Older Falun Gong Practitioner Zhang Huiru's Experiences During Eight Arrests

My name is Zhang Huiru, and I am 65 years old. I am a retired employee from the Hualian Company in Jiamusi. I started practising Falun Gong in 1997. Since the persecution of Falun Gong began in July 1999 I have been arrested eight times and been imprisoned five times. I hope that my own experiences will help people to recognise the evil nature of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

After the persecution began, I told myself that I must appeal for Falun Gong and try to restore its reputation and that of my Teacher, Mr. Li Hongzhi, because I have benefited so much from the practice. I went to Tiananmen Square on February 11th, 2000, to appeal. A plainclothes police officer approached me and said he was a Falun Gong practitioner from Harbin. He asked me if I was also a practitioner. I said, "Yes." A police van arrived and police officers forced me into the van and took me to the Qianmen Police Station. I heard later that police officers were to be paid 50 yuan¹ for each practitioner they arrested on Tiananmen Square. (According to police insider information, the daily cost of arresting Falun Gong practitioners on Tiananmen Square in 2001 was 1.7-2.5 million yuan, which would make the annual cost about 620-910 million.) A police officer later took me to the Jiamusi City Liaison Office in Beijing and forced me to pay him 50 yuan for local transportation.

Two agents at the Liaison Office searched me. They took 200 yuan from me. After four days of incarceration, police officer Yan from the Chang'an Police Station in Jiamusi and Jia Xiyuan, an official from my employer, the Hualian Company in Jiamusi, arrived to take me back to Jiamusi. They took me immediately to the Chang'an Police Station and confiscated 160 yuan--the only cash I had. Officer Yan later went to my job site, demanding 3,522 yuan as a "round trip fee" from Jiamusi to Beijing. The perpetrators extorted a total of 4,600 yuan from me.

Since Jiang Zemin's [former leader of China and instigator of the persecution] gang had blocked all conventional channels for practitioners to communicate with other practitioners, I had planned to open a banner at Tiananmen Square on November 20th, 2001, that read, "Falun Dafa Is Good." Plainclothes police followed us as soon as we got there. We opened the banner and shouted, "Falun Dafa is good!" The police rushed toward us before our banner was completely open. They beat and kicked us and pushed us into a police van. I was also beaten in the van. We were taken to Qianmen Police Station. Since we refused to reveal our names they sent us to the police station in the Haidian District where criminals monitored us while we slept on benches.

Because we refused to reveal our names, the police issued a number to each of us. We were sent to the Haidian Detention Centre. Xiangyang Police Department official Qin Zhongli returned me to Jiamusi. He demanded 50 yuan from me, for food during the trip. As soon as we got back to Jiamusi, Xiangyang District Police Department, agents sent me to the detention centre in Jiamusi where I was incarcerated for 24 days. I eventually learned that National Security Team head Cui Rongli from the Xiangyang Police Department had extorted 4,000 yuan from my family, and Qin Zhongli had extorted 1,150 yuan from them.

In spring 2002, while I distributed leaflets exposing the persecution in the Wanfatun District of Jiamusi, some people reported me and took me to a grocery store. I told myself that they had been deceived by the CCP and that I should explain the truth to them. So I tried, and several of them at the store accepted the truth. They said, "It is really difficult for a person your age to do this. Go home!" Then they released me. I saw an abandoned flyer in the street, so I picked it up and left it at a house. The people who released me saw this and yelled, "We let you go, but then you do it again." Two young men caught me, and their mother said, "Take her to the police station, and we will be rewarded!" They took me to Qiaonan Police Station. Since I refused to answer any questions, they again took me to Xiangyang Police Department. Later, they took me to Jiamusi Detention Centre where I was held for nine days. Cui Rongli from Xiangyang Police Department this time extorted 2,000 yuan from my family.

I moved to another practitioner's home in May 2002, since the police kept coming to my home and harassing me. On the third day after I had moved, officers from the Zhongshan Police Station broke into the house at 4 o'clock in the morning. Another practitioner and I threw a bag of Dafa books out the window so the police would not confiscate them. The bag also contained 450 yuan in cash, along with some other items. The police found the bag outside and took everything, including the money. Many people watched as we were escorted out through the residential compound gate. I shouted to them, "Falun Dafa is good!" A policeman slapped me and pushed me into a police car.

Officials at Zhongshan Police Station thought I was from out of town. Five officers asked me questions, but I refused to answer. Shao, one of the chiefs, holding a copy of a Falun Dafa book said to me, "If you don't answer my question, I will burn this book." I said to him, "Please don't. Listen to me." Then, I told him that good will be rewarded with good, and evil will meet with retribution.

The police eventually put a heavy metal helmet on me and took me to the detention centre. The people at the detention centre recognised me. I was held there with several other practitioners. Chen Yongde, chief of the National Security Team at the Dongfeng Police Department in Jiamusi, and Chen Wanyou from City Police Department in Jiamusi interrogated practitioners at the detention centre for several days. After 20 days, Chen Wanyou put us in shackles and took us to Jiamusi Forced Labour Camp. I was released since I didn't pass the labour camp's physical exam.

In June 2003, a man detained me as I handed out leaflets exposing the persecution. He lied to me by saying, "If you throw away your bag, I will let you go." My bag was full of leaflets, so I refused and tried to explain the facts to him. He refused to listen and took me to the Yonghong District Police Department. I refused to answer the questions asked by Shi Xiuwen, the department National Security Team chief. He threatened, "I can still send you to a labour camp even if you don't answer my questions." He called the head of the Yonghong District Police Department and asked him to sign the paperwork to send me to a labour camp. He didn't show up, so Shi Xiuwen called my husband, telling him that I was supposed to be sent to a labour camp, but he (Shi Xiuwen) helped me so that I did not have to go. Shi told my husband to pay him 3,000 yuan [for "helping" me]. My husband told him that we could not afford that much, so Shi finally settled for 1,000 yuan.

In August 2005, a local practitioner was tortured to death. To expose what the authorities had done, fellow practitioners and I explained the truth in different ways, which scared the evildoers. Someone reported me on the evening of August 30th, 2005, as I handed out leaflets at Xinglinhu Park in Jiamusi. Officers from Qiaonan Police Station took me to Xiangyang Police Department, where I was bound to a metal chair. The next morning I escaped. A few days later, National Security Team head Sun Fuli from Xiangyang Police Department and several other officers broke into my home. They scared my grandson and searched my house. I was then taken to Xiangyang Police Department and later to a detention centre that same day. I started a persecution protest hunger strike and was released nine days later because I was very weak.

On November 9th, 2006, Chen Wanyou from the National Security Team of the Jiasmusi City Police Department, along with several police officers, came to my house. They searched it my house and confiscated all Falun Gong related materials. They took me to Xiangyang Police Department and bound me to a metal chair. It was very cold. They tried to photograph and fingerprint me, but I refused to cooperate. The policemen held me down and pushed my hands against the ground. A young policewoman kicked my head. As a Falun Gong practitioner I didn't hate them and tried to explain the truth to them, but they refused to listen. They finally gave up trying to photograph and fingerprint me.

I was taken to a detention centre that same evening. Five days later, Chen Wanyou took me to Jiamusi Forced Labour Camp where I tried to explain the facts about Falun Dafa. They didn't listen but tried to record my words, to be used against me for further persecution.

Labour camp guards broadcast brainwashing information that slandered Falun Gong through loudspeakers night and day. I started a hunger strike to protest the brainwashing. Guard Liu Yadong ordered two criminal inmates to monitor me. Inmate Sun Yufeng was very bad. She had two specially-made spoons to force-feed me. I was force-fed twice a day. My lips were torn, six of my teeth were loosened, and my stomach bled. Sometimes, to increase my pain, they force-fed me slowly. Additionally, some unidentified ingredient was added to the food, which caused me to have diarrhoea every time. A few days later they tried to give me intravenous infusions, but I resisted. Four people held my arms and legs to the bed and inserted a needle into my arm. The guards also urged the criminal inmates to monitor me closely.

Two weeks later I became extremely weak. They were afraid of being held responsible for my death, so they let me go home. I was too weak to walk, so my son carried me home.

Once I was at home, the authorities assigned many police officers to monitor me, which put a lot of pressure on my family.

When I was detained at the detention centre, thirty people were crammed together in a small room, and everyone had to share the bed. Our daily diet consisted of poor quality corn cereal, which was actually farm animal feed. Many people developed skin diseases during their incarceration. When I was on a hunger strike in the detention centre and labour camp, the police ordered the criminal inmates to fasten me to the ground. I could not move, even when I needed to use the bathroom. During the force-feeding they inserted a plastic tube into my mouth and poured thin corn cereal in, sometimes with unidentified ingredients. I often vomited from the pain.

The persecution has caused my family and me immense anguish. Even still, my experiences of abuse, torture and torment are merely a drop in the bucket when compared to what all practitioners have suffered.

Note

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

Chinese version available at http://minghui.org/mh/articles/2007/7/16/158955.html