Practitioner Ms. Ren Shujie from Liaoning Province is at the Brink of Death from Torture

Ms. Ren Shujie was detained in the Longshan Forced Labour Camp and the Masanjia Forced Labour Camp for three years for cultivating Falun Dafa. During that time she endured inhumane persecution. She could not eat normally after returning home due to her mistreatment in the labour camps. She is now so weak that she is dying.

Ms. Ren Shujie is emaciated and extremely weak

Ms. Ren Shujie, 42, is a practitioner from the Tiexi District of Shenyang in Liaoning Province. She previously owned a fabric shop in the Donghu Market in the Hong District. Ms. Ren started practising Falun Gong in 1998 and benefited mentally and physically. After she became a Falun Dafa practitioner, Ms. Ren became honest and kind and enjoyed helping others. Her customers and the other shop owners regarded her as a good person.

On May 21, 2002, officers from the Zhonggong Police Station, under the Tiexi District Police Department in Shenyang, abducted Ms. Ren Shujie and sent her to three years of forced labour. They detained her in Team Two of the Longshan Forced Labour Camp. After she arrived at the labour camp, Ms. Ren started a hunger strike that lasted for 64 days. The long hunger strike severely affected her health. Nevertheless, two weeks after she started the hunger strike, team leader Tang Yubao, disregarding her weakness, arranged for her to be "reformed" (brainwashed). The officials deprived her of sleep for seven consecutive nights. Because Ms. Ren went to bed to rest following the camp schedule, Tang Yubao used two electric batons and shocked her for thirty minutes.

Other Falun Gong practitioners also saw Tang Yubao's vicious act. Because Ms. Ren persisted in her belief and did not give in, Tang Yubao got so exasperated that he threatened, "If you don't reform we will send you to Dabei Prison." Ms. Ren was unmoved.

Besides brainwashing, Longshan Forced Labour Camp officials also forced practitioners to do the extremely heavy manual labour processing candles for export. They had to work from 7:00 a.m. until 10:30 p.m. The slave labour facility was on the second floor. Practitioners had to carry the candles upstairs and then downstairs and got so tired that they could hardly stand upright. To resist such inhumane abuse, on February 4, 2003, Ms. Ren, Sun Yan, and Su Weihuan started a hunger strike. Policeman Tang Yubao still ordered the three of them to work and threatened, "I want to see who doesn't work!"

On the fifth day of the hunger strike, under the extreme duress of physical and mental persecution, Ms. Ren violated Falun Dafa's prohibition on taking any life, including one's own. In her desperation, Ms. Ren swallowed pieces of glass, in an apparent attempt to take her own life.

The prison police sent Ms. Ren to the No. 2 Hospital of the Medical University. The hospital refused to admit her. Two days later Tang Yubao, team leader Wang Chunmei, and Liang Zhen sent her to the Army General Hospital. The hospital's diagnosis stated "torn oesophagus from glass, having produced a hole." The doctor placed a "protective net" inside her oesophagus and requested that the prison police bring her back in 20 days to remove it. When the prison police finally brought her back 40 days later, the doctor told them that because of the delay, the net had become permanent and could no longer be removed. The doctor also said that Ms. Ren would only be able to ingest fluids from then on. Since then, Ms. Ren Shujie has been unable to eat normally, and her health has declined daily.

In mid-June 2003, a disabled, elderly practitioner named Huang Shixiang kindly asked that Tang Yubao remove the Falun Gong founder's picture from the floor that was put there for people to tread on. Tang Yubao beat her viciously and shocked her with an electric baton. Ms. Ren told Tang Yubao to treat older practitioners kindly. Tang also shocked her with an electric baton and kicked her. Ms. Ren's mouth was swollen and drooped, her eye sockets were bruised and swollen, her eyes were bloodshot, her face was disfigured, and her body was covered with bruises.

In March 22, 2004, Longshan Forced Labour Camp authorities sent Ms. Ren Shujie to the Masanjia Forced Labor Camp. She was ordered to sleep on the cold floor for three months. Ms. Ren Shujie's face swelled, and her legs showed signs of severe edema. Each time a spot was pressed, an indentation would remain. Ms. Ren also held a hunger strike during that time. Since Ms. Ren could not eat normally, she was extremely weak at the time of her release from the labour camp on December 24, 2004.

Because she still had the "net" inside her oesophagus, Ms. Ren was not able to eat normally after she returned home. She has grown weaker and weaker, and her vital signs have been precarious several times.

Now Ms. Ren vomits whenever she eats or drinks, and she is emaciated. She used to weight 80 kilograms (176 lbs.) but now weighs less than 40 (88 lbs.). Her life is ebbing away.

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2005/7/2/105313.html