Letter from a Practitioner in China to the Coalition to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong

Dear CIPFG,

I am 47 and was an employee of the Zhaoyuan Automatic Instrument Factory in Zhaoyuan city, Shandong province. The following are some of the facts of the persecution that my family and I have suffered. I'd like to provide them as evidence for the investigation.

On July 20th, 1999, my husband, my daughter, and I went to Beijing to appeal on behalf of Falun Gong. We were arrested and escorted back by the police from Zhaoyuan city. Since then we have never been able to have a peaceful life. My work unit and my husband's work unit, the Organisational Department of Zhaoyuan city and the Women's Union, took turns harassing us and trying to force us to denounce Falun Gong. Our home and telephone were monitored. On the politically sensitive days, we would be harassed. This lasted for several years. The security staff of the Electricity Bureau of Zhaoyuan City even camped out in front of my home to monitor us day and night.

On January 19th, 2001, all of us went to Beijing to appeal again. We were arrested and beaten up by police, and detained at the Public Security Bureau of the Tiananmen Area. Then we were escorted back to Luofeng Police Station in Zhaoyuan by personnel from the Zhaoyuan Liaison Office in Beijing. After being held for 23 days, I was imprisoned for another 15 days, during which time I was expelled from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) by the Organisational Department of Zhaoyuan city and dismissed from my work unit, the Zhaoyuan Automatic Instrument Factory. After being detained for 20 days, my husband Sun Guo continued to be imprisoned for two months, and he was fined 10,000 yuan¹ by the 610 office² in Zhaoyuan. He was also expelled from the party by the Organisational Department of Zhaoyuan city. My daughter was only released after being detained for 24 hours due to efforts from our relatives. She was later dismissed from her position as the monitor of the class at her school. During my husband's detainment, the 610 office members slapped him in the face, and kicked and shocked him continuously for two hours. He suffered terribly from this ordeal. He couldn't eat and constantly felt like vomiting for several days. After being released from the detention centre, he was sent to the brainwashing centre again by his work unit, the Electricity Bureau and the 610 office, before his injuries were even healed. He was so thin that the bones were protruding from the skin. He was not allowed to sleep for a long period of time. He was forced to watch videos slandering Teacher Li Hongzhi, the founder of Falun Dafa and Falun Dafa. He was also forced to help the police to "reform³" others. He was detained for as long as three months. After being released from the brainwashing centre, my husband was dismissed from his position as the section chief. Every month he could get only 320 yuan in pay. He was then sent to the thermo-electricity plant to do hard labour.

On April 25th, 2001, while I was visiting a fellow Falun Gong practitioner, members of the 610 office of Zhaoyuan city and the tyre factory broke open the door with sledge hammers. The fellow practitioner and I were dragged into a car by four or five people. We were sent to the brainwashing centre and held for more than a month. My home was twice searched by the local 610 office in July and October of 2001. I was arrested and taken to Luofeng Police Station in Zhaoyuan again after my home was raided in July 2001. The 610 police tortured me to get a confession from me. They grabbed hold of my hair and dragged me on the floor. They handcuffed me to the chair and tortured me for the whole night. My body was covered with mosquitoes bites. Later, I was dragged to Mengzhi police station and handcuffed to a metal chair. Still, I didn't give them any information they wanted. After torturing me for three days and three nights, they had to release me.

On April 3rd, 2002, while my husband was working, the 610 office and Song Shuqin from the brainwashing centre went to arrest him. He escaped and has to live a homeless life ever since. After his escape, the Electricity Bureau fired him. What's more, more than 10 people from the 610 office and the security department of the Electricity Bureau surrounded my home, searched for me everywhere and were trying to force me to surrender my husband. They also threatened to arrest me if I didn't. I was forced to leave my home and live a life of exile as well. My young daughter was left alone at home. The 610 office and the Electricity Bureau followed, intimidated and harassed my daughter for as many as more than 40 days, which caused great harm to my daughter's mental and physical health. In late July of 2002, during her school holiday, the 610 Office planned to send her to the brainwashing centre. They ordered her school to send her to the centre and pay the centre 1,800 yuan. The teachers had to drive to my mother and my mother-in-law's homes to get my daughter. My daughter was forced to leave home to avoid being caught. She had to hide for the whole summer holiday.

On September 5th, 2002, my husband and two other Falun Gong practitioners were arrested while explaining the true situation of Falun Dafa to the public. The police from Zhaoyuan viciously beat them up in broad daylight. They were kicked and knocked down into a muddy ditch beside the road, but the police dragged them up and continued beating them until they were bent over and could no longer get up. My husband was beaten so badly that he vomited blood on the spot. My husband was then sent to the Biguozheng Police Station, where he was again badly beaten. After that, on the same day, he was sent to the Zhaoyuan Detention Centre, where he was again tortured badly to obtain a confession. My husband was detained for as long as six months and no family visits were allowed. In February 2003, he was sentenced to eight years of imprisonment. He did not accept this and submitted an appeal. However, without notifying his family, he was sent to Shandong Prison secretly on March 25th, 2003.

In Shandong Prison, my husband has been tortured very badly. I learned from an insider from Shandong Prison that my husband had suffered all sorts of abuse there. Because he refused to denounce his belief, he was put under "strict management." Everyday he had to sit on a little stool motionlessly from 5 am to midnight. The guards put on a false "kind" face. On the surface, they did not participate in the persecution. But actually they were encouraging the criminals to torture him severely. My husband was often put into solitary confinement and kept under "strict management."

During my exile, on August 11th, 2005, my daughter's school and the 610 office of Zhaoyuan seized my daughter and held her as a hostage for more than 10 days, hoping to use her to capture me. This caused unbearable anguish for my daughter, myself and the rest of my family.

The persecution of Falun Gong has lasted for seven years. During the seven-year period, I have been driven into exile for four years while my husband has been imprisoned for four years. My underage daughter has been living a very hard life on her own for all these years. In order to try to arrest me, the 610 office of Zhaoyuan often harasses my mother and my mother-in-law. At about 9:30 p.m. on June 2, 2003, a group of people who claimed to be policemen raided my mother's home one more time. My mother, who is over 70 years old, was living by herself. The policemen asked my mother to surrender me and threatened to arrest her if she refused. She was so worked up and frightened that she suffered a mental collapse. Since then, she would laugh or cry out loudly in a frightening manner. She often ran out in the middle of the night and attacked neighbours' trees and vegetables. Later my mother was sent to the mental hospital for forced treatment. She was often tied up for injection and was fed medication. Her life is no longer that of a normal human being. For all those years, my mother-in-law, who was already in her eighties, has been missing her son, and worrying about her daughter-in-law and her granddaughter everyday. Whenever our family was mentioned, she would shed tears. The pain was too much, and she passed away on October 2005. My 84-year-old father-in-law was left alone in the world. Everyday he feels frightened and worried. He is often confined to bed or in the hospital.

I sincerely hope that the CIPFG and other good people can come to China to investigate and bring an end to this national disaster.

Note

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

2. "The 610 office" is an agency specifically created to persecute Falun Gong, with absolute power over each level of administration in the Party and all other political and judiciary systems.

3. "Reform or Transform" Implementation of brainwashing and torture in order to force a practitioner to renounce Falun Gong. (Variations: "reform", "transform", "reformed", "reforming", "transformed", "transforming", and "transformation")

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.ca/mh/articles/2006/5/13/127571.html