Falun Gong Practitioners in Masanjia Forced Labour Camp Tortured During the Olympics

During the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, the persecution of practitioners in Masanjia Forced Labour Camp escalated.

Guards were transferred from the male labour camp to work on forcing practitioners to renounce Falun Gong. They used electric batons, hung practitioners using handcuffs, physically abused them, and made them to stand for long periods of time. They employed a military management style, forcing practitioners to stand in lines under the burning sun. The practitioners were ordered to practise yelling slogans, sing Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and labour camp songs, and recite the thirty labour camp rules before and after each meal. If practitioners didn't cooperate, they were left in the burning sun or tortured. Some practitioners were tortured until they lost the ability to take care of themselves, became mentally unstable, had heart attacks, or were no longer able to stand. Some could move only one step at a time with the help of others.

On the Mid-Autumn Festival holiday of 2008, practitioners in the First Ward shouted "Falun Gong is good!" in the dining hall at noon. The practitioner who lead the shouting, Ms. Lu Lin, 42, was dragged away by guards, slapped, and hung from an iron bunk bed by her handcuffs for more than three hours. Her face and hands were swollen and numb, but the guards still forced her to work.

On October 7th, 2008, thirty practitioners in the First Ward refused to sign the monthly assessment paper. At 12:30 p.m. these practitioners were kept in their cell, then called to the office one by one. The office was full of guards, including Director Zhou from the superintendent's office, First Section instructor Li Mingyu, First Section warden Guan Lin, two from the education office, one named Peng Bo, 31, and an office chief surnamed Wang.

First the practitioners were threatened with beatings if they refused to sign a paper. Sounds of the guards yelling, electric baton shocks, screams, and practitioners crying, "Falun Gong is good! It's a crime to persecute practitioners!" were constantly heard from the office. Some practitioners had sudden heart attacks from the electric shocks, and were carried out of the office on stretchers.

Six or seven practitioners firmly refused to sign the paper. Guards dragged them to the Donggang Cell to subject them to the cruellest torture. They were forced to stand by the bunk bed with their stomachs pushed against the metal rails on the front of the bed. Their legs were bound together with rope and their wrists were handcuffed to the corner rails on the top bunk with only their toes touching the ground. They couldn't straighten their backs and they couldn't squat--their wrists took the full force of their entire bodyweight. It took only a few minutes before they were soaked with sweat, their hands swollen, black and purple. It was very painful. While they were hung, they were slapped, beaten, and shocked with electric batons. Their hair was pulled out and they were not allowed to eat or use the toilet. They were hung until October 10th, 2008. One of the practitioners, Ms. Zhang Yinglin, 52, was released only after she had a relapse of her previous illness. She was unable to eat for a few days, as she vomited everything she ate. Due to the long periods of stretching and hanging, the practitioners' muscle tissues were badly injured. They couldn't straighten up, they could barely walk, and their bodies were swollen and black and blue. Their hands looked very big due to swelling and were covered in bruises and pus. Some practitioners' arms were dislocated, and they could not raise them even to put on their pants.

Only twenty days after the torture, Ms. Zhang Yinglin was forced to work. She didn't even have the ability to take care of her physical needs, and others needed to help her to dress. Ms. Zhang is still detained in the First Section in Masanjia Forced Labour Camp.

Due to physical and mental torture, Ms. Qi Zhenhong became mentally unstable. Her body was swinging uncontrollably, her tongue often stuck out of her mouth, and she couldn't talk properly. Her family was finally allowed to take her home due to her condition.

The guards involved in this persecution include Li Mingyu, Zhang Chunguang, Gao Luan, Zhao Jinhua, Guan Lin, a clerk surnamed Zhai, a warden surnamed Chen, and others.

Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2009/2/17/195627.html