(Minghui.org) Recently the Chinese media broke a heart-wrenching story that drew the nation's attention. An 85-year-old lady went to Beijing 15 times trying to resolve a civil dispute. Instead of getting help, she was sentenced to 2.5 years for “picking quarrels and provoking trouble.” Even worse, she was turned down for medical parole, even when she suffered two broken bones and could no longer look after herself. The story led to public outcry against China's legal system and law enforcement.
However, the Chinese state-owned media has not covered how many elderly Falun Gong practitioners have been incarcerated by law enforcement.
Zheng Decai, 80, from Zhuanghe City, Liaoning Province, was sentenced to 1.5 years last year and is jailed in Nanguanling Prison. After many requests, his family was allowed to visit him in June 2018. He was in a wheelchair and recently developed hypertension and tachycardia.
Eighty-year-old Li Xihu from Shanxi Province was locked up in a prison cell, and the prison police Yang Chunsheng ordered the inmates to beat up Li.
Eighty-year-old Liu Meizhen from Xinxiang, Henan Province was arrested at home in October 2016. The local detention center refused to take her because she had hypertension, but the police didn't let her go. Since the detention center didn't take her, she was sentenced to prison for four years. In prison, her blood pressure rose above 200 mmHg, and her family was not allowed to visit her.
Eighty-three-year-old Cong Fulan and seventy-six-year-old Zhao Guirong from Benxi City, Liaoning Province. were arrested in June 2018. The director of the Caitun Police Station, Zhao Ning, and other officers searched their homes. The local detention center refused to take them because of their advanced age.
When 81-year-old Wang Xuebin of Boyang, Anhui Province was arrested in July 2017, he had been sick in bed for a month. The city police department head Zhang Jiazhong had him arrested anyway.
Zhang Donghua of Huludao, Liaoning Province filed a lawsuit in May 2015 against Jiang Zemin, the former head of the Chinese Communist Party, for personally launching and directing the persecution of Falun Gong. In July 2015, the local police broke into her home, searched it, and took away Zhang and her 80-year-old mother, who also practices Falun Gong.
Zhang's mother fell during a physical examination at the hospital and injured her legs. When the local detention center refused to take Zhang's mother because of her age, the policemen told the center that she was only 65.
Eighty-year-old Zhou Yi was also persecuted because of a lawsuit he filed against Jiang Zemin. Zhou is a retired professor in a military school in Nanjing, Jiangsu Province, and had a field officer rank equivalent to colonel. After his lawsuit was published on Minghui.org in June 2015, he was watched and followed by the local police. In August 2016, he was arrested at another Falun Gong practitioner's apartment. Some 20 local law enforcement officers broke into that practitioner's home. In March 2017, Zhou was put on trial.
Many senior Falun Gong practitioners, who were sentenced at the beginning of the persecution, are now over the age of 80.
Yu Changxin, one of the first generation of air force pilots in communist China, was sentenced to 17 years in 2000 because of his belief in Falun Gong, when he was in his 70s. He was a professor at an air force academy and had the rank of deputy corps commander. He was tried by a military court in Beijing in 1999.
Yu Changxin's wife, Jiang Changfeng, was sentenced to a ten-year prison term in 2001. She was tortured in prison, which led to a variety of health problems, including a spinal injury. After the prison term was over, she was sent to a labor camp. She was confined to a solitary cell in the labor camp in November 2011, when she was in her 80s.
Xiong Huifeng was the director and scientist of a research institute funded by the Aerospace Ministry. In August 2014, 76-year-old Xiong was arrested because he refused to renounce Falun Gong. He was sentenced to 7.5 years.
His wife Liu Yuanjie was a senior engineer in the same institute. She was recognized by the ministry multiple times for her contributions to missile research. During the persecution, she was often harassed by the local police. Her husband's arrest devastated her, and her health was severely affected. She passed away in March 2015.
Due to media censorship, the horrific experiences of these persecuted elderly practitioners are known by very few people.
Category: Perspective
