Depriving Toilet Access: Another Feature of a Shameless Persecution

Throughout history, depriving people of toilet use has not generally been used as a torture method. However, during the persecution of Falun Gong by the Communist regime, use of a toilet is no longer considered a basic right.

Toilet access in Division 2 at the Shandong Province Second Women's Forced Labour Camp is highly restricted. Guards require inmates to relieve their bladders in groups. Additional requests are needed for bowel movements. The request has to be worded according to a proscribed system: "Madam, I have a request." The guard asks, "What is it?" "I want to have a bowel movement." When the guard is in a good mood, she may say, "Go ahead." Sometimes the guard gives the detainee a hard time by requiring her to sing a song, such as "the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is good", or "socialism is good". If the detainee refuses, she has to hold it.

Why do the guards act this way? To humiliate the detainees. Even a "reformed" [forcibly renounce Falun Gong] former practitioner still has to bear these additional humiliations. If a practitioner does not yield, she may have to relieve herself in her trousers.

Ms. Xu Qingyan is a practitioner from Liushui Village, Daxue Town, the Taihe District in Jinzhou City, Liaoning Province. She was once sent to the Masanjia Forced Labour Camp. Ms. Xu spoke out when practitioner Ms. Qiu Li was dragged outside for force-feeding on April 17th, 2005. When Ms. Xu called aloud "Falun Gong is good," team head Li Mingyu forcibly held her head. "We are feeding her [Ms. Qiu]. Why are you calling out? " Another team head, Xie Chengdong, closed the door and brutally beat her until she fainted.

After Ms. Xu woke up she asked guard Liu Jing for permission to use the toilet. Liu Jing refused. Without toilet access for a long time, Ms. Xu soon had a large swollen area on her abdomen. Meanwhile, her chest and heart were severely impaired. Other practitioners told guards about the urgent situation, but they ignored it.

Depriving someone access to a toilet is cruel. Following are two examples in which male guards restricted female practitioners' toilet use.

Ms. Wang Shuchun is a 61-year-old practitioner from Haigang District in Qinhuangdao City, Hebei Province who was arrested on July 21st, 2010. After holding her at a detention centre for several days, police agents deceived her to go to the police hospital. After Ms. Wang's blood pressure registered over 180, Zhou Haitao and three other guards attempted to force-feed her drugs. Ms. Wang refused to take the drugs. Zhou and two other male guards pushed her onto a bed, tightly pinching her nose with one hand and with another hand forcibly opening her mouth for force-feeding. Ms. Wang spat out the drugs. Zhou furiously covered her mouth and nose yelling, "I am sure I can handle this." When Ms. Wang was powerless and had almost lost consciousness, guards forcibly injected her with drugs through an IV. Ms. Wang saw a piece of paper next to the IV bottle that had the drug's name on it. She reached for the paper to see more clearly. Zhou immediately ordered another guard to take the paper away. After the injection of this unknown drug Ms. Wang felt physically and mentally awful, as if her head would explode. During this process, Ms. Wang requested the use of a toilet. While at the toilet, Zhou shamelessly left the door open and, with another male guard, watched her urinate.

Ms. Yan Chunling is a practitioner in Nangang District, Harbin City. She was arrested in 2000 and sent to the Wanjia Forced Labour Camp. Because of refusing to write statements renouncing her practice, Ms. Yan was punished with solitary confinement and forced to stand on the floor for three days and two nights. In addition, guards tortured her in many ways, including the "Big Hang Up" and "Riding an Airplane". Guards once prohibited her from sleeping for 28 days. In order to further persecute her, the guards sent her to male cells for two days and two nights in June. The purpose was both to deprive her of toilet use and to humiliate her.

The following inhuman mistreatment occurred at the Wanjia Forced Labour Camp.

Ms. Liu Guihua is a practitioner from Farm 8511 in the Agriculture and Reclamation Bureau in Mudanjiang City, Heilongjiang Province. She was cruelly tortured in many ways at the Wanjia Forced Labour Camp including beatings, verbal abuse, other humiliation, sitting still on a small stool for a long time, and sleep deprivation. This happened every day. In order to reform Ms. Liu, guards once tied her hands and hung her upside down. This lasted two days. She was not taken down, even when she needed to use the toilet. She had to relieve herself in her trousers. Guards then pulled down her trousers and covered her mouth with her trousers soiled by urine and faeces.

Even medical professionals in the prisons are involved in toilet deprivation in the name of therapy.

Ms. Xu Hui is a retiree from the Jiutai Pharmaceuticals Co. in Jinzhou City, Liaoning Province. Following her arrest and incarceration in the Beijing Forced Labour Dispatch Centre, three inmates in the centre were assigned to monitor her. She was compelled to stand more than 10 hours a day, from early morning until she was allowed to sleep at night. During this time, she was forbidden to wash, sleep, and use the toilet. Long-term unavailable toilet access made Ms. Xu unable to urinate. Doctor Wang Yong in the clinic ordered several thugs to rub her stomach. One doctor said, "We guarantee that you will be able to urinate after going back." Then, what "treatment" did they give Ms. Xu? Several inmates pushed her on the floor, held her tightly, and hit her hard in the abdomen. Ms. Xu's abdomen was swollen and too painful to touch. The next day she lost bladder control and constantly urinated in her trousers.

Mr. Jiang Yong is a practitioner in Xuhui District, Shanghai. He was sentenced to eight years of incarceration in 2001 and was severely tortured in Tilanqiao Prison. He went on a hunger strike and was then tied up tightly on a bed, naked. Medical staff in the prison put a fake rubber urine receiver on his penis, with an excuse that he was too weak to urinate normally. Unable to urinate for a long time, Mr. Jiang's whole body was swollen. His bladder was swollen and painful, which led to pain in the kidneys.

In the Shandong Province First Forced Labour Camp, thugs also tied up practitioners' penises with cords. The urine accumulated and flowed back to the kidney. Practitioners experienced whole body oedema and felt extreme pain.

Depriving practitioner of toilet use is often the result of planning between guards and inmates.

Ms. Wang Cuifang is a practitioner in her 60s from Junan County in Linyi City. Guards tortured her severely in the Shandong Province First Women's Forced Labour Camp. If she ate or drank, guards forbade her to use the toilet, compelling her to relieve herself in her trousers. Ms. Wang ate very little and did not drink at all. The guards then said she was staging a hunger strike and threatened to force-feed her. Each time Ms. Wang requested toilet use, guards told her to wait, and then wait again. After many of Ms. Wang's requests the guard agreed. Guard Wang Yueyao already plotted this with inmate Wang Qian. When Ms. Wang Cuifang went to use the toilet, Wang Qian was already there, occupying the toilet--the only one in the bathroom--and did not stand up.

Although guards sometimes personally participated in such outrages, more often they ordered inmates to do so.

Ms. Zhang Yinying is a Sanitation Bureau employee in Dongcheng District, Beijing. She was sent to labour camps three times in the past and was detained for seven years altogether. She was prohibited from toilet use while held at the Beijing Forced Labour Dispatch Centre and had to relieve herself in her trousers. One inmate assigned to monitor her was a drug addict. She complained about her duty and did not want do it anymore. Why? The smell from practitioners compelled to urinate in their trousers made the smell in the room too strong to tolerate. The inmates thus occasionally secretly allowed Ms. Zhang to urinate into a barrel. The guards heard about it and told the inmates, "If you allow her to urinate in the barrel, then you are not allowed to use the toilet."

While some inmates were merciful, the others carefully selected by guards were cruel when abusing practitioners.

Practitioner Mr. Liu Yongwang was a division manger and chief engineer of a foreign company in Beijing. He is still incarcerated at Jidong Prison. Zheng Yajun, a guard in Division 1, kept Mr. Liu in an empty room on the top floor for eight months. He ordered 14 inmates to use various means to torture Mr. Liu.

Mr. Liu wrote some appeal information and passed it out of the prison with great difficulty. According to the information, some inmates even pushed him when he urinated, saying, "We can make you urinate in your trousers, or in the chair, whenever we want." Whenever they noticed Mr. Liu needed to urinate, regardless where, they pushed him hard. Thus, he often had no choice but to urinate in a chair, bed, or trousers. They frequently restricted Mr. Liu's toilet use to certain time slots. He was forbidden toilet use before that time. He needed to use the toilet one night in December 2007 about 20 minutes before the scheduled time. To avoid urinating in his trousers, he grabbed himself. When inmate Wang Quantao saw this he moved his hand away, making Mr. Liu urinate in his trousers.

Inmate Zhang Donghong was even more vicious. He wanted to torture Mr. Liu to death. He told Mr. Liu, "I will torture you slowly to death, and others will not know the cause of death." In the freezing winter nights the inmates left the doors and windows wide open. They then put a toilet-pot at a place where the wind was the strongest. Inmates Zhong Donghong and Wang Quantao wore heavy coats and stood behind the door. They then forced to Mr. Liu to wear a single layer of clothes and exposed him for half an hour to the cold. Who needs half an hour to urinate? This was to torture him. After Mr. Liu returned to his quilt, before he was fully warmed up, the inmates forced him to go out and "urinate" again. This continued the entire night. This is how inmate Zhang Donghong wanted to torture him to death.

With instigation from the guards, inmates are more reckless in abusing and mistreating practitioners.

Officials in the Baimalong Forced Labour Camp, Hunan Province, tightly restrict practitioners' toilet use. Ms. Liu Yuwei is an accountant at the Yiyang City Meat Plant, Hunan Province. Six inmates stripped her naked in public at the labour camp, and inserted a clothes fork [used to raise clothes hangers and hang them up] into her private parts. The fork was stuck inside for several hours and she was unable to pull it out. Mr. Liu was severely injured and unable to walk for a long time. Another time the inmates prohibited Ms. Liu from using the toilet for eight days. One day, fluid suddenly spurted directly from her belly button. The thugs had never seen this happening and were scared.

Ms. Zhang Guixiang, a practitioner in her 50s, from Xishui County, also received severe mistreatment at the Hubei Province Women's Forced Labour Camp. Guards Li Li and Liu Ling, together with Zhou Qiong, ordered Li Chunyan and other inmates to drag Ms. Zhang to the toilet. They kicked her, beat her, and stepped on her stomach hard, making her bowels and bladder evacuate spontaneously.

The above-related incidents are merely a few types of torture from prohibited toilet access that have happened to practitioners. There are many other kinds. For example, practitioners are sometimes stretched and tied tightly in bed for several days, or hung up for many days. Since they are left unattended, it is impossible for them to have access to normal toilet use. There were occasions when guards stripped practitioners naked before tying them up so they no longer had to concern themselves with practitioners' toilet needs. It is even more common for guards to prohibit practitioners from using toilet paper, restrict the toilet time, or intentionally harm the excretory organs.

Torture methods described above are common in detention centres, labour camps, prisons or brainwashing centres in China. This reflects the inhuman nature of the CCP. This is another example that fully reveals the severity and shamelessness of the persecution.

Chinese version available at http://minghui.ca/mh/articles/2010/10/21/231288.html