Years of Torture Nearly Killed Me

During the past ten years I was incarcerated on and off for nearly eight of those years, and I lost my job and my family. I was arrested six times, sent to forced labour camps three times, sent to a psychiatric hospital twice and to a brainwashing centre once. I was subjected to dozens of different physical tortures. As a result of the long-term abuse and mistreatment under the persecution, I suffered tremendously. Even now I have whole-body oedema. I also have severe insomnia and can't sleep for days. I have had a stroke, memory loss, been in a vegetative state, and lost the function of my four limbs. My legs are paralysed. I also lost bladder and bowel control and was near death four times.

I graduated from college in 1990 and became employed at the Liaohe Oil Field where my wife was also employed. My moral standard declined, along with that of society. I lived a shameful lifestyle and did many bad things. In November 1996 I became a Falun Gong practitioner. Following the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance, I changed into a new person with high morals.

On July 20th, 1999, Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader Jiang Zemin launched a brutal persecution of Falun Gong practitioners. I went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong, and as a result, the authorities abused me.

While I was incarcerated the first time in the Panjin Forced Labour Camp I witnessed the ruthless tortures of many practitioners. Some were beaten until they lost consciousness. I was tied to a bed. A criminal inmate named Hu violently hit my thighs with a bench leg. I was later force-fed with alcohol. They inserted a hose into my stomach through my nostrils, making my nose bleed. The force-feeding injured my stomach, and I vomited blood. Later they chained my arms and legs to a bed for a long time. For a while I could not even walk, and my legs turned purple. The officials eventually sent me to a hospital to continue torturing me. I almost died in the hospital. For a long time my vision was blurred, and I saw everything double.

The first time I nearly died the doctors spent hours to bring me back. At the time I had just been released from the Panjin Forced Labour Camp and had returned to work. I asked my company to return my personal belongings (including my Falun Gong books). The Party members and 610 Office¹ personnel from the Liaohe Oil Field took me to the company detention centre. At the request of the authorities, criminal inmates tortured and nearly killed me. Doctors at the emergency room rescued me from death, but I had sustained sufficient brain damage that I lost much of my brain function. I also had become incontinent. After I was brought back from death, they sent me back to the Panjin Labour Camp for torment and abuse.

I was subsequently once again released and I returned to work. Company Party members forced my family to bring me to Liaoning Province Kaiyuan Psychiatric Hospital. During the next 16 months I suffered from the most inhuman tortures. Each day they injected me with noxious substances and forced me to swallow unknown drugs. They also used electric shocks and force-feeding while I was roped to a bed, once for 60 days. During that time I could not move, and I was not given toilet breaks. The pain was simply beyond description. I told the doctors, nurses and others that I had no mental problems, and I asked them to let me go. But no one listened to me. When a section chief in charge of persecuting Falun Gong from my company came to see me I told him, "I have no mental problems. Please take me home." He said, "When you stop practising Falun Gong, we will take you."

I refused to go along with their treatment following that conversation. I strongly demanded that a psychiatric expert from the provincial justice system evaluate my case. Finally they agreed, and the evaluation proved that I was perfectly normal.

After my release I had no income, and I had to stay at my father's place. I made several requests at my company to allow me to resume working, but they turned me down because I wasn't willing to give up Falun Gong.

Before long I was arrested again and sent to a brainwashing centre in Fushun City for sixty days, after which I returned to my elderly father's home. Without an income and physically handicapped, I had to drag my injured body to collect recyclable materials from garbage and do odd jobs. Often times I had to find food and clothing from rubbish bins. Sometimes in the winter, I had to sleep in an unheated shack. One cold winter day I found a place near my mother's grave. The extremely heavy snow and sub-zero temperatures at night almost killed me.

I managed eventually to move to Panjin. As a homeless person I had to stay in abandoned homes or temporary shelters along the roadside. Communist personnel continued to harass me, and sometimes the police came to arrest me, so I could not stay in one place for long. During this time, my former employer tried to sever my employment contract. They said if I refused, they would send me to a labour camp or a mental institution. I had no choice but to agree. I permanently lost all income. I could only survive on garbage collection and temporary odd jobs. I lived a homeless life for years.

In May 2008, before the Beijing Olympics, I decided to go to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong and myself. Without money I had to walk. In a bit over ten days I walked 500 km. (311 miles). I begged for food and slept along the roadside.

When I passed Qianan City, I heard that the Communist regime was arresting practitioners to keep them away from the Olympics. Some arrested practitioners' families were trying to get their loved ones back from the authorities. I went to a police department along with some relatives, but the police officer in charge of the case refused to meet with us. The local police arrested me and took me to the Qianan Detention Centre. After a new round of physical torture I started a hunger strike that lasted more than ten days. I was later taken to the Panjin Detention Centre where I continued my hunger strike. The police brought in a psychiatrist to check me. He left without a word once I told him the torment and tortures I had been through under the persecution.

A week later I was sent to the Benxi Forced Labour Camp where I was subjected to eight months of gross abuse and mistreatment. The most notorious torture method at this place was the stretching bed. My arms and legs were stretched and tied to the bed, and an inflated airbag was inserted under my hips to increase the tension on my limbs. They stripped me of all my clothes, including underwear, and at night they opened the window so mosquitoes could freely sting me. In the winter they let the cold wind freeze me. They also sprayed me with cold water, stabbed my armpits with needles, brushed my fingertips with a hard toothbrush, flicked my eyeballs with their middle fingers, hit my chest with sticks, inserted an electric baton into my mouth, shocked my naval, nipples, chin, armpits, hands, and soles of my feet. Sometime they used two batons to shock me at the same time. High voltage shocks made my body bounce violently. I could not help screaming until I no longer had any voice and lost consciousness. After two months of continuous bestial torture I could no longer walk, and my body was covered in bruises.

At night my hands were chained to the bed. Four inmates were assigned to monitor me around the clock. The torture lasted two months. I was forbidden to freely use the toilet at night, but when I lost control and urinated in bed, they beat me as punishment.

I was later sent back to the Tenth Division and had three inmates monitoring me. Every day these people punched and kicked me as they wished, and I suffered multiple injuries. They dragged me by my hair and slammed my head into wall and onto the floor. In the evening because one of my hands was always cuffed to the bed, I could only urinate in my rice bowl or tooth cup. During my two months there I was beaten every day. The three inmates took turns punching and kicking me. They even used nails to prick into my fingers.

Most criminal inmates would be punished if they hit or cursed at others. But when they hit Falun Gong practitioners they received praise. The designated henchmen had the privilege of violating prison rules, eating special meals and drinking alcohol. They even had their sentences reduced. Wang Xiaojie from Goubangzi Oil Pipeline Administration in Liaoning Province was sentenced to 18 months of forced labor. He was released after only six months as a result of having earned credits for abusing Falun Gong practitioners. But he was killed in a car accident soon after that.

The torture left me handicapped. I can't walk, and have lost the function of my left arm.

The last torture to which I was subjected at the Benxi Forced Labour Camp almost killed me. My heart nearly stopped, my blood pressure dropped to near zero, and I couldn't move any part of my body. If I had given up the will to live, I would have died immediately. (I have gone through that experience more than once). When the abusers asked me what I needed most, I told them I had to read Falun Gong books and do the exercises. They brought Falun Gong books, and I began reading, though I could barely eat anything or move. My health gradually recovered. It was a miracle that modern medicine could not have accomplished. After they saw my recovery they took away the Falun Gong books and resumed torturing me.

After six months of abuse my weight dropped from 80 kg (176 lb.) to 40 kg. (88 lb.). The long-term tortures caused all kinds of illnesses. I suffered from oedema and stroke, and I looked terrible. But they still refused to release me. Instead, they sent me to the Kangning Psychiatric Hospital in Benxi. The nurses there tied me to a bed and injected me with unknown substances and fed me unknown drugs. I began to lose bladder and bowel control, my legs were paralysed, and I suffered from memory loss and became easily disoriented. After twenty days in the hospital, the doctors said I had schizophrenia. Benxi Labour Camp officials took me to Haicheng City, Liaoning Province and dropped me off at my younger sister's clothing shop, despite disagreement from my family members and local police.

I did not want to become a burden on my sister, so I crawled out of her house. I missed my daughter terribly and managed to go to Panjin City to visit her. But I was now a handicapped man who could not even control his bladder and bowels. I didn't want to scare my daughter and I had no place to go. Because of "guilt by association", anyone who helped me could become a target for persecution. I could only eat discarded food from the trash. One day in a city I had to crawl to a trash container which was 1,500 metres away, and getting there took me more than six hours. On my way to the trash can, I saw my father-in-law. He told me my daughter was fine, and I felt so happy.

I was exhausted after crawling to the trash can near a small market, but due to my hunger I began looking for food in the trash. I had no energy to clean my soiled underwear, and I was unable to avoid being near the dirty water leaking from the trash can, I slept right next to the trash can for the night.

I am only one among tens of thousands of practitioners to suffer this brutal persecution. Many others suffered worse. Some lost their lives as a result of torture, and others died after their organs were removed. Dawa County Dongfeng Farm practitioner Zhang Haiying has been missing for nearly ten years. She may have become a victim of organ harvesting.

When I was released from the Benxi Forced Labour Camp, several dozen practitioners were still there. They could be killed at any time.

All people with a sense of justice--please reach out to help these innocent people. We should all condemn this atrocity, and bring it to an end soon.

Note

1. "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/2009/7/12/204353.html