Practitioners from Tianjin City Cruelly Tortured; Several Died

Many Dafa practitioners from Tianjin City have been cruelly persecuted for their belief in the principle of "Truthfulness, Compassion and Tolerance." The following are some cases of persecution.

Ms. Liu Shuping, a Dafa practitioner from Tianjin City, has been detained for more than 5 years. At the end of May 2000, the local police station called her and said that they had something to talk to her about. She believed their words and went to the police station by bicycle. Halfway there, several policemen knocked down her bicycle and illegally arrested¹ her without any legal procedure. She was then directly sent to the Banqiao Women's Labour Camp of Tianjin City, where she was sentenced to 1 year of forced labour.

In the Banqiao Women's Labour Camp, Ms. Liu suffered from all kinds of torture day and night. During the daytime, the prison guards brutally beat her and tortured her with "flying the airplane," where she was bent over and her arms were pulled up behind her like the wings of an airplane. She was forced to hold that painful position for long periods of time. At night the prison guards ordered prisoners who were drug addicts and prostitutes to watch her to prevent her from falling asleep. Under such circumstances, Ms. Liu went on a hunger strike to protest her treatment. The police force-fed her many times, and for a while she became mentally disoriented due to the torment. Despite this, Ms. Liu refused to give up her belief in Falun Dafa. Consequently, her sentence was extended by half a year when her term ended. When the extension came to an end, she was sent to a detention centre and was again sentenced to 3 years of forced labour. Ms. Liu has been held for more than 5 and one half years. She has suffered from all kinds of cruel torture.

Jan. 1st, 2006, was the day of Ms. Liu's release after the second half-year extension of her 3-year term in the labour camp. However, when her family members went to the labour camp to pick her up, they were told that she had another 4-month extension because she went on hunger strikes. Ms. Liu is still in the Banqiao Women's Labour Camp of Tianjin City.

Ms. Shao Shuwen is a Falun Gong practitioner from Tianjin city. She was sentenced to 1.5 years of forced labour and was released after she wrote a statement promising to give up her practice of Falun Gong. After she returned home, she understood that her belief in "Truthfulness, Compassion and Tolerance" is righteous and again started to practise Falun Gong, for which she was sentenced to prison for 2 years. She went on a hunger strike to protest the persecution, so the police force-fed her, which led to a haemorrhage in her stomach. Although her life is in danger, she is still held in the Women's Prison of Tianjin City.

Ms. Li Aijun was a doctor at the Xi-ai Hospital in Beijing. She served in the hospital as a nurse and was very kind to her patients. However, she was let go from her work simply because she told people the truth about Falun Dafa, saying that the principles of "Truthfulness, Compassion and Tolerance" could bring great benefits to the country and to people and could improve society's morality. After that she became homeless in order to avoid further harassment. In 2002, she was arrested and was sentenced to 9 years in prison. She is still held in the Beijing Women's Prison. Other practitioners imprisoned together with her are Zhou Zi, a teacher from the Fangshan district of Beijing, who was sentenced to 7 years and Liu Qian, who was sentenced to 6 years. In the prison they suffered from all kinds of torture both physically and mentally and were forced to do slave labour for 16 to 20 hours every day.

Ms. Cheng Ke, a Falun Gong practitioner from Tianjin city, had been a government official. Because she refused to give up practising Falun Gong and firmly believed in "Truthfulness, Compassion and Tolerance," she was sentenced to forced labour in the Women's Labour Camp of Tianjin City 3 times. She was held for more than 3 years in total. The perpetrators there tortured her many times. Her leg was broken as a result. She died when she went on a hunger strike to protest the persecution.

Mr. Tang Jian, a Falun Gong practitioner from Tianjin City, graduated from the physics department of Nankai University in Tianjin City and was an excellent teacher in a middle school. In a movement held by his school to denounce Falun Gong, he wrote "to be confirmed" at the end of a propaganda slogan on a black board, for which he was sent to a brainwashing centre. Because he refused to give up his belief in Falun Gong, he was later sent to the Shuangkou Labour Camp in Tianjin City, where he was sentenced to one year of forced labour and suffered from all kinds of cruel torture. His face was covered with injuries caused by burning cigarettes. Each time before he had a bath, the prison guards beat him brutally so that his skin was broken and his muscles were smashed. Then they filled the bath tub with salty hot water and ordered criminal prisoners to hold him in the water so that he could not stand up. Mr. Tang still refused to give up his belief in Falun Gong. As a result, Mr. Tang died of the long term torture when he was only 39 years old, leaving his elderly parents, his young wife and a young child.

Note

1. Illegally arrested: Contrary to what former Chinese leader Jiang Zemin, who initiated the persecution, and the Chinese Communist Party would like the world to believe, practising Falun Gong is NOT illegal in China. Although the Public Security Department issued an unconstitutional set of restraints on the practice at the onset of the persecution in 1999, no laws have been passed by the only legislative body in China, the People's Congress, banning Falun Gong or granting the police the authority to arrest Falun Gong practitioners for practising the exercises or distributing flyers. For a more complete discussion of the illegality of the persecution of Falun Gong, please refer to the article "The Ban on Falun Gong—A Dictator's Whim, Not the Rule of Law". (Variation: "illegally sentenced")

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.ca/mh/articles/2006/1/6/118153.html