(Minghui.org) I am reluctant to recall my experience at Masanjia Forced Labor Camp because it was a nightmare. After petitioners' encounters at Masanjia were exposed worldwide recently, I felt shocked. I did not realize that the torture and horrendous treatment of Falun Gong practitioners was also being used on ordinary people.
I had been persecuted at Masanjia as a Falun Gong practitioner. Here are some of my persecution experiences and the things I learned in the small solitary confinement room that I was held in.
1. Iron chair on arrival at Masanjia
On my arrival at Masanjia, I was thrown into a room by several big men. I later learned that it was the jail of Masanjia, on the fourth floor of a building with security. I called out to go to the restroom, but no guards came. I started to do Falun Gong exercises. The guards soon came and said I could go to the restroom. There was an iron chair in the room, to which I was then handcuffed.
Torture Reenactment: Iron Chair
My limbs were fixed to the chair and I couldn’t move; my spine hurt greatly. It was a very painful experience.
However, I was aware of a Falun Gong practitioner who was suffering even more. She went on a hunger strike, and her hands were handcuffed to the two ends of a bench. She was force-fed many times. As a result, she coughed continuously, and she coughed up blood. Her voice became hoarse. The concentrated brine that she was force-fed made her suffer even more. She had not slept for many days because there was a speaker in the room broadcasting loud noise 24 hours a day.
On the second day, after the guards changed shift, I was taken to the No. 1 room, leaving the No. 3 room. Seeing that I was in a lot of pain, the guards released me from the iron chair and I could lie down to sleep. Several days later, a guard named Fan took everything out of the room, and I could only lie down on the floor.
The No. 1 room was the largest among the small solitary rooms. On the morning the beddings were taken away, Falun Gong practitioner Zhou Hua was detained there. Several hours later, she went to the restroom but did not return, because the guards had heard us exchange messages through their monitoring system. From then on, I learned that I was being monitored continuously.
2. Force-feeding
One day, a group of people wearing white uniforms went to the room next door. I listened carefully and realized that they were force-feeding someone. So I understood that whenever the speaker became louder, it was because the force-feeding crew had come. The loud noise was used to cover-up the screaming of the victims. When guards were doing evil deeds, Falun Gong practitioners would call out, “Falun Dafa is good!” The guards were then left feeling uneasy. This is what I heard from the guards.
Torture reenactment: Force-feeding (drawing)
Someone was stalking the corridor, and even watched me through the window. I muted the speaker, so that I could hear the guards talking. I thought, “Fellow practitioners are being persecuted, I cannot just turn a blind eye.” Whenever those people came to do evil deeds, I would call out, “Stop persecuting Falun Gong. Force-feeding is harmful.” Someone said, “We are trying to rescue her life, or else she would starve to death.” I said, “Doctors should help the wounded and dying people. We are innocent and being persecuted. You are helping the persecutors to do evil deeds.” A while later, the guard on duty came and handcuffed me to a bench near the window.
A practitioner in the next room had a weak heart. The continuous noise from the speaker every day made her feel extremely uncomfortable, plus every day force-feeding and handcuffing. At 10 p.m. one day, she could not stand it any longer, and hit her head against the door continuously. The guard on duty found her and called others to take her to the hospital.
Practitioners who were in the solitary rooms usually went on hunger strikes. Later, I learned that those people who did the force-feeding were actually guards, not doctors at all. Once when they force-fed practitioner Xia Yulan, they inserted the tube into her trachea. I heard Xia struggle with all her effort in the iron chair. She said with an unclear voice that the tube was inserted into the trachea. The guards then inserted the tube again. Xia was almost smothered. I could hear the sounds of force-feeding every day. My heart felt anxious all the time.
3. Room doors
When the practitioner hit the door with her head, I knew she would not harm herself, because the door was covered with thick foam. In order to persecute Falun Gong, the Chinese Communist Party spent a huge amount of money on building the Masanjia Forced Labor Camp.
When I was detained at the forced labor camp, the weather was cold. But guard Guan Liying took away my cotton-padded jacket.
When I felt very cold, I saw that the leather below the door was broken, so I took out the foam inside and inserted it into my clothes. The faom was 5 cm thick, and the quality was very good. I did not understand why the door was like that. As time went by, I understood that it was for sound proofing.
When the guards found the foam on me, they got angry, “You destroy public belongings. You should pay for it.” I said, “I asked you to give me back my jacket, but you would not. Please go and tell my family that I am still alive and where I am.” The guards were infuriated.
4. Rooms without windows
I was moved to several different rooms. This particular room had no window, which was a room inside a room, specially used to persecute people who would not listen to the guards.
My health was good, but once I got into this room, I felt like I had entered a plateau, because the air was very thin. The length of the room was a little longer than the straw mattress, so the door could not be opened widely. When I lay down along the width of the room, my head was next to the wall, and my feet reached the wall on the other end, but my legs had to lift high, even though I am less than 1.6 m (5'2”) tall.
I stayed there for half a day. As the guards could not see me in the monitor, because I was lying down next to the slot under the door, they later moved me to the No. 1 room again.
The above is just a little of my experience in Masanjia in 2005. After I got out of Masanjia and saw the support of righteous people, I really appreciated them.
I hope we can make efforts together to stop the persecution of Falun Gong by the Chinese Communist Party. Without truthfulness-compassion-tolerance, we could not live on this planet.
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