Personal Account of Persecution by the Late Mr. Liu Quanguo from Shuangcheng City, Heilongjiang Province

Name:Liu Quanguo
Gender:Male
Age: 45
Address: Qiansanjiazi Village, Handian Town, Shuangcheng City, Heilongjiang Province
Occupation: Farmer

Date of Death: February 16th, 2008
Date of Most Recent Arrest: February 18th, 2004
Most Recent Place of Detention: Changlinzi Forced Labour Camp
City: Harbin City
Province: Heilongjiang
Persecution Suffered: Detention, extortion, beatings, interrogation, forced labour, sleep deprivation, electric shock, drug administration.

Mr. Liu Quanguo was arrested without a warrant, detained, sentenced to forced labour, tortured, and injected with unknown drugs. The head guard publicly said to him: "You'll die after you are released." And after Liu Quanguo was released, he did pass away on February 16th, 2008 at the age of 45. We have obtained this personal account of the numerous persecutions and tortures he suffered:

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I always had poor health, later developing serious liver disease so that I could not work. After I began to practise Falun Gong, all of my diseases disappeared. I also quit smoking and drinking alcohol, so my temperament improved.

On July 20th, 1999 Jiang Zemin started the persecution of Falun Gong. I went to the provincial government to appeal. I was pushed into a car by the police and taken to the public security bureau at Shuangcheng City, where the police recorded videos of us. The Vice Mayor of Handian Town Zhang Dianqi and official Li Zhu took us back home. The mayor Liu Yingwen cursed us then released us.

After I returned home, one of the village security men Yu Zhanmin ordered me to turn in my books on Falun Gong but I refused. Wang Zhinian told me to write a pledge to give up the practice, but I would not. They said that I would be taken away, but they did not do it.

On September 5th, 1999 I went to Beijing to appeal, and I was arrested in Yuyuantan Park, Beijing. After being detained for a day, I was sent to the provincial office in Beijing. On September 10th, 1999, policemen Yu Zhanjun, Sui Guangcheng and Zhang Dianqi flew to Beijing. The next day they took me and more than a dozen practitioners to Shuangcheng City Detention Centre. As soon as we got out of the car, the policemen recorded a video of us. Before leaving Beijing, Sui Guangcheng took two hundred yuan¹ in cash off me and hit me twice.

In Shuangcheng Detention Centre, the 610 officer (an organisation of special agents just for persecuting Falun Gong) Liu Chunyang interrogated me again and again, trying to find out who organised our group. He pulled my hair and said: "Speak! If you don't tell me I will make you kneel on bamboo (a means of punishing a detainee)." The guard ordered other prisoners to beat me. Prisoner Guo Shengli told me to recite the prison regulations, if I refused I was punished by having to stand for a long period of time. After I was forced to stand for 24 hrs, I was made to pick up a toilet bucket weighing 50 kilograms. Prisoner Meng Wu led the other prisoners to beat and kick me, I had black eyes and a bleeding nose and mouth. When my family came to pick me up, the guards made me say that I fell down. At break time they did not allow me to go out in case anyone saw that I was injured. They refused to let me to sleep on a bed or have any covers . I had to sleep on the concrete floor for three months.

Once after they beat me up they stripped off all my clothes. I was forced to stand in front of a broken window, it was December and very cold. I repeatedly requested guard Huang call my family and let them send in a sweater. He refused. I was only wearing a shirt and pants. I sat on a cold bed, and in the evening I slept on the floor. Later I was forced to write a pledge statement falsely stating that Falun Gong is cult. Guard Jin Wanzhi received twenty-five hundred yuan from my family, and Yang Hongqiao demanded fifty yuan for meal costs.

In November 2001 I went to Beijing to appeal for the second time. When the train arrived at Changchun, the police searched me and asked me if I practised Falun Gong. They found a banner and the policeman hit me in the face with his fist. They took seventy yuan from me. I was detained at the Shanhaiguan Crime Response Squad for a day and night, and robbed of fifty yuan. Two hours after Handian Police Yu Zhanjun and Sui Guangcheng took me to the provincial office in Beijing, I was sent to the Pingfang Detention Centre in Harbin for a month, where I was beaten once every two days. When they asked me if I practised Falun Gong, I said yes. They tried to force me to curse Falun Gong, I refused and they started to torture me. They raised my chin onto the headboard, tied my hands behind my back, pushed my legs backwards, and forced my stomach to the floor. They then stepped on me, pulled my head, and punched my throat. I could barely breathe, I almost died.

On February 9th, 2002 I was sent to Changlinzi Forced Labour Camp in Harbin City for one year. I did not wear shoes when I left. After I arrived at Wanjia Training Team, I stood barefoot outside for half an hour. Then they started to search me, I was stripped and left in the cold for more than 20 minutes. In addition, I was forced to do hard labour, like dismantling a wall, every day. Once I was forced to help a welder, who burned my arm with hot-red welding if I did not follow his instructions. Later I was forced to be transformed and to turn in the book. After being released, I was fined two thousand yuan by village officer Yang Zhaowen.

In the afternoon of February 18th, 2004, over a dozen people including Sun Jihua, Politics and Law Enforcement Committee Director of Handian Town, some government officials, Handian Town policeman Yu Zhanjun and some officers of the 610 Office at Shuangcheng, drove in two cars to storm into my home. They demanded to know if I still practised Falun Gong, and I answered yes. They began to search for books, but were stopped by my father. So they forcibly carried me into a car, and I was detained at Shuangchen City Detention Centre.

They stripped me and poured cold water over me for a long time. I was trembling. Fifteen days later, I was sent to Changlinzi Forced Labour Camp again, this time for three years. On my arrival at Team 4, the team head Ji Gang searched me and tried to force me to write the three statements. The guards threw me into a tub of cold water, and beat me around the head with a shovel handle. They held me underwater. I refused to write the statements, so they kept pouring water on me, hitting me and holding me under.

Later I was transferred to the Fifth Brigade where Falun Gong practitioners are seriously persecuted. Team head Zhao Shuang had signed a contract with the camp. With each practitioner he transferred he would receive two hundred yuan. I was forced to do hard labour and not allowed to talk. I was assigned 35 boxes of toothpicks to pack a day, and I could not sleep until I finished. I was not allowed to sleep for four days and four nights. My legs became extremely swollen and I could hardly see, but I was still forced to work. As a result, I became very weak and could not sit up. Guard Zhao Shuang said: "Let your family bring money for medical treatment. We will not release you or let your family members visit you."

While at Changlinzi, I endured shocks from electric batons and brutal beatings. I became so weak that I could only walk with the help of two people. Fellow villagers learned about my situation and wrote a letter holding many signatures to appeal on behalf of my good character. Zhao Shuang saw the letter but did not stop the brutality. Instead he kicked me and hit me in the face until I fainted, bleeding from my nose and mouth.

While at the labour camp, they also injected me with unknown drugs. Zhao Shuang openly said: "You will die as soon as you are released!"

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In the autumn of 2006 Liu Quanguo was finally released. He became weaker and weaker, and he passed away on February 16th, 2008. He is survived by his parents, who are nearly eighty years old.

Note

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

Chinese version available at http://www.minghui.org/mh/articles/2010/8/1/227822.html