(Minghui.org) My name is Zhou Yeling, and I live in Songyuan City, Jilin Province. Only a few months after I began to practice Falun Gong in late March 1997, many ailments had disappeared.
Because of Falun Gong’s tremendous health benefits and elevation of one’s morality, it spread quickly across the country. When the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) realised that the estimated number of practitioners was more than registered Party members, Jiang Zemin, the then CCP head, ordered the persecution of Falun Gong in July 1999, which remains unabated to this day.
As I refused to renounce my faith, I was given one year of forced labor in 2001 and sentenced to eight years in 2015. Now over a year after I was released from prison in May 2023, I still haven’t fully recovered from the torture I suffered in custody. My legs are in constant pain and I have trouble walking. I still become confused from time to time and my memory is very poor.
With the protection from Master Li, the founder of Falun Gong, I gradually recalled the torture I suffered in the labor camp and prison. I’m writing that down to expose the evilness of the CCP and urge the world to help stop the persecution and bring the perpetrators to justice.
One-Year Labor Camp Term
In February 2001, I took my four-year-old daughter to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong. Before we even found our way to the state council’s appeals office, we were arrested and escorted back to Changchun, the capital of Jilin Province. As soon as we arrived at the train station, I saw the local police, who also brought in my two sisters to pick up my daughter. I was then taken straight to the Jiutai Forced Labor Camp in Changchun. Because the Jilin Province Women’s Prison was at capacity at the time, the authorities held female Falun Gong practitioners at the Jiutai Forced Labor Camp, a male detention facility.
Because I refused to renounce Falun Gong, I was forced to stand for eight hours a day, which was gradually increased to twenty hours, from 3 a.m. to midnight. The standing torture lasted nearly a month. Later I was taken to a dark room. Three guards shocked me with electric batons on my face, mouth, and lower back. My face was swollen and bruised. It took more than six months to recover. A guard once summoned me to her office and showered me with fists and punches. I was released in November 2001.
Eight Years of Torture in the Prison
I was arrested again in 2014 for distributing Falun Gong materials on the street. The police continued to monitor me after I was released three weeks later.
I was seized by officers of Ningjiang District Domestic Security Division and the Xincheng Village Police Station on May 22, 2015. They took me to the Songyuan City Detention Centre. The cell head inmate, Feng Danna, often organized other inmates to beat me and verbally abuse me. They also reported to guard Hou Jiaxin that I did Falun Gong exercises there. Hou forced me to wear a 15-kg shackle. My vision also became blurry as a result of the persecution.
Without informing my family, the Ningjiang District Court sentenced me to eight years on December 28, 2015. I was transferred to the Jilin Province Women’s Prison in July 2016 and held at the eighth ward.
The guards arranged for murderers and drug addicts to monitor and torture Falun Gong practitioners in the eighth ward. Three former practitioners tried to persuade me to renounce Falun Gong. As I refused to comply, they forced me to sit on a tiny stool for kindergarten kids, often from 3 a.m. to 1 a.m. the next day. I wasn’t allowed to move or talk while sitting. Sometimes I wasn’t allowed to sleep in the bed at all. They also limited my restroom use to 3-4 times a day or not at all. After prolonged periods of sitting, my legs and feet became extremely swollen and I had much trouble walking. When an external inspection team came, I could get a short break from the sitting torture, as the guards put the tiny stools away.
In addition to the sitting torture, they also forced me to watch videos smearing Falun Gong, verbally abused me, poured cold water on me, and limited the food given to me. I wasn’t allowed to take showers, call, or meet with my family either. Sometimes they forbade me from brushing my teeth in the morning or barred me from doing the laundry.
On April 12, 2018, because I refused to answer the roll call, the guards cuffed a hand and a foot of mine to a bed. I shouted “Falun Dafa is good; Truthfulness, Compassion, Forbearance is good” in protest. They sprayed something onto my face and into my eyes. My eyes kept tearing. When I covered my eyes with my hands, they sprayed the chemical onto my hands, causing them to swell.
The torture lasted until early evening before I was given a restroom break. After that, I was carried into a solitary confinement cell and hung up by the wrists. They didn’t put me down until a week later. I started a hunger strike to protest the torture. They mixed unknown drugs into the food and force-fed me. As a result of the torture, hunger strike, and force-feeding, I lost consciousness several times and became extremely weak. I was taken back to the cell on May 25, 2018.
In June 2019, the ward director Ni Xiaohong left and Qian Wei took over.
Because practitioner Ms. Che Pingping was tortured in solitary confinement in September 2019, I held a hunger strike to protest the persecution. Qian ordered the guards to carry me to the hospital for force-feeding. I shouted in protest and the inmates beat me and covered my mouth. Inmate Liu Pingping pinched me on my neck and body. While I was hospitalised, they placed a death bed next to the hospital bed, warning me that they could restrain me on it anytime.
They handcuffed me to the bed again in early July 2020 when I refused to answer the roll call. I held a hunger strike for a week to protest.
In mid-July 2020, prison warden An Hongyu teamed up with Qian and another guard Zhang Yishu to push for a transformation campaign aimed to make steadfast practitioners renounce their faith. The trio came up with the torture plan, including sleep deprivation, sitting on small stools motionless, beating, kicking, stomping, pinching, pouring filthy water on us, yanking hair, and hitting our heads against the wall. Screams from practitioners during the torture were heard on every floor in the building.
In room 106 on the first floor, inmates Wang Shuwen, Wang Kuo, Han Limei, Pan Yuehui, and Song Jun ordered me to sit on the small stool all day long. When I refused to comply, they pressed me against the floor and beat me. They also pinched me on my inner thigh, breast, and inner arms. They didn’t allow me to close my eyes, or they would spray pepper water into my eyes. They poured garlic water, disinfectants, or pepper water on me. At night, they didn’t allow me to sleep. Inmates Han and Pan collected some insects and put them into my clothes. Wang Shuwen stuffed my mouth with dirty paper picked up from the trash bin. My body was covered with injuries and bruises.
In late November 2020, inmates Wang Kuo, Pan, and Song tortured me every day. They carried me to the bathroom and poured cold water on me. They beat me like crazy, yanked my hair, and hit my head against the wall. My ears were ringing. Eleven of my teeth cracked as a result. They covered my mouth to prevent me from screaming and kept pouring cold water on me. My clothes were soaked. It was so cold that I couldn’t breathe. I was in a delirious state and almost lost my senses.
When the guard on duty came the next morning to inspect the cell, I tried to report the abuses to her. The inmates stopped me at the door. I called out to the guard, but she turned around without responding to me. The inmates were upset about my actions. They removed my top clothes, poured freezing water on me and opened the window to let cold wind blow on me while my body was still wet. I shook uncontrollably and couldn’t utter a word. My head became numb due to the coldness.
One morning, I ran out of the cell when the inmates weren’t watching and complained to the guard on duty about the abuse. The guard lowered her head and remained silent. Upon hearing me talking, inmate Wang Kuo ran over, pulled me back to the cell, and gave me a round of savage beating.
As the prison authorities turned a blind eye to the inmates’ torturing Falun Gong practitioners, it happened from time to time that some practitioners were tortured to death. Ms. Fu Guihua was one of them, who died in July 2021. I tried to seek justice for her from the ward director Qian, but to no avail.
The prison found out in January 2022 that people in the building across from ours could see through the windows the inmates torturing the practitioners here. To cover up the crime, the guards covered the windows with paper. We could no longer see the outside world. It felt like the whole building was as awful as hell. It further caused my health to take a turn for the worse. My vision was blurred and I sometimes had trouble opening my eyes. My limbs were numb and my body was in constant pain. I also had a mental breakdown that caused my memory to decline drastically. All these conditions continued even after I was released in April 2023 and I still haven’t recovered to this day.
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