The Persecution of Mr. Ma Yingju from Inner Mongolia

On January 5th, 2009, Mr. Ma Yingju from Duolun County, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, was again arrested by the local police. At the same time, Ms. Yang Yulian and Ms. Zhang Chunrong were also arrested. They are currently detained in a local detention centre.

Mr. Ma Yingju, 44, used to be a teacher in Duolun County No.1 Primary School. After the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) began to persecute Falun Gong in 1999, five practitioners in Duolun County were removed from the educational system. Mr. Ma was transferred to the Forestry Bureau. For nine years, he was repeatedly arrested, detained, and sentenced to forced labour for persisting in his belief. In the labour camp, he was brutally abused.

In July 1999, he went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong. He was intercepted and detained for 15 days and 2,000 yuan¹ was extorted from him. Two months later, he went to appeal again and was taken to a local detention centre as a result. Wang Lei, director of local Police Department, told police officers to handcuff Mr. Ma to a radiator and beat him on the head and chest with wooden sticks and electric batons. Consequently, his ribs were broken and his breastbone was dislocated. In December 1999, he was taken to the Xilinguole Prefecture Forced Labour Camp. Nine months later, he was transferred to Wuyuan Forced Labour Camp.

In Wuyuan Forced Labour Camp, he was subjected to so-called "special education." He was allowed to sleep for only two hours each day. As a form of brainwashing, he was forced to read slanderous material about Falun Gong at the noon break. This abuse lasted for one month, but Mr. Ma was still steadfast in his belief.

At the beginning of 2002, Mr. Ma and two fellow practitioners held a hunger strike to demand the return of Falun Gong articles that had been seized. On February 6th, 2002, he was taken to the assembly hall on the first floor. Eight or nine guards, including Li Weidong, Zhao Naiwei, Liu Jun, Zhang Qian, Chen Lei, and Zhang Dafu, surrounded him. Sun Guoqing, Li Weidong, and Liu Jun wrapped his arms with a rope, tied his hands behind his back, forced him to kneel on the ground, and pulled the rope to keep his body straight. The guards hit him hard on the chest and lower back with three electric batons. When Chen Lei, who was drunk at the time, hit Mr. Ma's navel with an electric baton. Afterwards, Sun Guoqing took off Mr. Ma's trousers and shocked his soles with an electric baton. The ropes were then loosened and his hands were pulled way back. His trousers were around his ankles and his body was shaking back and forth from being pulled. The guards laughed. When his arms could move no further, the guards handcuffed him to the back of a chair. When he needed to urinate while all this was going on, he asked the inmates to untie his trousers. Then he would kneel down to urinate with the chair attached to his back.

In the afternoon, the guards repeated the tie-up torture and proceeded to hit him with three electric batons. During this torture, his mouth was stuffed with a towel. Mr. Ma lost control of his body and shook all over. Chen Lei made a derogatory comment that it looked like he was dancing. His body turned black and blue from being hit, and his skin dried until it peeled. His arms were stained with blood.

In the beginning of September 2002, the more than 60 practitioners detained in Wuyuan Forced Labour Camp refused to be "transformed²". The labour camp launched a large scale persecution of the practitioners in which more than 100 guards and all the inmates were involved. As a result, many practitioners were injured. Mr. Ma was confined to solitary confinement for 40 days. Monitored by the "controlling inmates," he was deprived of sleep until he became muddleheaded and wrote a statement to give up Falun Gong. In January 2003, although he was facing a great amount of pressure, he wrote with determination a "solemn statement" in which he said that he would persevere in practising Falun Gong. The guards immediately forced him to stand day and night. The inmates were ordered by the guards to take turns monitoring him and preventing him from closing his eyes. Yang Furong, the deputy director of the labour camp, beat and kicked him personally, tied his hands behind his back, and then hung him up by his hands.

Mr. Ma's legs were swollen to the size of a bucket. He became incontinent and fainted twice. After he regained consciousness, he was forced to stand again. When he fainted for the third time, he was taken to a hospital for treatment.

After an entire month of such brutal persecution, Mr. Ma's strong faith still prevailed. The guards and inmates, shocked by his determination, gave up torturing Mr. Ma. Even the most malicious inmates gave the thumbs up to show their admiration for him.

After he was released from the labour camp in 2003, he was monitored by agents from the local 610 Office³ and local police officers. Later, he was detained and several thousand yuan were extorted from him. In 2004, he was taken to a brainwashing centre in Chifeng City.

Note

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

2. "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")

3. "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.ca/mh/articles/2009/1/18/193695.html