Practitioner from the Countryside in Hebei Province Recounts the Persecution She Has Experienced

At 4:00 a.m. on July 1st, 2008, several police officers from the Mancheng County Police Department and the Police Criminal Team, along with officials from Bailong Town, came to my home to arrest me under the pretext of security for the Olympic Games. I managed to escape while they were busy searching my home.

I am a Falun Gong practitioner living in the countryside. After the the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) began to defame and persecute Falun Gong on July 20th, 1999, several other practitioners and I went to Beijing to explain the facts of Falun Gong to the authorities. We were arrested by the police, and they sent us to the Tiananman Police Station. We were later transferred to the County Armed Forces Department and detained there for seven days. During our detention, Bailong Town Political and Legal Committee Head Gao Huikun and others forced us to watch videos that slandered Falun Gong. They also tried to "reform" us by forcing us to write statements to give up our practice.

I have been a practitioner for years and knew from reading Falun Gong books that Falun Gong teaches people to improve themselves. The books make us more compassionate and teach us to reclaim our lost moral values. I made up my mind to live my life according to Falun Gong's principles. Before that, I often argued with my husband but since becoming a practitioner, I stopped arguing with him even when he was bad to me. I tried to do what Teacher Li Hongzhi, the founder of Falun Gong, told us, "As a practitioner one should not fight back when being punched or insulted." (Zhuan Falun)

I was determined to follow the principles of Truth-Compassion-Forbearance as my guidelines for life. Gradually, my chronic ailments such as migraine headaches, stomach pain and spinal cord injury all disappeared. My family life became harmonious. For that I was very grateful to Falun Gong.

In September 1999, two other practitioners and I went to Beijing again. Officers from the Tiananman Square Police Station arrested us again. They verbally abused us for refusing to tell our names. We were very sad to see many Falun Gong books being thrown to the floor at the station. The police knew how much we want to preserve those books. They promised to let us take some books home if we would tell them our names. We trusted their words and told our names and home addresses.

"You can go home now," an officer said. But as soon as we exited the gate with our books, police waiting there arrested us again and sent us to the Fengtai Stadium. We had been tricked. Later, Mancheng police officers Zhao Yuxia and Zhang Zhenyao escorted us home. Bailong Town Police head Jing Hongchi and policemen Cao Chaowei, Liu Yongchao, Yuan Yuejun, and Go Yongfu took us to the Mancheng Detention Centre.

During our detention, Zhao Yuxia and Zhang Zhenyao brought in a professor from a medical and scientific institute to brainwash us. During the brainwashing session, a practitioner talked about her recovery from myocarditis through practising Falun Gong. A medical doctor said that it must have been a psychological effect and added that there is no way for Falun Gong to heal myocarditis. He stated that it might have been misdiagnosed originally. The practitioner asked him if medical instrumentation were valid, to which he replied, "Of course." The practitioner went on, "I have undergone ultrasound, colour doppler ultrasound, electrocardiograms and other heart function tests several times, and the doctors all confirmed that I had myocarditis. How do you explain that?" The doctor no longer had anything to say. He turned around and left quietly. That was the last we saw of him.

A police officer said, "As long as you give up Falun Gong, you can go home. In the future, even if you commit murder or arson, we could pretend we didn't see it happen." I was so shocked to hear this.

We were detained for more than three months. They eventually extorted 2,000 yuan¹ from us without giving us a receipt and released us.

In September 2000, Bailong Town Political and Legal Committe Head Gao Huikun and his people forced us to attend a nine-day brainwashing session at the Mancheng Party School. Each of us had to pay 500 yuan for room and board. After the session was over, Bailong Town staff frequently harassed us at home and constantly monitored our daily activities. Once they called us to the town government building and kept us there until evening. My husband wondered about me and came to look for me. When he asked why they did not release me, Gao Huikun slapped him in the face repeatedly.

In the summer of 2000, my cousin called us and told us he was coming to visit my parents. The phone was tapped, and policeman Jing Hongchi found out about his visit. Before my cousin arrived, Jing Hongchi and his staff forced me to wait for him at the village entrance. After my cousin arrived, they searched his car and called his workplace to check if he was a Falun Gong practitioner. Only after they verified that he was not a practitioner was he allowed to enter the village. But to prevent him from talking with me, they locked me up at the police station for a day and night. This act made my cousin and family greatly fearful.

In January 2001, several practitioners and I went to Beijing to appeal for justice again. As soon as we arrived at the Great Hall of the People we were arrested. Participating in the arrest were local policemen from our town: Tian Ye, Kang Xinyuan, Cai Tao, Li Jingdong, Zhang Zhenyao and Liang Min. It turned out that the Bailong police found out we were missing and followed us all the way to Beijing. 610 Office² head Liang Min shouted, "Throw her into the trunk. After we get home, beat her like you are beating cattle." We were detained for three months and sent to a labour camp for a year. While there, they tortured us very badly. In order to force us to give up Falun Gong, they made us stand facing the wall for a long time. They also forced us to stay in a half-squatting posture with our arms around our bodies. The torture went on 24 hours a day.

As a result of the persecution, my feet were swollen so badly that I could not wear shoes. Sometimes, I had to do forced labour the whole night. The persecution made my whole family suffer. My three children were all school aged, from 12 to 15 years old. My detention harmed my children psychologically. They missed their mother a lot. My husband could not go outside to find work, and we could not even pay school tuition. My oldest daughter had to drop out of school and became a migrant worker to support her sister and brother's schooling. My husband had to do all the farm work and household chores.

This is only part of the persecution that I and other practitioners were subjected to over the years.

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.

Chinese version available at http://minghui.org/mh/articles/2008/10/6/187189.html