao Liyun. Later, grinning fiendishly, Yao Fuchang sat there and asked her, "Is Falun Dafa still good?"

According to rules set up by prison guard Zhao Ruqing, every day after getting up at 5 a.m., Falun Gong practitioners were forced to sit on small plastic stools with their hands placed on their knees and their feet placed together. They were not allowed to move except for mealtime and for using the toilet. In December 2003, over ten Falun Gong practitioners were forced to squat until 9:00 p.m., after sitting on the stools from the morning until 6:00 p.m. Guard Yang Guohong monitored the practitioners' squatting. Both feet had to be inside a tile (30 x 30 cm. -- 11.8 in. square) on the floor and could not be beyond the tile. The heels had to be together and the head could not be lowered. The body could not move. Some practitioners could not squat and they could not touch their heels to the ground. As a result, their toes had to support the whole body. They felt much pain, numbness, and agony in their feet, legs, hips, backs, and neck. The prison guards often forced Falun Gong practitioners to squat like this. Some were even forced to squat as long as 19 hours, and the longest was three days. Yao Fuchang would pick up a big electric baton to shock the practitioner or use the "Big Hang Up" (2) method if a practitioner could not endure such squatting or if the posture was not maintained correctly.

The concentrated training section fabricated words slandering the founder of Falun Gong and forced Falun Gong practitioners to recite the words and to declare giving up Falun Gong practice. Almost all practitioners were violently tortured for refusing to recite the words. The following are several examples:

At the beginning of November, Yao Fuchang dragged Song Yingjie out by her hair when she refused to recite the words. Two hours later, Song Yingjie's entire face was full of bruises, and was swollen and distorted. Her lips alone were swollen to 5 cm. (2 in.) thick. The injured areas that were shocked by electric batons seeped a yellow fluid, which looked horrific. While holding Song Yingjie's hair, Yao Fuchang said to us, "Do you see her? Who dares not to recite! This is the result. And this is just a light case." The degree of cruelty and violence was astonishing. Later, they dared not look at Song Yingjie. In order not to let others see their crimes, Zhao Yuqing and Yao Fuchang forced Song Yingjie to sit in the corner of the cell and did not allow her to go out of the cell. Falun Gong practitioner Jiang Lianying was violently beaten to the point that her nose was blue and her face was swollen, just because she shouted out, "Falun Dafa is good." Then she was forced to sit in the metal chair. On June 23, 2004, section head Li was on duty. At about 9:00 p.m., he said to some prisoners, "Hurry up and drag Jiang Lianying to the small cell. The authorities are here to inspect our work." This was what they usually did to cover up their crimes. When they abused Falun Gong practitioners, they said that they acted according to the official documents. Sometimes they even said, "So we treated you unfairly. But who dares to interfere with us?"

Falun Gong practitioner Zhang was discovered reading one of Teacher Li's articles. Zhao Yuqing and Yao Fuchang took her to the small cell, hung her up and shocked her with electric batons. She was then deprived of sleep for 22 days, and tortured in order to make her disclose the source of the article. Ms. Zhang's face and neck were full of injuries, adding new injuries to the old that still had not healed, and she was on the brink of losing consciousness.

Zhao Yuqing recklessly brutalized Falun Gong practitioners with verbal abuse, vicious beatings, tortures, extended detention, and extorting money. Nonetheless this person was rewarded for "excellence in work."

Whenever there were new Falun Gong practitioners sent into the forced labour camp, we often heard their bitter cries as a result of being hung up and shocked by Wu Hongxun (section head), Zhao Yuqing, and Yao Fuchang. Deputy section head Yang Guohong (female) read the prison regulations to Falun Gong practitioners. It said, "Prison guards are not allowed to beat, curse, and punish detainees." One Falun Gong practitioner asked, "How come you curse, beat, and torture us?" Yang answered in an intimidating tone, "There are numerous laws. Other laws stipulate that we are allowed to punish you." Yang Guohong treated Falun Gong practitioners like enemies, seeking opportunities every day to torture them both mentally and physically.

All Falun Gong practitioners, regardless of age, have been forced to work since March 2004. If they cannot finish an assigned task, their terms are lengthened or they are physically punished and inhumanly devastated both mentally and physically. The reform through forced labour system says that detainees can be given wages according to levels of production. However, each Falun Gong practitioner was given only 0.8 yuan to 1.00 yuan after they were forced to work for a month.

Section heads Wu Hongxun and Zhao Yuqing often took Falun Gong practitioners in groups to the concentrated training sessions for further persecution. Wu Baoyun, supervisor of the concentrated sessions, is Wu Hongxun's sister-in-law. She is extremely cruel and vicious to Falun Gong practitioners, often cursing, beating and kicking, pulling their hair, and torturing them. She handcuffed a Falun Gong practitioner to the end of a bed, making the practitioner unable to either squat or stand up. The practitioner was so in so much pain that she continuously sweat and shivered. Some Falun Gong practitioners could not endure such persecution and said words against their will. They often wept secretly because of this.

This is just the tip of the iceberg regarding Wanjia Forced Labour Camp's persecution of Falun Dafa practitioners.

The following are reenactments of some of the torture methods used in the forced labour camp.

(from left to right): : A practitioner being stretched. The arms are handcuffed to two upper bunk beds and four people push the beds in opposite directions.

Photo 2: Tied and hung up

Photo 3:Hanging up a practitioner with their arms behind their back

Photo 4:Forced squatting

Photo 5:Tying practitioners to a bed so they cannot move

Photo 6:"Riding an Airplane"

Photo 7:Forced squatting while handcuffed to a bed with the arms behind the back

Photo 8:Sitting on the metal chair

Detailed description of the torture methods:

http://www.clearwisdom.net/emh/articles/2004/11/2/54103.html

Notes:

(1) Riding an Airplane - In this torture, the head is bent down until it cannot go down any further, while the hands are pulled up and held up to the highest point. The hips have to point up. One is forced to keep this position unchanged for a long time. The body in this position looks like the shape of an airplane, which is what this torture is named after.

(2) Big Hang Up - There are two forms of this torture: 1) With both hands handcuffed behind the back and only the toes touching the ground, one is hung by a rope that is tied to a metal window frame; 2) One hand of a practitioner is handcuffed to one bunk bed and the other hand to another bed, and the two beds are pulled in opposite directions. Both methods are extremely painful tortures.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2004/11/13/89084.html