Why Must This Two-Year Old Suffer?

Yu Jialiang is the two-year-old daughter of Beijing Falun Gong practitioners Yu Ping and Zhao Yumin. Little Jialiang should be living a happy and peaceful life with her loving family, but in the past year, she has witnessed the unjust arrest of both her parents. Now she suffers in a broken family without parents to care for her.

Jialiang’s father was pursuing his master’s degree in the Department of Thermal Engineering at Tsinghua University in 1995. In March 1997, he began to work on his doctorate degree ahead of schedule due to his outstanding accomplishments. During the course of his study, he was awarded a Siemens Scholarship.

In early June 2000, he successfully defended his doctoral dissertation, gaining the unanimous approval of the dissertation committee. The dissertation was also selected as an excellent thesis.

However, despite his academic achievements he was never awarded the PhD degree—because of his spiritual beliefs.

Since July 20th, 1999, the Chinese communist regime led by Jiang Zemin has staged a reckless campaign of suppression against Falun Gong. Jialiang’s parents went to Tiananmen Square seven times to appeal for an end to the persecution of this peaceful practice.

Because of Yu’s involvement with Falun Gong, Tsinghua University refused to grant Yu Ping a doctoral degree. At that time, he managed to obtain a full scholarship from Ohio State University; but the regime detained and incarcerated Yu, so he lost the chance to study aboard.

In November 2000, local police officers searched the Yu home and arrested Yu Ping and Zhao Yumin. Yu Ping was sentenced to four years and detained in Qianjin Prison in Tianjin City. Zhao Yumin was detained at Beijing Women’s Prison.

After four arduous years of torture and incarceration, Jialiang’s parents were finally released and returned home. Later Jialiang was born into this happy family.

However, the good times didn’t last long. Prior to the 2008 Beijing Olympics, the Chinese authorities increased the persecution of Falun Gong and arrested many Falun Gong practitioners. According to incomplete statistics, from the end of 2007 to June 30th, 2008, more than 8037 Falun Gong practitioners were detained or arrested, especially in Beijing, including Jialiang’s parents.

On April 19th, 2008, at around 4 p.m., some seven or eight policemen from local police stations in Chaoyang District broke into Jialiang’s home, forcefully arrested Jialiang’s parents, along with their grandmother and aunt. Then one-year-old Jialiang was extremely terrified, and cried aloud when watching her family being taken away from her.

Jialiang’s parents were both sentenced to two-and-a-half years of “Re-education Through Labor (RTL).” (Re-education Through Labour is the Chinese regime’s euphemism for putting people, without trial, into forced labour camps.) Her father was sent to Beijing Tuanhe Forced Labour Camp and her mother to Women’s Forced Labour Camp in Wuhan City, Hubei Province. Her 68-year-old grandma was also sentenced to two years of RTL.

With no parents to care for her, little Jialiang often cries for no apparent reason. Her 16-year-old brother is often silent, as he doesn’t know how to talk about his family to teachers and schoolmates. Jialiang and her brother have been left in the care of her 70-year-old grandfather who suffers from hypertension.

Finding it difficult raising two young children on his own, Jialiang’s grandpa often sighs mournfully, “Life cannot go on like this.”