The Epoch Times

Oct 29, 2004

NEW YORK - At times, Ms. Wang Yuzhi struggled to read her opening speech. One of her eyes that had been blinded from torture in a Chinese labor camp gave her trouble, forcing her to use a lens to read her statement. At Earl Hall of Columbia University she talked about her new book, Crossing Over Death, - a chronicle of the persecution she faced in China.

Wang was persecuted in China for refusing to give up the meditation practice Falun Gong when it was banned in 1999. She said that she gained a lot from Falun Gong.

"The stock market had gone down, and all my life savings with it. This caused great difficulties for my elderly mother. When I was desperate and pained, someone introduced me to Falun Gong. Through practicing it, I overcame my fear and pain, and went back to work. Eventually, I was able to build a successful business." Falun Gong also helped her recover from her chronic ill health, she said in a statement.

In July of 1999, former Chinese leader, Jiang Zemin - upset at the widespread popularity of the practice - began a state-sponsored persecution of Falun Gong that utilized China's state-controlled media and all branches of China's communist government. Ms. Yuzhi, like millions of others who had benefited from the practice, went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong.

After that, she said, began a horrifying tale of how "people who believed in truthfulness, compassion and tolerance [Falun Gong's principles] were forced to shed blood, tears and their lives for their beliefs."

She was put in a labor camp where a husband was forced to watch his 6-month pregnant wife cuffed by her wrists and dangled in the air - a torture that eventually caused the woman to have a miscarriage. In the same labor camp, a few blocks away from her, a female practitioner was gang-raped by three male criminals.

In a mental hospital she was placed in just before her escape to Canada, she heard a husband sob and cry as he watched his wife being force-fed salt water by police. The wife had refused to give up Falun Gong.

Wang Yuzhi's story is touching and tragic at the same time. Mr. Feng Lin, a Chinese Communist Party history scholar and political commentator, said of the book, "It reminds us that persecution and darkness still exist in today's society, and that sometimes we take our blessings for granted... People say that things [in China] are better, but inside, there's still a lot of persecution, while on the outside, it's all milk and honey."

Among the other speakers, Mr. Zhiyuan Wang - an investigator for the World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong - talked about his organization's attempts to document the deaths of practitioners and how the Chinese Communist Party has expended 25 percent of its national GDP on persecuting Falun Gong--one-third of which, he said, is sustained by foreign investment.

Mr. Tianliang Zhang, China Affairs Columnist for The Epoch Times (Chinese edition), said, "In Ms. Wang Yuzhi's book, you will read about persecution, but nowhere do you see hatred against the persecutors. The compassion shown by Falun Gong practitioners towards their persecutors is a first in history."

Ms. Wang Yuzhi's book Crossing Over Death is currently available only in Chinese.

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