A Brief Account of the Persecution of Falun Gong Practitioners in Qinghai Province

A. Information on Practitioners Who Died as a Direct Result of Torture and Abuse in Detention

According to incomplete statistics, a total of eight practitioners have been persecuted to death in Qinghai Province; they died either from severe torture and abuse or by injection with lethal drugs.

1. Ms. Tan Yingchun

Ms. Tan Yingchun was a biology teacher at Kunlun High School in Xining City. On December 29th, 2002, she was tortured to death at Qinghai Province Women's Forced Labour Camp. She was only 46 years old. Before she died, one practitioner who was detained with her saw alarming and disturbing wounds on her legs. Another practitioner witnessed guards putting a rope round Ms. Tan's neck, then dragging her backwards. She almost died of suffocation. In order to destroy the evidence and cover up their crime, the Labour Camp did not release the notice of Ms. Tan's death until three days later. The authorities at the camp claimed that she had "hanged herself." However, when some practitioners pointed out that if she had hanged herself, there would have been physical evidence on her neck, the guards lied and said, "Tan was a biology major. She knew how to kill herself."

2. Ms. Zhang Xuefeng

For two years while she was detained at Qinghai Women's Forced Labour Camp, the guards never gave up trying to force Ms. Zhang Xuefeng to stop practising Falun Gong, but she firmly refused. Then the guards used drugs to disturb her central nervous system. After she refused to take any of the pills the guards tried to give her, they injected Ms. Zhang with drugs. As a result, she became mentally disoriented and eventually suffered a severe mental collapse. In December 2002, Ms. Zhang was released. However, unable to stand the misery she had suffered from the persecution, on November 20th, 2003, she jumped out of a building and died. She was only in her early 40s. [Note: The teachings of Falun Gong prohibit killing, including taking one's own life. The fact that Ms. Zhang died in this tragic manner is yet further evidence of the brutality of the persecution.]

3. Mr. Zhang Youzhen

Mr. Zhang Youzhen was tortured to death at the age of 47. He was a resident of Huzhu County, Qinghai Province. He was the principal of Shuidong Elementary School in Biantan County. Mr. Zhang remained steadfast in Falun Gong. He had received more than a dozen honorary titles for being a very responsible principal. However, because he practised Falun Gong, he was handcuffed with a board hanging around his neck and publicly insulted in front of over ten thousand people. To further humiliate him, he was paraded through the streets. As a result of the extreme physical torture he was subjected to at the Huzhu County Detention Centre and Qinghai Province Forced Labour Camp, he passed away on June 19th, 2003.

4. Ms. Zhao Xiangzhong

Ms. Zhao Xiangzhong was illiterate before practising Falun Gong. After practising, she could read Falun Gong books. Five months after she started cultivation, Ms. Zhao had memorized Hong Yin. After the persecution of Falun Gong started in July 1999, Ms. Zhao was placed in Qinghai Women's Forced Labour Camp four times. Right before the 16th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), she was arrested for the fourth time. Policemen in six vehicles surrounded the residence of her husband's (He Wanji) parents. As a result, Mr. He and his entire family, including two of his relatives' children, who were staying with them, were all arrested. One of them was a 12-year-old girl and the other one a two-year-old boy. They were detained for more than ten hours. Ms. Zhao was kept in a confinement cell and brutally tortured. It was winter, and she was only allowed to sleep on the freezing cold cement floor. After about 20 days, she could not walk anymore. Her lower body was numb, and her upper body was in severe pain. She could hardly eat anything. She was bedridden and was on the verge of death. On February 22nd, 2004, Ms. Zhao passed away. She was only 50 years old.

5. Mr. He Wanji

He Wanji, Ms. Zhao Xiangzhong's husband, died when he was only 53. Before he died, he was an officer at the Xining City Police Department Railroad Branch in Qinghai Province. Because he practised Falun Gong, he was repeatedly persecuted. First, he was imprisoned at Qinghai Province Forced Labour Camp for a year. After that, he was sentenced to 17 years and imprisoned in Menyuan Prison in Qinghai Province. The long-term brutal torture that Mr. He was subjected to caused him to develop high blood pressure. On May 28th, 2003, personnel at Menyuan Prison notified He Wanji's family that he had died from a stroke.

6. Ms. Fan Lihong

On May 6th, 2001, officials at the notorious Qinghai Women's Forced Labour Camp transferred Ms. Fan Lihong to a mental hospital, where she was force-fed an unknown drug. After that, she was detained in a mental hospital many times. The drugs caused her to become mentally disoriented, and eventually she totally collapsed. In January 2002, someone found her body in Qinghai People's Park.

7. Mr. Ping Chunfeng

Mr. Ping Chunfeng had worked at Qinghai Normal University. He was detained in Qinghai Province Forced Labour Camp twice. After he was released the first time, in 2002 and 2003, he told people how he had been injected with poisonous drugs twice and been give poison when he was in detention. As a result, he was mentally disoriented and behaved abnormally. He was unable to express himself well. The second time Mr. Ping was released, CCP agents watched him closely. He passed away in 2005, but the authorities at Qinghai Normal University withheld the information. Even now, nobody knows exactly how he died. The authorities claim that he "committed suicide." Before being detained and tortured, Mr. Ping had no mental problems at all. Even though he was not able to clearly describe what was done to him, he was able to communicate that he had been poisoned in the labour camp. The effects of the poison caused his death.

8. Ms. Huang Fengying

Ms. Huang Fengying was retired from Hutai Middle School in Xining City, Qinghai Province. She was sentenced to forced labour because she practised Falun Gong. After she was released, officials from the local neighbourhood associations, her school, the local police station, the 610 Office, and the police department constantly harassed her. Unable to escape from the pressure of the vicious intimidation, Ms. Huang passed away in early 2006. She was only 65 years old.

In addition to the above deaths, Mr. He Wanji's father and Ms. Zhao Xiangzhong's mother were unable to accept their children's sudden and unnatural deaths, and they, too, passed away.

B. Practitioners That Are Missing

Due to the fact that CCP agents receive huge profits from harvesting organs from living Falun Gong practitioners and then cremate the bodies to hide the evidence of their crimes, we are very worried about the safety of all missing practitioners. Currently, one practitioner from our province is missing. Ms. Xi Xiaolian disappeared in 2001. She was 61 years old and retired from Qinghai Province Traffic School. She lived in Building #9, First Section, Qinghai Province Road and Bridge Company. She was once detained in Qinghai Province Forced Labour Camp Women's Section. Her whereabouts are currently unknown.

Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2008/12/2/190901.html