By practitioner from Weihai City, Shandong Province

(Clearwisdom.net) The following are my experiences and some facts on how the police and government officials persecute Falun Dafa practitioners, as well as how practitioners resisted the persecution and validated Dafa.

On September 9, 1999, I called my fellow practitioners; we scheduled to meet at the seashore at midnight. However, police officers were monitoring our phone conversations, and they thought many Falun Gong practitioners were planning to get together for something. After 11:00 p.m. that night, several policemen came to arrest me, charging me with having "disturbed the social order." Just because of the discussion about going to the seashore, six practitioners were arrested; the authorities detained them for several days and fined several practitioners 200 yuan each. [500 yuan is the average monthly income for an urban worker in China.]

In October 1999, Liu Jie, a member of the political security section of Huancui District Police Department, deceived me into attending a symposium that was arranged by officials to spread lies about Falun Gong. Aside from myself, the attendees there were all directors of various government bureaus. The lowest ranked official was the head of a hospital.

In the meeting, a speaker read to the audience newspaper articles slandering Falun Gong. The directors of the symposium and people from the TV station then asked me to speak. I told everyone, "That newspaper is wrong. We Falun Gong practitioners do not seek political power. Although in the beginning, we started practicing to improve our health, practitioners all know now that the practice is actually about cultivating one's moral character and living according to the principles of Truthfulness-Compassion-Tolerance. I feel that I started practicing Falun Gong too late in life, and also I did not do well because soon afterward I began practicing, the practice was banned." After I spoke these words, the entire audience broke into laughter. I knew they were laughing at me, and they thought that I was not being sensible. However, what I had told them was the truth. Later when the TV station broadcast the news, my voice was erased. Instead, commentary was voiced over, "This is [slanderous words omitted]. I will stop practicing."

Actually, I learned the news of my television appearance from a fellow practitioner long after the program was broadcast because after July 20, 1999, my TV was rarely turned on since I did not want my child to be contaminated by the lies. I later found Liu Jie and told her, "What you did was wrong." But she only laughed at me.

Through this incident, I further understood that the propaganda on TV was deceiving the people, and my family and friends also realized that the programs on television were not trustworthy.

In March 2000, I went to Beijing to appeal for Falun Gong, and I was arrested. The police detained me for 15 days. During the detention, I was interrogated many times. They said, "Appealing in Beijing is not allowed." I replied, "The state appeal bureau was established for understanding citizens' requests and situations. I spent my own money to come here to tell the authorities the facts about Falun Gong. I came for the sake of this country. You did not praise me but detained me here instead. You are violating the law." They said, "You don't have the right to appeal." I answered, "It is every citizen's obligation and right to tell the government the facts" Because they were wrong, they could never find one legitimate reason for detaining me. The police later stole my money for train tickets.

When "The Tiananmen Square Self-Immolation" incident was broadcasted on TV, I was detained in that detention center. Only half way through the program, everyone knew it was fake. There were too many blatantly phony things: Why were policemen carrying around fire extinguishers everywhere in Tiananmen Square? Why did the plastic bottle [allegedly containing gasoline] between Wang Jingdong's legs remain unmelted? Later on, when they broadcast follow-up programs, how could it be possible for someone to speak so clearly after having her throat cut open? The wraps for the girl's burns looked like plaster casts, which are not the right way to treat burn victims. The other woman undoubtedly lied in her account of the incident, too. She claimed that she drank half a bottle of gasoline, but that amount is easily enough to kill her, or at least severely poison her on the spot. There was no way she would be sitting there giving an interview.

At the end of April 2002, police grabbed my arms and dragged me down a flight of stairs because I was still firmly practicing Falun Dafa. I shouted, "Falun Dafa is good!", and my neighbors witnessed the scene.

In the detention center, many practitioners went on hunger strike to protest the illegal detention. All the practitioners on hunger strike were handcuffed. Some were handcuffed to metal chairs, some were handcuffed to beds, and some were handcuffed to the metal rings on the floor. We were cuffed day and night. On the 5^th day of hunger strike, the police began using force-feeding. They handcuffed me tightly under a metal chair. With two men pressing down my head, the prison doctor inserted a plastic tube through my nose into my esophagus. Every time they force-fed me, tears ran down my face because of the pain.

On the 16^th day of my hunger strike, my esophagus became swollen, so the tube could no longer be inserted into it. I also vomited blood. The police still tried to deceive my son, telling him, "If you pay 5000 yuan, we will let you take your mom home." My son is not a practitioner, so he paid the 5000 yuan.

In early May of 2002, I witnessed a Dafa practitioner with two injured legs who was 30-40 years old (I think his name is Li Hu.) being shackled to a steel chair in the Weihai Detention Center. This practitioner was also on hunger strike. When the prison doctor and other criminals tried to force feed him, he would shout "Falun Dafa is good!" or sing the song "Falun Dafa is good!" The police didn't allow anyone to sing the song, but the inmates who were helping with the force-feeding would hum along quietly.