Darkness Lurks in the Zhejiang Province Women's Prison

The Zhejiang Province Women's Prison is located in Hangzhou. Numerous Falun Gong cultivators have been imprisoned there, and they have experienced brutal persecution and suffering at the hands of police officers and criminal inmates, by being forced to "reform¹," practise other forms of qigong, and listen to the anti-Falun Gong propaganda.

When I was first detained in the prison, I was injected with an unknown drug, which made me involuntarily jump up from the sitting position. At one point, Falun Gong practitioner Ms. Xue Hairong refused to cooperate and police officer Lian ordered two of the most vicious criminal inmates to forcibly drag her from the cell on a very high floor to a room on the sixth floor. Xue Hairong was crying in pain for a long time and we were very anxious and sad.

A secret, so-called "advanced class" for guards started on May 25th, 2004, which resulted in further escalation of the police brutality against steadfast Falun Gong practitioners at the Zhejiang Women's Prison. The Falun Gong practitioners were brutally and individually tortured in isolated cells on the third floor of the newly built women's prison. In addition, the library of the prison building was turned into a sealed "classroom" designated for Falun Gong practitioners. Since October 2005, it has served as a holding place for Falun Gong practitioners. Whenever new criminal prisoners are admitted, they are assigned to a prison team, while Falun Gong practitioners are immediately delivered to the isolated "classroom." They are forced to use a chamberpot in lieu of the toilet, and are locked inside at all times, where they suffer greatly.

I myself have lived through the brutal terror inside the special "classroom." There was a varying number of "guards" and another thug who held the title "supervisor." All were selected from the most hard core criminals. During daytime there were three "guards" (criminal inmates) and at night there were two. I suffered through several savage beatings at their hands. Sometimes all five beat me at the same time and I started to bleed from the head. Sometimes my head and face were so swollen that they called me "Panda" because I had become so rotund. Since I would not betray or criticise Falun Gong, several of them grabbed my hands and pounded them against the table, causing my hands to bleed and swell up. They also cursed us and verbally abused us. They sometimes did not allow me to drink water for two days at a time, or they gave me only a very small amount of water. I suffered terribly, being so thirsty. At other times, I was not given water to rinse my mouth with for ten or twenty days in a row, let alone water to wash myself or my clothes. My body became very dirty, and my hands looked like I had been playing with coal.

Since I was not allowed to sleep or take a bath, I did not notice that parts of my body were covered with pus from the wounds of the beatings, until these areas emitted very bad smells. Sometimes I was not allowed to sleep for ten or twenty days in a row. I was beaten whenever I tried to close my eyes. Eventually, I was beaten even when I just lowered my head. Almost my whole body was bruised and swollen. Sometimes, the night shift thugs became bored with beatings, so they stepped on my back and kicked me. At times, I was kicked up to fifty or sixty times. They also kicked me in the head and whipped me several hundred times, and would still not stop. When I raised my arms to protect my head, my hands became swollen from the lashes. I tried to reason with them, but they simply stuffed my mouth with a cleaning rag that was used to mop the floor.

Sometimes several thugs dragged me to the ground, or squeezed me in between a metal bookshelf and a metal table, beating me in the eyes until I was dizzy and had become quite deaf. I became disoriented, and the window and door seemed to randomly trade positions, the ground was unsteady and the walls seemed to oscillate. My daily food rations were cut, and I was not allowed to sleep. I became emaciated and looked frightening to other people. I was not allowed to sleep for a very long time, and they poured a kind of very strong herb oil into my eyes, mouth, and on my head and neck, which had a burning feeling. Several people took turns pinching my neck muscles. Whenever they ruthlessly beat me, they turned up the volume on the television because they were afraid that other people would hear the sounds of the beatings or the verbal abuse. I also frequently heard miserable cries from the floors above and below me.

During that time, many of my blood vessels became swollen. I fell against the table as if I had a short-term stroke. I fell even when I was already sitting on the ground, and I frequently had spells of losing awareness. Once, a rumour reached the isolated "classroom" that someone from Beijing was coming for an inspection. I was quickly transferred to another prison area - even my chamberpot was moved out. They then cleaned the room, but locked me back inside it after the inspection was over. While I was confined there, my chamberpot often had worms crawling around in it. Sometimes, the worms crawled onto the ground and only then would I be allowed to empty the chamberpot. Every day I was allowed to use the toilet four times but when the toilet was too smelly, often I was not allowed to use it. After this type of brutal treatment lasting a full four months, everyone was shocked at my appearance. I had been forced to sit in a fixed posture for several months and not permitted to move. My buttocks had developed large lumps, which sometimes would develop scabs and bleed. I reported this many times to the official guard, but the more I reported them, the more ruthlessly the criminals would beat me.

After I left the confinement room, the official guard told me that they would punish the persons who beat me and make them apologise. However, I saw that in fact, this group of thugs were promoted and received awards for being "model workers" and "outstanding supervisors."

I have now served my prison term and I have come home. I took pictures of all the wounds that remain on my body. I would like to take this chance to appeal to all kindhearted Chinese people, to please wake up, and to not participate in the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners. I also appeal to all the kind people in the world to stop the persecution against Falun Gong that originated with the Chinese Communist Party, as well as Jiang Zemin, Luo Gan, and their henchmen.

Note

1. "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://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2006/10/24/140871.html