(Minghui.org) The Chinese New Year is a time for families in mainland China to be with their loved ones, however, many practitioners cannot be with their families because they practice Falun Gong. Due to the persecution, countless practitioners have been arrested, detained, killed, and disabled by the Chinese Communist authority.
The state security police in Tongliao City, Inner Mongolia made another series of arrests before the New Year, causing many families to be separated.
Ms. Zhang Ping was illegally arrested on August 22, 2013 for handing out Shen Yun Performing Arts DVDs. She has been held in a detention center for over five months.
Officers Wang Bo and Xu Jing went to Ms. Zhang's home, arrested her husband Mr. Song Bingfu at 3 p.m. on January 24, 2014, and took him to the Hexi Detention Center.
Mr. Song's daughter is close to 13 years old, and suffers from congenital deafness. Mr. Song is the only son of his 86-year-old mother. His neighbors and relatives hid the truth of her son's arrest, worried that she could not withstand the news.
Several days before the New Year, the elderly lady stood in front of the window everyday, looking forward to spending the New Year with her son and daughter-in-law who cannot come home.
Police from the Tongliao Domestic Security Division broke into the home of Ms. Zhou Baihong at 3 p.m. on January 24, 2014. She was not home, so the police lied to her family and said, “Do not worry, we just want to ask her to sign a document.”
Ms. Zhou was forced to flee home to avoid persecution, and her whereabouts are unknown. Officer Wang Bo went to her relatives' homes to try and find her.
Ms. Zhou's husband Sun Zhanmin suffers from cancer, and her young child is in school. Mr. Sun is ill and cannot do heavy work, so all the housework was done by Ms. Zhou. After she left home, her husband and son fell into hardship, and they won't be able to celebrate Chinese New Year.
Ms. Liu Xiurong, 63, was arrested on August 23, 2013, for putting up a sticker with the words “Truthfulness-Compassion-Tolerance is good” on it. She also faces a prison sentence. The local Procuratorate fabricated a document to frame her, but the case was rejected twice due to many loopholes in the evidence. But the police still refused to let her go. Ms. Liu's daughter appealed to rescue her mother, but was threatened by Wang Bo, chief of the Domestic Security Division.
Ms. Liu's family of six all practice Falun Gong, and suffered relentless persecution. Her husband Mr. Tian Fujin died from torture, while the rest of the family's prison terms add up to 39 years. Her family members have been repeatedly arrested over the years, and Ms. Liu and her daughter were detained in the same cell at the same labor camp five times.
Ms. Liu's second daughter Tian Xin recalls: Her father, mother, elder sister and younger brother were all arrested in that year, and she was also imprisoned in a forced labor camp, leaving her 11-year-old son at home alone. He was so frightened that he vomited and fainted, and has been left permanently terrified by his ordeal. Tian Xin also witnessed the horrors of her father dying in prison, and when he was still barely breathing, the guards spoke about how they all wanted to go home, and hoped for her father's quick death.
Ms. Liu's family never reunited over the years. Before this New Year, Ms. Tian wrote an open letter to Inner Mongolia authorities, demanding the release of her mother. She wrote: I have lost my father, I can't live without mother, and my mother is still suffering from torture at the Hexi Detention Center.