(Minghui.org) Wangzhuang is a small town in Chengde City, Hebei Province. Since the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), led by party leader Jiang Zemin, began a brutal campaign of persecution against Falun Gong in July of 1999, practitioners in Hebei Province have suffered tremendously.
Ms. Xu Suxia lives in Wangzhuang, and is one of those who suffered. She recently submitted an article to the Minghui.org website, giving an account of her experiences.
Xu Suxia took up the practice of Falun Gong - a spiritual system based on the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Forbearance - in July of 1998. Although she had illnesses, once she started the practice, her physical health rapidly improved, and she became more open-minded as well.
After the persecution of Falun Gong began, Ms. Xu was arrested and illegally detained on four different occasions, including an 18-month detention in a forced labor camp, and a four-month-detention at a CCP brainwashing facility. For nearly 20 years, she has been harassed relentlessly by police and local officials, for following her beliefs.
Here is her story.
Three Arrests in Two Years
I was first arrested on July 20, 2000, and forced to attend a brainwashing session organized by local officials. They held me and other practitioners in a damp basement, where we were forced to sleep on the floor. Seeing spider webs covering the walls, and bugs crawling across the floor, I suggested we do a group meditation instead. Shortly after we began, we were reported to the town manager. He sent us to a local detention center to serve a 15-day detention.
After my release, I continued my practice of Falun Gong, and in December I traveled with two other practitioners to Beijing to appeal to the government. There, I was arrested for a second time.
They first took me back to my hometown and detained me for seven days, before transferring me to the Chengde Detention Center. At Chengde, I was forced to stand on one leg in the snow, while guards slapped my face, hit me with rubber clubs, and poured cold water all over my body. Later I was tied down and force-fed through a tube.
After detaining me for more than 50 days - and extorting 3,000 yuan from me – I was released on February 6, 2001.
The third time I was arrested was on April 5, 2002. Officers from the Yingzi Mining Police Department, and local police, searched my home, and confiscated my Falun Gong materials. I was taken to the police station for interrogation.
I refused to tell them where the materials came from, so they sent me back to Chengde. After witnessing the brutal torture of four Falun Gong practitioners, I went on a hunger strike to protest their treatment. But the guards at the detention center held me down and force-fed me through a tube, for 10 days.
Two months later, I was sentenced to forced labor – for refusing to renounce my faith.
Brutal Torture in a Labor Camp
On June 6, 2002, I was transferred to the Gaoyang Labor Camp. A detailed description of the torture I endured was covered in a previous report. Here I would like to highlight some of the torture methods used on me, and others.
At Gaoyang, the guards beat practitioners frequently, and started on me right after I arrived. A captain of the guards took me to a small room. I remember her name: Ye Shuxian.
When she saw I would not renounce my belief in Falun Gong, she slapped me in the face and beat me with shoes. She stomped hard on my bare feet, with her leather boots. Several other guards pinched me, kicked me, and beat me. These beatings lasted well into the evening. My face became so swollen and deformed, I was unable to see anything.
Electric shock was another method guards used to torture me. It was applied to me by a guard (surnamed “Li”) that same day I arrived at the camp. On June 22, another guard (surnamed “Liang”) handcuffed me and asked an inmate to shock me with electric batons. This went on for an hour. When they finally stopped, my hands and feet were covered with blisters that oozed a yellow fluid.
In November of 2002, when the CCP was holding its 16th National Congress in Beijing, two guards—each holding an electric baton—shocked me for over two hours straight. A few days later, three guards shocked me, simultaneously, until I collapsed on the floor, shaking violently. But still, I would not give up my belief.
One winter night the guards took me out near a river, and handcuffed my arms around a tree. “Will you still practice Falun Gong?” they asked. “Yes,” I said. So they left me there for over five hours. It was very cold. When they finally returned, I was unable to walk, due to the cold and hours of standing, cuffed to the tree. Later I heard other practitioners in the camp also suffered the same abuse that day.
Sleep deprivation was another method used on me. On May 4, 2003, guards took me to a room, where they took turns asking me to stop my practice, and did not allow me to sleep. Whenever I closed my eyes, the guards would beat me.
To protest the tremendous physical and mental torture, I sometimes would shout out, “Falun Dafa is good!” When I did this one morning in April of 2003, an inmate came up and covered my mouth, while a guard started beating me. Then Captain Ye came in and handcuffed me to a pipe, and she and another guard beat and kicked me all morning. For a while, this was a daily occurrence.
One day officials from other cities came to tour the labor camp. I saw them and called aloud, “Falun Dafa is good!” A guard reacted violently and started shocking me with an electric baton, while another guard kicked me in the face, and beat me. This brutality lasted for six hours, leaving my face completely swollen.
Although I was scheduled to be released at the end of December 2003, I was held for an additional 15 days, and eventually released on January 14, 2004.
Four Months in a Brainwashing Center
After my release from Gaoyang, local police constantly harassed me, and on May 16, 2004, I was arrested once again. This time they sent me to a brainwashing center in Chengde City, where I was held for four months. The guards force-fed me, and beat me, viciously.
After my release from the brainwashing center, the harassment from local police and officials continued. Prior to the Olympic Games held in China in 2008, two police officers came to my home and took away my ID card, to stop me from going to Beijing to appeal against the persecution.
In January of 2010, police officers came to my home several times and took my Falun Gong book (I managed to retrieve it later). Agents from the local 610 Office visited me in June 2012 and tried – unsuccessfully - to pressure me into writing a statement to renounce my belief.
I would not renounce my faith in Falun Gong.
Related Reports:
Ms. Xu Suxia Tortured in Gaoyang Labor Camp in Hebei Province for Years
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