Condemn and Punish Those Who Have Persecuted Practitioner Ms. Zhang Lianying

During the last few months Beijing Falun Dafa practitioner Ms. Zhang Lianying has been subjected to brutal torture at the Beijing Women’s Forced Labour Camp. Ms. Zhang was on a hunger strike when she shouted, “Falun Dafa is good!” In retribution the guards assigned inmates to apply a new kind of torture. They tied a rope tightly around her neck. Just when she was about to lose consciousness they violently beat her. They repeated the torture countless times. Labour camp guards monitored the torture sessions by television. On the morning of March 20th Ms. Zhang was suffering inter-cranial hemorrhaging due to the torture and her life was in danger. She was sent to Renhe Hospital in the Daxin District of Beijing for emergency surgery and regained consciousness afterwards.

When Ms. Zhang’s family visited her, her face was unrecognisable due to her injuries, and she was very thin. Her condition is still critical.

That Zhang Lianying could be tortured to the point where her life was in imminent danger was caused by the systematic criminal methodology employed at the Beijing Women’s Forced Labour Camp under the direction of the Supervising Department for Labour Reeducation. The root cause is the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which has forced the entire Chinese legal system to participate in its crimes.

The Supervisory Branch of the Beijing Labour Reeducation Department can’t shirk its responsibility, either. As early as December 2006, Ms. Zhang asked her husband, practitioner Niu Jinping, to submit written and verbal appeals to the Intermediate Court of Beijing, the Supervisory Branch of Beijing Labour Reeducation Department, and the Tuanhe “Procuratorate.” The appeals charged the Dispatching Centre of the Beijing Labour Camp, 10th Team Deputy Chief Cheng Yuanzheng, and certain inmates with beating Zhang Lianying and seriously injuring her. In the appeals Niu Jinping asked the authorities to consider their legal responsibilities. These departments, however, always shift responsibility to others on the orders of their supervisors, and automatically and illogically ignore the accusations of Falun Gong practitioners.

In the beginning of March 2007 Niu Jinping went to the Supervisory Branch of the Beijing Labour Reeducation Department to ask for the results of their investigation. He spoke to Yu Shicheng, who was in charge. He answered the query perfunctorily, saying, “We have investigated this. Your appeals and accusations are not based on the facts. The inmates said that no one asked them to beat anyone. It was a matter among themselves. There was no evidence that the guards told the inmates to beat anyone. The labour camp didn’t blackmail you, either. The money they asked you for was used to pay for the costs associated with force-feeding Zhang Lianying.” Niu Jinping asked to see the evidence, such as signed statements. Though the request was reasonable Yu Shicheng arbitrarily rejected it, saying, “This is our work!” His meaning was obvious, “It’s none of your business and evidence won’t be shown to you.” Niu Jinping argued, saying, “Zhang Lianying was seriously beaten between August and October 2005 while she was in the 9th Team. We appealed at that time, but no one cared and no one paid attention to it. After several months in the 10th Team, she was beaten and injured again. This meant that something was wrong inside the dispatch centre. No one stopped the inmates from beating her, instead it got even worse. If the guards weren’t behind it, how could such things happen again and again?” Yu Shicheng could answer none of these questions and he angrily replied, “I don’t want to talk with you. This makes no sense!” Then he left. Niu Jinping followed him and said, “Don’t run away. Our family doesn’t know how badly Zhang Lianying has been tortured. The labour camp must release her! If anything happens to her you’ll be held responsible. I will sue all of you!”

Niu Jinping’s voice boomed through the whole office building. People from every branch came to see what was going on. A policeman tried to console him, saying, “Brother Niu, don’t be angry. It’s wrong for him to run away, but please lower your voice.”

Niu clarified the facts to the police officers. He told them, “Zhang Lianying is a kindhearted person. She was a department head at the Guangda Group and became a certified accountant in her 30s. After she started practising Falun Dafa in the 1990s her workplace assigned a 120 square metre apartment to her, as befitted a department head, but she didn’t take it. Instead she passed it on to a colleague who was having housing difficulties. Where can you find a kindhearted person like her these days? In China good people like this are sent to jails and beaten, and there’s nowhere to appeal. Society can’t distinguish good from evil and has traded kindness for wickedness, so how can people do the right thing? Why is it wrong for Zhang Lianying to practise Falun Gong exercises and be a good person? While she was feeding her baby at home a group of policemen came and abducted her like gangsters. The baby was only one-year-old at the time and lost the love and companionship of its mother. You guys have kids, don’t you think it’s inhuman?” Niu Jinping’s reasoning touched everyone’s hearts. The whole room was silent and people listened quietly for more than 40 minutes.

“Where did the guards go when the inmates were beating Zhang Liangying? How could they not know what was happening? At the very least they were negligent. Even after Zhang Lianying appealed, the guards not only failed to prevent the beatings but also verbally abused her. Clearly they were allowing these crimes to continue. In fact, guards tightly monitor every inmate in the labour camps, and they can’t act freely. Without the guards’ tacit consent my wife wouldn't have been severely tortured. That’s just common sense. Everyone knows it.”

According to Chinese law, the 248th regulation of the Criminal Code says, “In facilities such as jails and detention centres, if personnel beat or physically punish detainees, in serious cases they can be sentenced to terms of imprisonment up to 3 years. If the situation is extremely serious they can be sentenced to 3 to 10 years.” According to the 238th and 248th regulations, “If they cause injury, disability or death, they should be severely punished.” In that case, if the supervising personnel instructed inmates to beat or physically punish or abuse other inmates they should be punished according to these terms.

If inmates commit crimes under the guards’ supervision, the guards should be held legally responsible. Yu Shicheng and the other supervisors should be very clear about the law. The fact is, the Dispatch Centre assigned inmates to torture Zhang Lianying. As long as she refuses to give up Falun Gong they will use every conceivable method to persecute her, and each method will be more severe than the last. Because there were guards behind them, the inmates had no fear, and if they didn’t use violence they would be punished. They wouldn’t get extra points to reduce their sentences. The labour camp and the Dispatch Centre capitalised on their weaknesses and rewarded or punished them according to their participation in the persecution of Falun Gong. There are secret rules they use to persecute practitioners, which won’t be revealed to the public.

Between the Dispatch Centre of the Supervisory Branch of the Beijing Labour Reeducation Department and the Beijing Labour Camp for Women, Ms. Zhang suffered all kinds of torture. It was all because of the policy created by the CCP to eliminate Falun Gon: they force labour camp personnel and inmates to brutally persecute Falun Gong practitioners.

We appeal to the people and governments of all countries to continue to pay attention to the persecution of Falun Gong practitioners in China and to the persecution suffered by Zhang Lianying, Niu Jiinping and their daughter. Please help to end the despotic rule of the CCP, stop the persecution, punish the murderers, and restore justice.

Supervisory branch of Beijing Labour Reeducation Department, Yu Shicheng: 86-10-83502560 (Office)

Beijing Labour Reeducation Department: E. Youanmen Street, #7, Xuanwu district, Beijing, PRC 100054

Telephone: 86-10-83502065

Email: [email protected]

Managing Branch, Beijing Labour Camp for Women: 86-10-60278899 Ext. 5819
Beijing Labour Camp for Women Training Team Leader Wang: 86-10-60278899 Ext. 5810

Office of Xiangheyuan Street, Zhao Yuwang: 86-10-64645203 (Office)

Xiangheyuan Street 610 Office Head Yang Yiguo: 86-10-64671059 (Office)

Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2007/3/24/151444.html