Since Chinese New Year's Day, 2005, in Shanghai alone, more than 90 practitioners have been arrested, detained, sentenced to forced labour camps and brainwashing centres, and tortured to death. According to recent reports, practitioner Ms. Zhang Ying is on the verge of death because she is refusing to accept any food or water to resist the brutal persecution of forced labour. This was Ms. Zhang Ying's third arrest. Before this she was sent to a forced labour camp for two and a half years for producing Falun Gong materials. Six months after being released she was arrested again and was forced to undergo brainwashing.

Ms. Zhao Fenglian, 54, started to practise Falun Gong in 1996. Although she is not literate, she actively spread Dafa. In 2001, she was sentenced to one year of forced labour because she was caught delivering leaflets exposing the persecution. In October 2003, she was arrested again and secretly sentenced to 4 years in prison. From September 2005, when Ms. Zhao was detained in Lanzhou Women's Jail, her health quickly deteriorated and she suffered from gastritis. As a result, she was unable to eat anything and became emaciated. After so-called "treatment," Ms. Zhao's health became worse and worse, and soon she was only skin and bones.

On November 22nd, 2005, Falun Dafa practitioners Mr. Yan Li and Mr. Wang Xiaodong were arrested by State Security Agents from the Chifeng City Police Department. Mr. Yan Li went on hunger strike to protest the persecution after being arrested. On December 5th, 2005, Mr. Yan Li's family received a phone call indicating that Mr. Yan Li was arrested, and that the family would receive the notice in the mail within several days. On December 7th, 2005, Mr. Yan Li's family arrived Chifeng City, but found out that Mr. Yan Li had already died.

"My wife, Yu Zhenghong, died as a result of the persecution on November 17th, 2005. Around 6:30 a.m. on September 27th, 610 Office agents ransacked our home and took my wife. They sent her to Wendeng Detention Centre. They used despicable means to attempt to force her to give up practising Dafa, and she held a hunger strike. She was taken to hospital on the 12th day to be force-fed. On the 14th day she was tortured to the brink of death and then transferred to Wendeng Central Hospital. My wife never recovered, and she passed away on November 17th, 2005 (at the age of 43)."

This is an extremely cruel torture. According to the drug addicts, no one can last ten minutes while being tortured this way. The practitioner's arms are pulled behind him. His hands are tied together so that the inside of his wrists are turned away from the body, and he is then hung by a pair of handcuffs. The pain is so excruciating that the practitioner usually cannot move his arms after a few minutes and will not recover until after a few months. Practitioners have become disabled through this torture.

Mr. Cui Shimin, a Falun Dafa practitioner from Liaoning Province, went to Beijing several times to appeal for justice for Falun Gong after the persecution began in 1999. He endured persecution by both the city and county police departments and eventually was fired from his job and forced into homelessness with his wife. In February 2005, police forcefully arrested Mr. Cui. The officers were so violent that they threw him to the ground, injuring his back as he held onto the home heating radiator while resisting the arrest. The injury was so severe that that even now he cannot walk with his back straight.

This photo shows a re-enactment of the torture method of spreading the body. Guards at Jinzhou Forced Labour Camp tie a practitioner to the metal bars of the bed with the arms and legs spread apart. Guards and criminal inmates (under the instruction of the guards) take turns beating the practitioner, kicking the practitioner's abdomen, forehead, back, face and mouth.

Mr. Ma Jianshe, 53 years old, used to have diabetes. After he practised Falun Gong, the disease vanished. After the persecution began he went to Beijing to appeal, but he was arrested, pummelled by the police, detained for more than 40 days, and illegally fined 2,600 yuan. Police went to Mr. Ma's home many times to search the place and harass him and took him to a brainwashing session. They threatened, "If we find even a little Falun Gong material, we will go after you until you have lost everything." He suffered a relapse of his old disease and left the world on June 13th, 2005.

Ms. Liu Baolan, 67 years old, was a retired teacher. To tell the facts to the government, she went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong twice. She was detained and sent to the notorious Shibalihe Forced Labour Camp in Zhengzhou City, Henan Province. Although she was over age for a labour camp, the government agents gave her a one-year sentence anyway. For years after that, the agents harassed her at her home. She was thrown into a stupor, became paralysed, and developed oedema all over. Liu Baolan passed away on November 8th, 2005.

In November 2005, the 97-year old father of Falun Gong practitioner Tian Fujin was severely ill and bedridden. He was expecting his son and granddaughter to come home and see him, but both were in prison. The Wuyuan Forced Labour Camp, however, refused to release them. On November 18th, 2005, Tian Fujin's father died. Tian Fujin and his daughter did not see him before he passed away. Mr. Tian Fujin's family has been torn apart for the last six years, six of his family members were subjected to persecution and sentenced to forced labour camps and prisons.

Mr. Li Yequan is a 38-year-old practitioner. He is now being brutally abused at the Daqing Detention Centre. He has been on a hunger strike for 56 days to protest the illegal treatment. Every day, for 24 hours, he is handcuffed, shackled, and force-fed. A guard forced a litre of hard liquor down his throat and spat on him. They also poured cold water on Li Yequan. Due to being force-fed three times a day, Mr. Li's oesophagus has been badly injured. He shows symptoms of pneumonia and mental disorientation and his body temperature has dropped. He is extremely weak, has slipped into a coma many times and is now dying.

Falun Gong practitioner Ms. Jin Minghua has been sentenced to forced labour camp twice for her belief in "Truthfulness, Compassion, Forbearance" and for her steadfast insistence on being a good person. Jin Minghua's 11-year-old daughter suddenly lost her mother's love and the warmth of her family. She had to live at home all by herself. She suffered a mental collapse and was sent to a mental hospital. The family was originally told that the hospitalisation would be free of charge. In March 2005, after being released from the forced labour camp, Ms. Jin Minghua went to visit her daughter in the hospital. Her daughter's medical bill was more than 20,000 yuan.

Zhao Shuang is head of Division No. 5 at the Changlinzi Labour Camp in Harbin City. He is extremely cruel when persecuting Falun Gong practitioners. He follows the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and frequently said, "Killing a Falun Gong practitioner is just a matter of filling out a form saying it was a normal death. The labour camp has a large enough death quota." Zhao Shuang often told practitioners, "Torturing you is entertainment for me! Don't tell me about humanity! I do not have any humanity! If you make me upset, I might torture you to death."

In Xuzhou Mental Hospital practitioners were tied to beds, given injections and force-fed unknown drugs. Medical staff members injected large dosages of unknown drugs. Immediately after the injections, we would lose consciousness. After some time, we regained consciousness, and then the medical staff would untie the ropes (used to restrain us). When the drugs took effect, it felt very painful, as if our internal organs were being torn apart. We would roll on the floor screaming with pain. After we regained consciousness, we would question the medical staff, "Why did you inject us and feed these drugs to us when we are not sick??" They answered shamefully, "It is not up to us. The people at the top instructed us to do so.

Recently the family of Dafa practitioner Zhao Hongli received a phone call from Panjin Prison authorities. They were requested to visit Zhao Hongli, who had already been on hunger strike for more than forty days. When Mr. Zhao's family arrived at the prison, Zhao Hongli had already been taken back to the prison from the hospital. When the family saw Zhao Hongli, he was lying on a bed with his face up, and he could not move. His hands and legs were cuffed, he was given IVs and plastic tubes were stuck in his nose. The prison was forcibly giving him IVs and feeding him. Zhao Hongli was emaciated and had difficulty talking. They never mentioned releasing him.

Falun Gong practitioner Ms. Meng Lijun was unjustly arrested. This, her ninth arrest, occurred on September 27th, 2005. She has been incarcerated at the Jinan City Detention Centre for two months. She is now on the brink of death after holding a long hunger strike. Her husband goes to the detention centre almost weekly and asks to see his wife. The authorities not only deny his requests, but also threaten him. The police stated, "We won't release her, even if she dies from the hunger strike."

As a matter of fact, every practitioner who arrived at the prison would be watched by several inmates. Everything he said and did would be strictly controlled. The perpetrators would talk to him during the day and force him to study and write his "confessions" in the evening. They also deprived practitioners of sleep. Until the practitioner renounced Falun Gong, he would not be allowed to sleep for more than five hours a day. These steadfast practitioners were physically and mentally injured as a result of such maltreatment.

In the summer of 2002, I was reported to the police for telling the facts of Falun Dafa to people who had been misled by the government propaganda and exposing the persecution. The local security office sentenced me to three years of forced labour and then sent me to the Masanjia Forced Labour Camp. During the three years I was tortured at the Masanjia Labour Camp, my husband also suffered tremendously at home. During the three years of detention in Masanjia I suffered every day under intense labour and was only served stale and mouldy food.

In the prison systems of Heilongjiang Province, practitioners are detained mostly in eight prisons. Among those prisons, Hulan Prison and Harbin Prison carry out the most ferocious brainwashing and persecution. They employ all sorts of physical torture and abuse. The "Intensive Section" in Harbin Prison, the First Section and the Ninth Section have all persecuted practitioners to death. The practitioners detained in the Harbin Prisons have now been transferred to other prisons in the province.

Ms. Chen Jianhua, about fifty-one years old, appealed in Beijing for justice for Falun Dafa in 1999. The authorities extorted more than ten thousand yuan from her. She was imprisoned at a detention centre, and handcuffed to a chair. She was deprived of sleep and force-fed. Ms. Chen was brutally tortured and she was only released when she was on the verge of death. Later six police officers arrested Ms. Chen in 2005, took her to a brainwashing centre and tortured her. She was finally released because of her poor health. Ms. Chen passed away on March 20th, 2005.

Ms. Lu Cuihua was about 68 years old. She lived in Dalian City, Liaoning Province. After she started cultivating Falun Dafa in 1996, her cerebral hemorrhage was cured. She went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Dafa and was detained twice and harassed many times. A group of police officers stormed into her house and searched her home illegally. They arrested her and took her to the police station. She was tortured until she was unable to walk. She was released only after a hospital diagnosis. Under the long period of persecution, she became very nervous and was afraid of meeting people. She was found dead in her house on October 17th, 2005.

Practitioner Ms. Wang Ruo'e was taken from her home and brought to the brainwashing centre on September 6th, 2005. Although she is elderly and already in her seventies, the authorities did not allow her to get a proper amount of sleep and forced her to write the "three statements". Against her will, she signed them, when she could no longer bear the physical torture. The next day she became very depressed about what she had done and tore up the document, declaring that she refused to be brainwashed. Ms. Wang Ruo'e has still not been released.

Falun Gong practitioner Mr. Fei Weidong, a middle school teacher told the facts of Falun Dafa to people in a shop on October 17th, 2005. The owner reported him. The police arrived and closed the shutters to the shop, then they beat Fei Weidong to death. An autopsy was performed and the body was cremated soon afterwards. The ashes were returned to Fei Weidong's family. The authorities claimed Fei Weidong died from heart disease. They refused the family the right to make enquiries. According to witnesses, there was a large hole on each of Fei Weidong's temples, and all of his front teeth were knocked out. The police beating was savage.

The jailers torture the practitioners by tying their wrists and ankles with cloth ropes. They tighten the ropes until they cut into the practitioner's wrists and ankles so the practitioner cannot move. They then tie the other end of the ropes to bed posts, and pull on the rope until the practitioner's body is fully stretched out and hanging in the air. They constantly tighten the rope. Almost all practitioners who were tortured this way had ongoing pain in their backs and legs. Some practitioners had blisters on their arms and legs, and some practitioners had swollen hands and feet that were black and blue because the ropes impeded blood circulation. This method of tying people is unprecedented in terms of cruelty.

Sixty-six-year old Ms. Ma Rangliao was forced to report regularly to the police station for more than a year. Because she spread the truth about Falun Dafa, her home was illegally searched and her property was confiscated many times. She was held in a detention centre and sent to a brainwashing centre twice. The police threatened her and her family repeatedly and did not allow her to have contact with others. Because of the long-term harassment and intimidation from the police and other authorities, she endured intense mental and physical pressure. Her health began to deteriorate in 2002. She passed away on October 22nd, 2002.

This eye-witness account of the persecution against Falun Gong escaped circuitously from the Harbin Women's Prison on a piece of cloth. A practitioner transcribed the hand-written message on the cloth and compiled this article. Starting in September 2004, practitioners have suffered more severe tortures. Some practitioners were hung from the upper frame of a bunk bed by their back-cuffed hands - with feet above the ground for over three months. Others were forced to sit on the concrete floor for up to four months.

My name is Wang Jinfeng. I am 40 years old and live in Liaoning Province. On May 23rd, 2002, I was sentenced to Masanjia Forced Labour Camp for two-and-a-half years. During this period I witnessed the guards beating and torturing Dafa practitioners. They tied the practitioners' legs, shocked them with electric batons, slapped their mouths, forced them to squat, didn't allow them to sleep for days on end, forced them to stand on a small brick and detained them in solitary confinement, among other methods.

Falun Dafa practitioner Mr. Liu Zhirong was a teacher. He was arrested and held in detention several times since 1999, because he went out to appeal for justice for Falun Dafa. In July 2002, Liu Zhirong left the detention centre. The police searched for him and lived at his home for several days straight. They intimidated his wife to turn him over to the police, but she refused. The police followed and monitored his family. During the time Liu Zhirong lived away from home, he broadcast videos telling the facts of Falun Dafa in Gansu Province. On October 25th, 2002, he was sentenced to 15 years in prison at the Chengguan Court in Lanzhou City.

Years of torture in detention left Ms. Zhang Xihui mentally disordered. When she was released from hospital, Ms. Zhang Xihui had lost her memory and was mentally unstable. According to some insiders, they may have given her nerve-damaging drugs. She had oedema in most areas of her body. No matter what anyone asked her, she would always reply, "I already had a meal. I ate some noodles." Every once in a while, she would say, "If you would allow me to do the exercises, I would not be like this."

Mr. Wang Yuesheng was 57 years old. Nonetheless, in August 2001 officers from the local 610 Office arrested Wang Yuesheng. Mr. Wang's wife, Ms. Li Ai'liang, is also a Falun Dafa practitioner. Ms. Li was sentenced to three years of "re-education" through forced labour in exchange for her husband's freedom. Since then, public security officials continuously harassed Mr. Wang, which put a lot of pressure on him and his family. During the years of persecution he suffered, Mr. Wang was tortured both physically and mentally. Finally, his former illnesses returned, and he passed away on November 4th, 2005.

"Our daughter Gao Rongrong, 37, was subjected to inhuman torture in Longshan Forced Labour Camp. The guards shocked Gao Rongrong for six to seven hours. The skin of her face, ears, neck, back and ankle were severely burned and charred. There were big blisters. Although she escaped for the prison hospital she was later re-captured and tortured to death. Why did they inform us one week after Gao Rongrong was admitted to the hospital and in a deep coma? If they had informed us on the day (June 6th) when she just was admitted to the hospital, Gao Rongrong could have been saved with her family's support. Why and how could this turn out like this?"

"I was brutally tortured at the Masanjia Forced Labour Camp. After three years of torture, I developed many diseases including heart disease, hypertension, vasculitis, cystitis and diabetes. Even now, I still have difficulty walking. In early November 2002, the division leader tried to force me to wear a label indicating that I am being "re-educated" through forced labour. I sternly refused and said, "I am a good person. I didn't commit any crimes. I refuse to wear such a label." Upon saying this, I was tied up with ropes by the guards for three days. The police hung me by handcuffs for more than two hours each night. Some practitioners were tied up like this for more than twenty days."

"I was arrested while distributing materials about the truth of Falun Gong in December 2002. On January 6th, 2003, the public security sub-bureau of Jiamusi suburb sent me and nine other practitioners to the local labour camp without any legal procedure. We were led into dorms on the first floor, in which there were "collaborators" awaiting us. These people surrounded me and persuaded me to write statements to betray Dafa, but I told them I would never do such a thing. Then some of them pressed me on the bed, and wrested one of my arms under the side of bed to my back and the other arm up from my shoulder. Then they kept me in this position and handcuffed the wrists tightly. The handcuff cut into my muscle and I suffered painfully."

Mr. Bai Jiazhen, 60 years old, was a retired official of a town government in Shandong Province. After practising Falun Dafa, many of his illnesses disappeared, and he had very good health. However, the police illegally searched his home, threatened him, and cancelled his salary when Falun Gong was banned on July 20th of 1999. He was sentenced to a forced labour camp after returning from appealing for Falun Gong in Beijing. In the labour camp, he was treated inhumanely, forced to labour beyond his physical strength, and brainwashed. He developed mental problems and died on September 19th, 2004.

"Why is it so hard to be a good person in China? They dared to do such violence to me, a good lady in her fifties. I hereby call on all people with conscience to pay attention to the evil crimes that happened to me. If the persecution of Falun Gong does not stop, these tragedies will continue. Right now, I am suffering after the shock of being raped, I feel blurry minded, and my lower body is in constant pain. If I did not know from Falun Dafa that suicide is a sin, I probably would have already left this world. I lost the courage to live, and the confidence to face the world. I only hope the world's people will wake up. I wish this persecution will end soon, and wish these kinds of crimes will end soon!"

Two years ago, when some criminals designated by the guards were slandering and smearing Teacher Li and Dafa, Mr. Chen Baoliang, a practitioner from Tianjin City, stood up and calmly said to them, "You can argue if you have enough reason, but do not call names at will." Just for saying this, the criminals publicly beat Mr. Chen to death. The guards later took his body to the hospital and got a medical certificate that said Mr. Chen had died of "a heart attack." The murderers were not held responsible for their actions. On the contrary, they were released three months ahead of schedule as a reward for "actively supporting government agents."

"I am going to expose all I have witnessed when being an inmate in the Shuangkou Forced Labour Camp. Since practitioners are often transferred between teams and we were not allowed to talk to each other, also, all the tortures happened secretly. The first night of being there I was beaten with a big pickax handle, which is a torture every newcomer is subjected to. 67-year-old Zhang Baozhu, who was a government official, was beaten to the ground with the pickax handle. The guard yelled at him, "Now will you write a repentance letter?""

One day in 2001, Ms Feng Shumei was telling the facts of Falun Dafa to people who had been misled by the government propaganda when police abducted her. She was sentenced to two years of forced labour. Feng Shumei was shocked with electric batons, brutally beaten and subjected to brainwashing at the Heizuizi Forced Labour Camp. The guards deprived her of sleep and forced her to do slave labour. She was detained 20 days past her term. During her detention, the officials deprived her son of a job opportunity because of his mother's Falun Gong practice.

Mr. Yu Shujin, 55 years old, has been unjustly arrested ten times in the past several years for appealing for Falun Dafa and distributing leaflets exposing the persecution. He was detained and persecuted in Tiebei Prison for more than a year. On June 25th, 2004, the Public Security Department of Shulan City secretly and illegally sentenced Mr. Yu Shujin to 12 years. He has been tortured to the point that he now has cirrhosis of the liver and his body and stomach are swollen. He cannot eat, has difficulty breathing, and is in critical condition.

Dafa practitioner Mr. Liu Jianjun was twice at the brink of death, and Ms. Zhao Xiaolu was tortured until she sustained brain damage. She lost the vision in her left eye and her leg muscles atrophied. She has not recovered. To this day, she still stumbles whenever she walks. In May 2002, four officers arrested Ms. Li Hong at her home. They took her to a brainwashing centre, where she was completely deprived of personal freedom for 32 months and was violently tortured. She could not meet with or take care of her family. Wang Runcheng, the head of the brainwashing centre threatened practitioner Wang Zhong saying, "If you try to escape, I'll shoot to kill!"

Ms. Jiang Zhenmei was 75 years old. She went to Beijing to appeal for Dafa and as a result was arretsed and since that time detained on many occasions. In September 2001, the authorities sent her to a brainwashing centre where she was brutally tortured for more than four months. A guard savagely beat Ms. Jiang. She was also forced to stand for a long time in the chilly winter wind. After Jiang Zhenmei returned home, the authorities put her under long-term surveillance and arbitrarily harassed her. Along with the long-term mental stress of the persecution, Ms. Jiang became extremely weak, and died on October 28th, 2005.

The prison applied all kinds of soft and hard tactics to force the practitioners to "transform" and give up their belief in Falun Gong. The inmates were rewarded with a six-month term reduction if they forced a practitioner to "transform." Under such incitement and seduction, the inmates covered the practitioners' eyes, and beat and kicked them frenziedly. They violently whipped them with steel chains, handcuffed the practitioners' hands behind their backs and hung them up for long durations. This is only a fraction of the vicious treatment they meted out.

Practitioner Ms. Pei Shuhua was arrested when she was telling the facts of Falun Dafa to people who had been misled by the government propaganda on November 4th, 2005. To protest the persecution she immediately went on hunger strike, which has now lasted for over two weeks. Instead of releasing her, the authorities transferred her to the central hospital of Jilin Province Prison Administration Bureau and continued their persecution. Visits by her family members have not been permitted. We still do not know if she is alive or dead or what her current condition is.

During his time in a detention centre, Geng Huaipu was tortured with a method called "bathing" (having large buckets of freezing cold water poured on him in chilly weather). Criminal inmates in the detention centre beat and kicked Mr. Geng, causing numerous injuries. These photos were taken ten days after he left the detention centre.

"The police at the Plaza Precinct of Hengyang City arrested me on a tip while I was distributing leaflets exposing the persecution, and kept me in custody for 15 days. At the precinct, a young officer beat me savagely, grabbing me by the hair and repeatedly throwing me against the wall. He kicked me ferociously, and I was not allowed even to sit for the whole night. The pain in my head lasted for a year. Fifteen days after I was in detention, my husband got me out, spending over 4000 yuan as "asking-for-favour fees"."

In April 2001, Ms. Wang was arrested and taken to a detention centre, where she was subjected to inhumane torture. She went on a hunger strike to protest. Police held her on the ground, pinched her cheeks, and pried her teeth open with chopsticks or an iron spoon before violently force-feeding her. They continued to hit her until her face was swollen and she nearly chocked to death. The prison doctor even inserted a tube into her stomach and filled it with highly concentrated salt water, which caused her to vomit and suffer greatly. Ms. Wang nearly died several times.

At Dongchengfang Town Police Station, a policeman named He Xuejian raped 51-year-old Ms. Liu Jizhi and 42-year-old Ms. Han Yuzhi during the so-called "official investigation." After the rape, the police told Ms. Liu Jizhi to mop the floor, clean up the rooms and the office. According to Ms. Liu Jizhi, her legs were weak and she was absent-minded for she was shell-shocked from the horrible rape. During the rape, He Xuejian repeatedly slapped Ms. Liu's face and choked her neck. For the past few days since the rape, Ms. Liu has been crying and sobbing every day and staring blankly.

40-year-old Falun Dafa practitioner Mr. Dong Hongqiang had been detained many times by the County 610 Office or the police. He had been sentenced to three and a half years of forced labour, and was tortured in the Xinmi Forced Labour Camp. He was injected with unknown drugs while four or five people held him down. Ever since the poisonous injection, Dong Hongqiang became very weak, his belly became extremely bloated, and he suffered a mental collapse. He was severely emaciated and had difficulty breathing. Mr. Dong suffered a mental collapse, which led to his death on November 9th, 2005.

Ms. Long Lianqiu, 53, was from Gansu Province. In 2002, the police went to her home to confiscate her Dafa materials and detained her. After she was tortured to the point of becoming very sick, she was released on bail and went home. Because the police often harassed her, she was under severe psychological pressure. She was sent to a brainwashing centre. She was persecuted and sustained a cerebral hemorrhage. At that time, the police arrested and detained her daughter. Ms Long was ill at ease and worried. In addition, the police often went to her home to threaten her. Finally, she died on September 11th, 2005.

On October 20th, 2005, all middle and elementary schools in Wu'an City abruptly organised their students to complete a survey about Falun Gong. Lawless officials marked the surveys "Confidential: Keep Private" to conceal their guilty consciences. There was no official seal or organisation's name on any of the documents. The first question was about their attitude towards Falun Gong. The second and the third questions were meant for young children who haven't understood the truth about reporting Falun Gong practitioners. The questions pressured the children to agree to report practitioners.