(Minghui.org) Ms. Zhang Wei, a Jilin City, Jilin Province, resident, has been incarcerated numerous times for her faith in Falun Gong. Her most recent imprisonment was a 7-year sentence from 2013 to 2020. She suffered tremendously in prison, and her pension was suspended during her term.
Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a spiritual and meditation discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.
Arrested for Her Faith
Ms. Zhang, 59, was arrested at home on the evening of July 19, 2001. Police officers ransacked her apartment and took away her personal belongings, including Falun Gong books, exercise music CDs, and a meditation mat. She later escaped from the local police station and became destitute and homeless for over four months.
Ms. Zhang was arrested again after going to Beijing in November 2001 to appeal for Falun Gong. She displayed a banner on Tiananmen Square with information about Falun Gong. A police officer kicked her in the chest, which almost knocked her out.
She was locked up in a metal cage at a police station in Beijing. The police stripped off her clothes to search her body. They also beat and shocked her with electric batons because she refused to tell them her name and address.
After the police found out her name and address, they summoned her family and manager at work to Beijing to take her back. Her family was made to pay all the expenses. She was detained for 13 days.
Detained in a Brainwashing Facility
Ms. Zhang’s work unit received an order that if Falun Gong practitioners in their unit did not sign the statement renouncing Falun Gong, the work unit’s Communist Party secretary would be laid off. So her work unit readily collaborated with the police to arrest her in spring 2004. Many other Falun Gong practitioners who worked for the same railroad system that her work unit was associated with were also arrested at the same time. They were all detained for a month in a brainwashing facility where they were forced to go through programs that defamed Falun Gong. The authorities collected 3,300 yuan in living expenses for each practitioner from their respective work units.
8-Year Old Niece Traumatized
Over a dozen officers from the Jilin National Security Team broke into Ms. Zhang’s apartment on December 24, 2013. They beat her up and forced her to kneel down in front of her 8-year-old niece. The child wailed uncontrollably and was traumatized.
After taking Ms. Zhang and her niece away, the police confiscated her personal belongings including Falun Gong books, computers, laser printers, blank CDs, printer paper, and more than 5,000 yuan in cash.
Suffering from Various Torture Methods
Ms. Zhang was tied up in a metal chair while she was detained in the No. 1 Special Police Room and in the Changyi Public Security Bureau, with her hands handcuffed to the back of the chair and her feet to the metal ring under the chair. During the interrogation with torture, the police covered the surveillance camera.
An officer surnamed Sun said, “Now tell me what bad things have you done.” Ms. Zhang replied, “I haven't done anything bad!” Sun threatened, “I’m just a machine, a hand of the Communist Party. I will hit anyone it asks me to.”
The police first poured water on Ms. Zhang’s head. Her winter jacket and pants were soaked. They then taped over Ms. Zhang’s mouth, and inserted two lit cigarettes into her nostrils, until the cigarettes almost burned her lips. When inhaling, smoke was inhaled into the trachea that caused her to choke and cough ceaselessly. When exhaling, smoke burned her eyes, and she could not help but cry.
They grabbed her hair and pushed her head all the way down, then forcibly poured a mixture consisting of a tube of wasabi and a bottle of drinking alcohol, into her nose. Ms. Zhang shook her head on impulse, splattering the mix everywhere. The police wiped her face with a floor mop before continuing the torture. When Ms. Zhang still refused to collaborate with them, they poured another bottle of the same mix into her nose.
After a while, another group of people came in and danced around Ms. Zhang. Officer Sun also came over, held her up, and poked her ribs.
Ms. Zhang was later sentenced to seven years in Jilin Province Women’s Prison. Her pension was suspended during her imprisonment. Although the authorities resumed her pension payment following her release, the amount she received was the same as at the time of her arrest, without the automatic annual increases.
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