Inside the Labour Camps

  • The Persecution of Practitioners at the Hands of the Jiangsu Province Forced Labour Camp Bureau and Judong Women's Forced Labour Camp

    Tang Guofang, head of the education department in Jiangsu Province, has been the main perpetrator in charge of persecuting Falun Gong practitioners for the past eight years. Tang in Judong Women's Forced Labour Camp, has been viciously torturing practitioners both mentally and physically. As a result of being severely beaten by the guards, Ms. Zhu Ruifeng's neck was forced into her chest cavity. She had to be taken to a hospital in Zhenjiang City where her neck had to be straightened. Ms. Wu Shunzhen's lower body was burned with mosquito incense and her head was pushed into a urine bucket by a guard. Ms. Deng Jinmei and Ms. Zhu Jinmei were brutally beaten in prison. After they were released, they still suffered extreme pain from internal injuries.
  • Atrocities at Inner Mongolia's Tumuji Forced Labour Camp

    Practitioner Baosiqin Gaowa was imprisoned twice at the labour camp and was put in the brainwashing centre three times. The first time, she was put into the brainwashing centre for more than 40 days. A man named Guan beat her so severely that she suffered many serious injuries. A one-inch long scar below her mouth is still visible now. The second time she was again put into the brainwashing centre for more than 40 days. The third time, she was put in the centre for more than three days. She was forbidden to sleep for two days straight and was forced to stand the whole time. As a result, her feet became severely swollen.
  • Eyewitness Account: Falun Gong Practitioners Persecuted at Xinhua Forced Labour Camp in Mianyang City, Sichuan Province

    Mr. Lu Zhiyong, a practitioner around 40 years old, was a forestry policeman. He was sentenced to forced labour twice. His wife is imprisoned in Nanmusi Women's Forced Labour Camp in Sichuan Province. Mr. Lu refused to comply with the guards' unreasonable orders, so they tortured him. Head of the Sixth Division Su Xin directed several guards to shock him with electric batons until he fell unconscious. After he regained consciousness, the guards handcuffed him to a metal bed frame and kept shocking him. Mr. Lu was then put into a separate cell for "strict management," and his term at the forced labour camp was extended.
  • Exposing the Persecution of Falun Gong Practitioners in Shandong Province No. 1 Women's Forced Labour Camp

    From my own experience, I knew that imprisonment in a forced labour camp was just like entering a demon's den. Besides insolent guards, there were one or two inmates assigned to monitor and torture practitioners. The inmates cooperated with the guards to carry-out brainwashing, involving instilled falsehoods and absurdities, in attempts to force practitioners to "reform." If these measures were counter productive, the guards would strike out by themselves. For example, division head Sun Juan would kick the older practitioners' naked calves with her shoes on. If you asked, "Isn't beating people not allowed here?" She would answer flagrantly, "Is this beating you? What I did was to educate you." She often declared openly and shamelessly, "We often denigrate you practitioners or even beat you. Why don't we do the same thing to passers-by on the street or others but only to you? It is because we love you."
  • Ms. Jin Peixia Persecuted in Zhenjiang Public Security Bureau and Judong Women's Forced Labour Camp

    Ms. Jin Peixia is 64 years old this year. The Zhenjiang City Public Security Bureau of Jiangsu Province and the 610 Office have persecuted her just because she is determined to continue to practise Falun Gong. The prison guards instigated and controlled the drug addict and prostitute inmates to torture and harass the practitioners determined in their belief. Besides keeping the practitioners confined in the small cells and kept under tight surveillance, the guards also used other means to torture them, for example the so-called "husband and wife bed" (using an electric baton to shock the female practitioners' genitals). They refused to let the practitioners use the toilet, deprived them of sleep, and used unknown drugs to destroy their central nervous systems. Practitioners were not even allowed to talk to each other, nor were they allowed to make eye contact.
  • Forced Labour Situation at the No. 2 Labour Camp in Shandong Province

    The labour camps are used by the police to detain suspects and torture them without following any legal procedures, as there is no evidence against approximately two thirds of those who are detained in labour camps that they committed a crime or even disobeyed the law. When the police torture them but cannot find any criminal evidence, they send these people to forced labour camps to avoid trials and to cover up for their misconduct in enforcing the law. They also do this to make a profit by "selling the labour" of these detainees. In addition, they can make deals with the suspects for personal gains. For example, a criminal suspect given a forced labour sentence of three years could have it reduced to one year after some deals are made.
  • The Criminal Behaviour of Those in Charge at Wangcun Forced Labour Camp

    Just before the 2006 Chinese New Year practitioner Xu Ruliang wrote a disclaimer to declare that his statement obtained by forced-brainwashing was null and void. Guards hung Mr. Xu up by handcuffs for 13 days during the Chinese New Year. In October 2006, Mr. Xu once again voided his statement that had been obtained by force. Zheng Wanxin, Sun Fengjun, and other guards tortured him for a whole day with electric shock batons. His feet and back were covered with red and black scars. It was so painful that he couldn't take a shower for a month.
  • Crimes Committed In the Masanjia Forced Labour Camp

    When practitioners refused to wear the camp uniforms, they were beaten, cursed at, kicked, and hung up by handcuffs during the day. Their hands were handcuffed to the headboards at night, which meant that they couldn't turn over or move freely. After only a month in Masanjia they became very weak from being tortured. From April through May, practitioner Ms. Yuan Shuzhe was hung up for the entire two months, which caused compression of her lower spine. This can lead to paralysis.
  • Mr. Huang Liqiao Brutally Tortured in Several Forced Labour Camps in Tianjin

    Mr. Huang firmly believes in Falun Gong and refused to be "transformed". [brainwashed] Unfortunately he became a prime target for persecution at the Shuangkou Forced Labour Camp. The guards tried to force him to learn the prison regulations by heart and take a test, but he refused. Guards brutally beat him. When they were exhausted, they used an electric baton to shock him on his head and chest. His body twitched from the high voltage shocks and he slammed onto the concrete floor. Numerous burn marks appeared on his head and chest. The guards forced him to watch videos that slandered Falun Gong, and instigated other inmates to beat him.
  • Chen Zihui Tortured at the Changlinzi Forced Labour Camp in Harbin City

    In 2002 Mr. Chen was sent to the Changlinzi Forced Labour Camp and taken to division five, which is the most notoriously cruel division in the labour camp. The division leader Zhao Shuang is outrageous and vengeful. Under his leadership, guards tortured practitioners in just about every way imaginable. In order to "transform" [brainwash] practitioners, they forced them to squat from 5 am to midnight. Besides that, they also tortured practitioners with the "big hang up", electric shocks, pricking them with darts, allowing mice to bite them, pinching and rubbing their private parts, and push-break. The "push-break" is a where they push someone to the ground. A guard rides on top of the practitioner's body, with feet or knees against the practitioner's lower back, while at the same time pulling the practitioner's arms up and back. Some practitioners' arms were broken from this torture.
  • Chongqing Women's Forced Labour Camp Cruelly Tortures Falun Gong Practitioners

    Practitioners do forced labour every day. They get up at 6:00 a.m., brush their teeth, do morning exercise, have breakfast and then do forced labour with no breaks the whole day. They will finish the whole day's work at 9:30 p.m. at the earliest. If there is an urgent job, they usually have to work until 2:00 - 3:00 a.m. or even the whole night. When they sew mobile phone covers, they do not go back to their bedrooms for a whole week. If the practitioners refuse to work, they are punished by being forced to stand until 2:00 - 3:00 a.m. If they do not comply with the standing punishment, they are beaten with their hands and feet bound and their mouths taped, then dragged somewhere where no one can hear the noise.
  • Ms. Mao Jiangxin, in Her Sixties, and Ms. Song Xiaotang Cruelly Tortured by Wangcun Forced Labour Camp Officials

    Ms. Mao Jiangxin is in her 60s. The police sent her to Wangcun Women's Forced Labour Camp in early 2007. Because she refused to "reform," [give up Falun Gong]they locked her in a toilet, a specially built "small cell", with the windows and doors sealed. There is no air-flow in the toilet/cell and the foul odour is suffocating. Ms. Mao was often beaten and verbally abused by guards. In the winter the cell is as cold as a freezer. To reach the ordered "reform quota" and gain some petty profit, the three female guards attempted to force Ms. Mao to sign statements to renounce Falun Gong. Ms. Mao did not comply. Guards then ordered criminals to beat Ms. Mao's face and kick her body, making her fall onto the ice-cold floor.
  • Arrested Three Times and Imprisoned for Five Years in Masanjia Labour Camp: 58-Year-Old Shi Yingchun from Liaoning Province

    Ms. Shi Yingchun, 58, is from Huludao City, Liaoning Province. In the years of persecution of Falun Gong, Shi Yingchun has been arrested three times for practising the Falun Gong exercises in a a park and has been imprisoned and tortured for five years in total. In Masanjia Forced Labour Camp she was often beaten by guards. Compared to the physical torture, the mental torment was more cruel. Under the pressure and lies of warden Qiu Ping, Shi Yingchun was "transformed" and wrote a guarantee of "not practising any more". After that, she felt sad and depressed and often cried for no reason. Then she was sent to a mental hospital forcefully and prescribed some medication for mental disorders. She was forced to take the medication and so-called "punctuation" treatment in the forced labour camp. She felt awful after taking the medication and the treatment once, so they had to stop.
  • Falun Gong Practitioners on Hunger Strike Subjected to "Dead Man's Bed" Torture in Masanjia Forced Labour Camp

    On February 21st, 2008, the director of the No. 1 men's division of the Masanjia Forced Labour Camp obtained "dead man's beds" and forced all "personal cangues" [Note: "cangues" are detainees assigned to implement close surveillance on practitioners] to use them on Falun Gong practitioners who went on hunger strikes. According to eyewitnesses, four practitioners were viciously beaten by prison inmates. Practitioner Zhen Haitao and Chen Yan were tied to the "dead man's bed." Their limbs were stretched out in four different directions. An object was inserted in their mouths so that they could not close their mouths or speak. They were force fed, their lives are in danger.
  • Brainwashing and Abuse at the Qiqihar Forced Labour Camp

    From September 2001 to March 2003, I was detained in the forced labour camp in Qiqihar, Helongjiang Province. I encountered brutal brainwashing and was forced to do hard labour in a poisonous environment. In order to earn money in a low, base manner, the guards in the labour camp forced us into a one-story building nearby to pour pesticide into containers. The toxicity of some of the pesticides is very bad. After a whole day's work, some criminals had bloody noses, swollen eyes and faces, and chapped skin. People should have gas masks to pour pesticides, but we only had regular respirators. After a day's work, the toxic pesticide chemicals were all over our clothes, inside and out. We don't have hot water, let alone bathing facilities. Before meals, over 100 people had to wash their hands using water from the same basin and it was impossible to wash off all of the pesticide.