(Minghui.org) Before Human Rights Day, December 10, 2024, Falun Gong practitioners in 45 countries submitted to their individual governments another list of Chinese Communist Party (CCP) officials who have been involved in the persecution of Falun Gong. Because these officials have participated in the 25-year persecution, practitioners have requested that they, along with their family members, be barred from entry to their respective countries and that their assets be frozen.

These 45 countries include The Five Eyes (United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand), all 27 countries in the European Union (EU) and 13 countries on other continents. The EU countries are Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Netherlands, Poland, Sweden, Belgium, Ireland, Austria, Denmark, Romania, Czechia, Finland, Portugal, Greece, Hungary, Slovakia, Bulgaria, Luxembourg, Croatia, Lithuania, Slovenia, Latvia, Estonia, Cyprus, and Malta. The remaining 13 countries are located in Asia, Europe, and the Americas: Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, Switzerland, Norway, Liechtenstein, Israel, Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, Chile, the Dominican Republic, and Paraguay. This was the first time Paraguay had joined the list.

The CCP’s persecution of Falun Gong has continued for 25 years and the regime recently escalated its control overseas. According to a report published by the World Organization to Investigate the Persecution of Falun Gong (WOIPFG), the CCP highlighted a goal in a May 2024 meeting organized by the Ministry of Public Security, “Pay special attention to the cooperation between Falun Gong and Western politicians to sanction high-level Chinese leaders. Stop such behavior at all costs.”

Among the perpetrators listed was Gao Changsheng, deputy secretary of the Party Leadership Group and deputy director of the Liaoning Provincial Department of Justice, secretary of the Party Committee, and director of the Liaoning Provincial Prison Administration Bureau.

Perpetrator Information 

Full Name of Perpetrator: Gao (last name) Changsheng (first name) Chinese Name: 高长生Gender: MaleDate/Year of Birth: September 1966 Place of Birth: Unknown 

Title or Position

November 2014 – January 2018: director of the Discipline, Inspection, and Supervision Cadre Supervision Office of the Liaoning Provincial Discipline Inspection Commission 

February 2018 – October 2021: member of Liaoning Provincial Supervisory Committee 

November 2021 – Present: deputy secretary of the Party Leadership Group and deputy director of the Liaoning Provincial Department of Justice, secretary of the Party Committee and director of the Liaoning Provincial Prison Administration Bureau 

Main Crimes

Liaoning Province has been one of the top provinces with the most brutal persecution of Falun Gong practitioners. The number of persecution deaths, arrests, and sentences are among the highest in the country. The torture of practitioners are horrendous in many of the prisons in the province, such as Liaoning Province Women’s Prison, Shenyang First Prison, Panjin Prison, Nanguanling Prison, Benxi Prison, and Dongling Prison. 

Since Gao Changsheng took office as the deputy director of the Liaoning Provincial Department of Justice and secretary of the Party Committee and director of the Liaoning Provincial Prison Administration Bureau in November 2021, he has continued to implement persecution policies, forcibly transforming the practitioners incarcerated in various prisons. The authorities also instigated criminal inmates to torture the practitioners, often with the incentives of term reduction. 

In the past three years, eight practitioners were tortured to death in prison or died shortly after being released. Some became disabled due to torture or suffered mental disorders.

Shenyang City First Prison

The Shenyang City First Prison has been used as a central base for the persecution and practitioners are brutally tortured in all prison divisions. In the “high-security division,” the practitioners are subjected to a variety of torture methods, including: being force-fed with feces and urine; tiger benches; being pepper sprayed in the eyes; scraping the ribs; smashing cans on their toes (which can break a toenail in one hit); sitting on a small stool motionless for 16 hours a day; sleep deprivation; denied bathroom use; being scalded with boiling water; being hung up by the wrists; electric shocks, especially on sensitive parts such as genitals; freezing the testicles with ice cubes; and being forced to listen to slanderous speeches against Falun Gong with high-volume headphones. 

Mr. Liu Dianyuan, a Chaoyang City, Liaoning Province, resident, was sentenced to 11.5 years in 2016 at the age of 78 for practicing Falun Gong. Despite his extremely poor health, the Shenyang City First Prison still accepted him. His condition continued to decline and he passed away in prison on February 10, 2024, Chinese New Year’s Day. He was 86 years old.

Dongling Prison

In Dongling Prison, the common torture methods used include: sleep deprivation; punching, kicking, and slapping; shocking with electric batons, including shocking the practitioners’ penises wrapped with metal wires; pulling pubic hairs; inserting bamboo sticks into practitioners’ penises; pouring ice water over practitioners, often in cold weather; and pouring urine and fecal matter on practitioners.

Many practitioners who were in good health developed physical ailments due to the abuse they endured and died shortly afterward. When they were in critical condition due to the torture inflicted on them, Tian would instruct his subordinates to conceal the information from practitioners’ families so that the persecution would not be exposed to the public.

Liaoning Province Women’s Prison

The 12th Division in Liaoning Province Women’s Prison is known as the intensive training and correctional area and is specially designated to persecute Falun Gong practitioners. The inmates, instigated by the guards, not only torture practitioners but also add unknown drugs to their food.

Practitioners are not allowed to bring anything into the prison when they are admitted. They are first sent to the 2nd Division for brainwashing sessions. If they refuse to renounce their faith, they are sent to the 12th Division three months later.

Once practitioners are sent to the 12th Division, their family members are not able to obtain any information about them. They are also not allowed to be visited by their family. Two inmates are assigned to monitor one practitioner. The practitioners are taken to a room to be tortured. The torture methods include sleep deprivation, not being given anything to eat or not being allowed to use the restroom, forced to stand for long hours, beatings, humiliation, forced to watch videos slandering Falun Gong, forced to write guarantee statements and thought reports, and forced to say defamatory things about Falun Gong. The aim of these methods is to force them to renounce their faith.

Ms. Xu Xiuyun from Fushun City had her food drugged for a long time; Ms. Jiang Wei from Chaoyang City was often forced to stand for hours and was beaten, abused, and drugged by the inmates, causing her to become extremely weak. Some practitioners were locked in solitary confinement. Some practitioners passed away a few months or a few years later after they were released, due to the unknown drugs.

The guards or inmates immediately feed unknown drugs to practitioners if they become unconscious from the torture. The drugs are also added to their meals. Practitioners who throw away the food (with the drugs in it) are punished if they are found out by the guards or inmates. It’s reported that the guards in the 11th Division were conducting “drug experiments” on the practitioners.

Some practitioners who were fed with the drugs suffered from memory loss, felt confused, or developed symptoms similar to diabetes and coronary heart disease.

Ms. Jia Guiqin was no longer the same woman that her family knew when she walked out of the Liaoning Province Women’s Prison on April 24, 2023. After serving 13 years for her faith in Falun Gong, the once healthy woman in Chaoyang City, Liaoning Province was hunchbacked and could no longer recognize her husband. A prison guard was heard saying, “It’s a miracle that this old woman survived all these years in prison.”

Ms. Jia, however, did not remember much of what she went through. She seldom talked after she returned home. When she did open her mouth, it was her scattered memories of her ordeal. Her family heard her say, “I was not allowed to sleep because I refused to renounce Falun Gong...three or four people followed me and didn’t allow me to talk...I didn’t want to take any pills but was forced to. I fell into a coma after taking the pills and was rushed to the hospital...”

Ms. Jia had trouble falling asleep and also complained about headaches. She died six months later on October 28, 2023, at the age of 74.

Not long after Ms. Sui Boqin was admitted to the Liaoning Province Second Women’s Prison in April 2023, a convicted felon, Luan Ling, punched her on the head, leaving her bruised everywhere on her face. Luan also kicked her lower body, causing severe swelling and bruises. On another occasion, Luan hit her on the head with a shoe brush. She bled profusely, staining her clothes.

Luan dragged Ms. Sui’s comforter to the restroom and had it soak the dirty water on the floor. She next poured cold water on the comforter before moving it back to the cell. She snatched Ms. Sui’s warm clothes and threw them away. Ms. Sui had no other way but to sleep under the cold and wet comforter at night.

When Ms. Sui protested against the violence and abuse, Luan said she was doing what the government ordered her to do. She once hit another practitioner on the head with a basin and whipped a third practitioner with a clothes hanger.

The guards forced Ms. Sui to do hard labor during the day. While inmates were offered breakfast and lunch at the workshop, Ms. Sui was not allowed to fetch food from the cafeteria and she could only eat dinner after she returned to her cell. She was soon reduced to just skin and bones.

The guards allowed other inmates to sit and do their assigned tasks in the workshop, but Ms. Sui had to stand for ten-plus hours during the day and finish her work quota. After she returned to her cell at night, she must stand for two or three more hours as punishment for refusing to renounce Falun Gong. Her legs and feet have become extremely swollen as a result of her long-term standing.

The guards provided no daily necessities to Ms. Sui and also prohibited others from sharing items with her. She was not allowed to purchase necessities either. She had to pick up crumbled tissues or toilet papers from trash cans to wipe herself when she needed to use the restroom.

Ms. Sui was also barred from washing herself since her prison admission. The smell she gave off became sickening after several months and her cellmates even struggled to eat with her around.

Select Death Cases

Case 1. Two Years After Wife’s Death, Liaoning Man Dies While Serving Ten-year Prison Term

Having lost his parents and wife in the persecution of Falun Gong, Mr. Yin Guozhi died on May 22, 2022, while serving a 10-year prison term for upholding his faith in Falun Gong. He was 56.

Mr. Yin from Chaoyang City, Liaoning Province, was arrested on September 26, 2019, after his rental apartment caught fire and the police came to investigate the accident. The arrest came after he spent ten years on the run to hide from the police. He was detained at the Jianping County Detention Center and was beaten by the detainees.

The Jianping County Court secretly sentenced Mr. Yin to ten years. They didn’t inform his family of his case status until he was sent to the Jinzhou Prison.

Shortly after Mr. Yin was sentenced, his wife, Ms. Fu Jinghua, who was also in displacement, died in her rental place on December 31, 2019, succumbing to years of persecution for their shared faith in Falun Gong.

A relative of Mr. Yin’s was visited by two prison guards and a village official on March 8, 2022. They said that Mr. Yin had developed late-stage lung cancer and was receiving oxygen in the hospital. His family was ordered to cover his medical expenses. While it’s not clear whether his family complied, Mr. Yin passed away two months later on May 22.

Case 2. Liaoning Man Suddenly Dies While Serving a 7-year Term

Mr. Di Yongchi’s daughter suddenly received a call from the Shenyang No. 1 Prison in Liaoning Province on December 17, 2022, and was told that her father had died after the hospital failed to resuscitate him.

Mr. Di, a 69-year-old retired power plant engineer in Huludao City, Liaoning Province, was serving a seven-year prison term for his faith in Falun Gong. His death came only 1.5 years before the end of his term.

Case 3: Cancer-stricken Man Dies Days After Being Denied Medical Parole, Remains Shackled as He Dies

Mr. Teng Yuguo, a Shenyang City, Liaoning Province, was arrested on October 13, 2020, and sentenced to five years by the Yuhong District Court around February 2021. He developed colon cancer and incontinence around May 2022 while he was incarcerated in the Dongling Prison. Despite his condition, the prison authorities refused to release him on medical parole. He was so weak that he did not have the strength to sit up. He also could not have bowel movements.

Mr. Teng passed away at the age of 67 on December 2, under tight surveillance. After he died the guards did not allow his family to get close to his body or dress him. They hired a company to prepare his body. Also under tight surveillance, Mr. Teng’s body was taken to a funeral home and cremated on December 4.

His wife could not fall asleep for days and often burst into tears. She said as soon as she closed her eyes, she saw her emaciated and dying husband, still shackled as he lay dying in the heavily guarded hospital bed.

Case 4: 51-Year-Old Man Dies Four Months After Serving 4.5 Years

Mr. Zhao Changfu, a 51-year-old man in Lingyuan City, Liaoning Province, died on July 18, 2023, four months after he finished serving 4.5 years for his faith in Falun Gong.

Mr. Zhao’s prison sentence stemmed from his arrest on August 22, 2018. The procuratorate twice returned his case to the police citing insufficient evidence. But the police fabricated more evidence and persuaded the procuratorate to indict him on May 9, 2019. The local court sentenced him to 4.5 years with a 2,000-yuan fine weeks after a secret hearing on June 5, 2019.

Mr. Zhao was subjected to brutal torture since the day of his arrest, and his health quickly declined. He was hospitalized multiple times throughout his incarceration, yet the authorities never approved his family’s request to have him released on medical parole to seek better treatment.

Mr. Zhao’s condition worsened in late 2021. He became blind in one eye, and the other eye had blurred vision. He could only see things within three feet with the one eye. His legs were severely swollen, with his calves oozing fluid. Two other hospitals in Shenyang were better equipped to treat his condition, yet the authorities only allowed him to use the Shenyang City No. 4 Hospital, which was overcrowded at the time. As Mr. Zhao was waiting for a bed, his eye condition got even worse. He was then allowed to have eye surgery at the He Eye Hospital at his own expense.

After a bed became available at the Shenyang City No. 4 Hospital around April 2021, Mr. Zhao was admitted there, but as soon as he got a bit better, the authorities moved him to the Xinkang Prison Hospital, where he served the remainder of his prison term.

Everywhere he was taken, be it various detention facilities or hospitals, Mr. Zhao was always given a large number of injections or pills, which had severe side effects and caused damage to his body. An inmate once saw a nurse give him a large number of pills and took a look at them after the nurse left. He told Mr. Zhao to not take a particular pill because he had seen it before and knew it would not be good for Mr. Zhao. This inmate used to be a prosecutor and had inside knowledge of how the regime used involuntary drug administration as a means of persecuting people.

After Mr. Zhao was released on February 21, 2023, he never recovered, and was also traumatized by the fear that his wife, also a Falun Gong practitioner, would be arrested again. She had been arrested with him on August 22, 2018, but was released much sooner, on January 30, 2019. Prior to that, she had been arrested multiple times over the years, also for practicing Falun Gong. His own physical suffering and the anxiety about his wife’s well-being eventually took his life on July 18, 2023.

Case 5. 78-Year-Old Man Released from Prison in Critical Condition, Dies Seven Months Later

Mr. Wang Zhongsheng, a former senior lecturer in Xinbin County, Liaoning Province, fell into critical condition while serving a four-year term for practicing Falun Gong. He was released six months ahead of time, on April 30, 2024, only to die seven months later on November 16. He was 78 years old.

Mr. Wang was arrested and had his home ransacked on November 1, 2020. He was sentenced to four years in prison and fined 4,000 yuan on April 26, 2021.

After Mr. Wang was taken to the third division of Dongling Prison, he was forced to sit on a small stool for long hours without moving, causing his buttocks to develop sores and a severe infection. As Mr. Wang’s condition continued to deteriorate, he was taken to the prison hospital for treatment. The prison released him on April 30, 2024, six months before his scheduled release date.

Due to the mental pressure from the persecution, Mr. Wang struggled to recover upon returning home. He took a fall in October 2024 and broke his femur (thigh bone). He died weeks later on November 16.

His wife, Ms. Wang Guilan, was also repeatedly targeted for practicing Falun Gong. She died as a result of the persecution in December 2019.

Case 6. 66-Year-Old Man Dies While Serving 11 Years for Suing Former Communist Regime Dictator

Mr. Yan Xuguang, of Chaoyang City, Liaoning Province, died on October 16, 2024, while serving an 11-year term for suing Jiang Zemin, the former head of the Chinese communist regime who ordered the persecution of Falun Gong. He was 66 years old.

Back in May 2015, the Chinese Supreme People’s Procuratorate and Supreme People’s Court announced that they would accept all cases filed with them. This triggered a tidal wave of criminal lawsuits from Falun Gong practitioners around the world against Jiang Zemin’s instrumental role in initiating the persecution.

A task force was established in Chaoyang City to prosecute Falun Gong practitioners who sued Jiang. Over 300 practitioners were arrested in Chaoyang on November 9, 2015. Mr. Yan was seized by the police while riding a motorcycle on the street. The police located him by tracking his cell phone.

Li Chao, director of the Chaoyang Municipal Public Security Bureau, ordered the local procuratorates and courts to expedite the prosecution process of practitioners. Mr. Yan, who was a volunteer coordinator of local practitioners, was deemed a key target.

At the Chaoyang City Detention Center, Mr. Yan contracted an infectious disease. Despite his serious condition, the police refused to release him and transferred him to the Liaoning Provincial Detention Center Medical Division. They strictly controlled information regarding Mr. Yan’s medical condition and his whereabouts. When his family managed to find out about his situation and questioned the police about it, the police didn’t answer them directly but asked how they had learned of his situation.

Mr. Yan, while being held at the Liaoning Provincial Detention Center Medical Division.

The Shuangta District Court held a hearing of Mr. Yan’s case on August 19, 2016. His lawyer entered a not-guilty plea for him. Although prosecutor Bao Lei of the Shuangta District Procuratorate failed to present any evidence showing how Mr. Yan had violated the law, the presiding judge Zhang Xiaohua still sentenced him to 11 years in prison. He was later transferred to the division for the elderly and infirm in the Shenyang First Prison.

When Mr. Yan’s family visited him in October 2023, he was still in good spirits. They didn’t visit him for a year after that. (It’s not clear whether they were unable to visit him themselves, or if the prison denied his family visit.) On October 12, 2024, they suddenly received a call from the prison, saying that Mr. Yan was in critical condition. When they rushed to the Shenyang Tenth Hospital, he was already unconscious.

The prison approved Mr. Yan’s medical parole two days later. He was taken back to Chaoyang City in an ambulance and admitted to the Chaoyang Tuberculosis Hospital. He passed away two days later on October 16.

Select Torture Cases 

Case 1. Ms. Zhang Chuanwen Loses Four Teeth and Goes into Shock After Brutal Beatings in Prison

Ms. Zhang Chuanwen of Qingyuan County, Liaoning Province was admitted to the Liaoning Province Women’s Prison in Shenyang on July 26, 2023, to serve a 3.5-year term. An insider revealed that she was assigned to Division 12 on August 1, 2023. The guards and inmates there did not allow her to sleep and ordered her to remain standing and watch videos smearing Falun Gong. She refused to comply and was savagely beaten and verbally abused. She lost four teeth and went into shock as a result of the beating. After she was rushed to the hospital, the doctors diagnosed her with heart disease.

The guards, however, did not tell her about her diagnosis and took her back to the prison without providing her with further medical care. For the next three months, she was only allowed to sleep for two or three hours every day, with the remaining time spent on sitting on a small stool motionless.

When Ms. Zhang’s family was finally allowed a virtual visit with her in late October 2023, she did not dare to tell them about her abuse. She was moved to Division 5 in late December 2023. The guards there forced her to do hard labor for long hours every day. She felt dizzy and felt tightness in her chest. Team leads Wang Zhuo and An Xinlei verbally abused her, and the inmates monitoring her removed her mattress and did not allow her to sit down.

Case 2. Ms. Wang Jinfeng Denied Family Visits in Prison for Over Nine Months

Ms. Wang Jinfeng, a 64-year-old Shenyang City, Liaoning Province, resident, was been subjected to various forms of abuse since her prison admission in March 2023 to serve four years for her faith in Falun Gong. The prison guards intentionally limited her food intake every day. She became emaciated and was in a precarious condition. Her family was denied all forms of communication with her for nine-plus months.

After Ms. Wang was assigned to Team Four of Division Ten, the guards directed inmates to torture her in an attempt to make her give up her belief. The inmates once taped her mouth shut and she was almost suffocated to death.

In September 2023, Ms. Wang refused to comply with an unreasonable demand at the end of a work day and two inmates held her arms tight while a third inmate grabbed her hair and yanked her head upwards. A fourth inmate condemned the first three inmates for abusing her. Lu Wei, head of Ward Ten, saw what happened but she verbally abused Ms. Wang instead of disciplining those three inmates.

As Ms. Wang remained firm in her faith, the guards did not allow her to have any form of communication with her family or purchase daily necessities. To further punish her, they started limiting her food intake about three or four months ago. They sometimes did not even give her anything to eat. 

Case 3. Ms. Guo Peilu Subjected to Standing Torture and Brainwashing

Ms. Guo Peilu was transferred to the 12th division at Liaoning Province Women’s Prison six days after her admission on March 28, 2023. She was put in solitary confinement, where two to four collaborators took turns cursing and verbally abusing her. They made her stand still for long hours and would not let her go to the bathroom. She was forced to watch videos that slander Falun Gong and was not allowed to sleep or close her eyes. When she could no longer stand, the inmates propped her up and forced her to continue watching the videos. She went into shock from the abuse, and her legs were severely swollen. She once had five thousand yuan in her prison account, but it disappeared.