Ms. Lian Taotao Monitored at Home after Release from Brainwashing Centre

Name: Lian Taotao
Gender: Female
Age: in her 30s
Address: Hunan Province Audit Bureau Apartment Complex
Occupation: Employee at Foreign Trade Industry
Date of Most Recent Arrest: May 5th, 2011
Most Recent Place of Detention: Laodaohe Brainwashing Centre
City: Changsha
Province: Hunan
Persecution Suffered: Brainwashing, extortion, physical restraint, detention, harassment, monitoring

Ms. Lian Taotao is a Falun Gong practitioner in her 30s who lives in the apartment complex affiliated with the Hunan Province Audit Bureau.

A group of Furong District 610 Office agents (an organisation of special agents just for persecuting Falun Gong), agents from the Mawangdui Street Committee, and officers from the Mawangdui Police Station and from the Guhancheng Community seized her outside her apartment building on May 5th, as she was on her way out. She was immediately taken to the Changsha Legal Education Centre, which the locals refer to as the Laodaohe Brainwashing Centre because of its location in Laodaohe of Kaifu District.

The local authorities set Ms. Lian free two days later on condition that her family agree to have her personal belongings confiscated and her freedom restricted after her release. She is now closely monitored at home.

Ms. Lian Found her Destiny in Falun Gong

Ms. Lian works in the foreign trade industry. She was deeply moved when she had the good fortune to obtain a copy of the Falun Gong book, Zhuan Falun, in March 1999 and was profoundly impressed by the principle of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance. From then on she followed the tenets inherent in Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance in her life and work, and enabled everyone around her to see the goodness of Falun Dafa.

Persecuted for her Belief

The Chinese Communist Party launched its persecution of Falun Gong four months into Ms. Lian's cultivation, and her life was turned upside down.

The Furong District 610 Office abducted and sent Ms. Lian to the Laodaohe Brainwashing Centre at the beginning of 2001. They forced her family to sign a guarantee and pay 20,000 yuan¹ in extortion money prior to releasing her.

When Ms. Lian and a friend visited Professor He Yingqing at the Hunan Biological Electromechanical Vocational Technical College on March 8th, 2004 they were arrested. Participating in the arrest were college security guards who had monitored Professor He, also a Falun Gong practitioner. Ms. Lian and her friend were held at the Mapoling Police Station for 15 days. They went on a hunger strike in protest and were released eight days later.

Directed by the Furong District 610 Office, Security Department agents and agents from the Logistics Department from the Hunan Province Audit Bureau have secretly kept track of Ms. Lian’s activities for a long time. Every once in a while they dispatch people to the apartment complex to examine the log and determine when she usually went out and returned.

Ms. Lian was getting ready to hop on her electric bike a few minutes past 7:00 p.m. on May 5th when several people waiting outside her apartment building surrounded her, and the person in charge snatched her bike key. They dragged her to a police vehicle parked near the apartment complex gate and drove her to the Laodaohe Brainwashing Center. The perpetrators included agents from the Furong District 610 Office, from the Mawangdui Street Committee, the Mawangdui Police Station (one policeman is surnamed Luo) and from the Guhancheng Community.

Ms. Lian already suffered from poor health prior to this May 2011 arrest. She began to develop severe edema and extreme fatigue at the end of March. She had trouble walking and climbing stairs. Just sitting up was a struggle for her. The police however, turned a blind eye to her symptoms. After arriving at the brainwashing center they dragged her all the way from the courtyard to the lobby on the first floor, leaving her gasping for air. She was left to sit on the floor for about 10 minutes before four people carried her to a room on the fourth floor. Furong District 610 Office head Jian Xinhua came to her room not long after, telling her she needed to stay for a few days. Guhancheng Community officials sent four people to the brainwashing centre later that night. Two of the people had been hired to monitor her around the clock.

Ms. Lian felt extremely uncomfortable the first night. She couldn’t fall asleep and had difficulty breathing. Learning of her condition, Laodaohe Brainwashing Centre deputy head Yang Lu and Furong District 610 Office head Jian Xinhua were unimpressed. They had no plan to release her right away, nor did they inform her family of her whereabouts. The second night turned out to be even worse for her. She requested immediate release several times.

Ms. Lian’s family finally learned of her whereabouts on the third day of her abduction. They rushed to the brainwashing centre at 9:00 a.m. and strongly requested her release. Furong District 610 Office agents and Mawangdui Street Committee officials insisted that they meet three conditions: first, have her electric bike confiscated; second, surrender her mobile phone and laptop; and third, forbid her to step out of the apartment complex before May 13th, World Falun Dafa Day. In order to set her free, her family agreed. The police confiscated Ms. Lian's mobile phone and laptop from her home the morning of May 7th and released her that afternoon. The next day, Guhancheng Community officials had people confiscate her electric bike.

The three-day ordeal has greatly harmed Ms. Lian. When she finally returned home the afternoon of May 7th after being detained for more than 40 hours, she had great difficulty breathing and moving around. Guhancheng Community staff however called her family every morning and evening, inquiring if she was still home. There were also people monitoring her right at the gate of the apartment complex. Her situation is really worrying.

Information about Furong District 610 Office Head Jian Xinhua

Ever since she became Furong District 610 Office head in April 2010, Jian Xinhua has actively persecuted local Falun Gong practitioners. According to incomplete statistics, in 2010 alone, Jian was personally responsible for the arrest and persecution of six practitioners: Ren Liyun (a retired worker from the Shuguang Group); Gong Xianghui (from the Furong District), Cao Zhimin (a former official from the Hunan Province Automobile Company); Tan Ronghua (father of Furong District practitioner Tan Mimi); Li Zhigang (a former assistant researcher at the National Defense University) and Lei Yangfan (a former Hunan Resource Department manager at the Hunan Branch Office of the Bank of China).

Under Jian Xinhua’s directive, the numerous street committees, communities and police stations in the Furong District have harassed practitioners non-stop. In addition to Ms. Lian, a few other practitioners were also closely monitored in early May.

Names and Contract Information of Perpetrators
Furong District 610 Office head Jian Xinhua: 86-731-84683178
Deputy head Li Zengxin: 86-731-84683179, 86-13055185126
Changsha City 610 Office head Wu Zhibin: 86-731-88667548 (Office), 86-731-85070065 (Home), 86-13307310607 (Mobile)
Deputy head Wu Kaiming: 86-731-88667549 (Office), 86-731-85133270 (Home), 86-13319578855 (Mobile)
Laodaohe Brainwashing Centre head Wu Kaiming: 86-731-88667549 (Office), 86-731-85133270 (Home); 86-13319578855 (Mobile)
Deputy head Yang Lu: 86-13975805222 (Mobile)
Mawangdui Police Station: 86-731-84786110
Domestic Security Division policeman Fu Ping: 86-13787143288
Hunan Province Audit Bureau Security Department: 86-731-89976190

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/2011/5/20/241090.html