1. History Remembered

There are thousands of reports of brutality, beatings, and torture of Falun Dafa practitioners while they were in police custody. There are also documented cases of deaths due to the beatings and torture. The following are few examples of those deaths.

Ms. Zhao Jinhua, 42, was a farmer in a small village in Shandong province and had been practicing Falun Dafa since 1995. On September 27, 1999, local police arrested her while she was working in the field, simply because she was a practitioner of Falun Dafa. She was tortured for ten days and had to be sent to the hospital for emergency treatment. After her resuscitation, the police took her back to the jail for further beating. Ten days later, on October 7, police notified Zhao's family that she had died. According to forensic reports, the cause of her death was trauma from blunt objects.

A law-abiding citizen's life thus perished because of police brutality. Ms. Zhao's only crime was her refusal to renounce her belief in the principles of Truthfulness, Benevolence, and Forbearance, the principles she had learned from her teacher, Mr. Li Hongzhi. And her only response was a firm "Yes" when repeatedly asked if she would continue to practice Falun Dafa.

Three years ago, Ms. Chen Zixiu hardly imagined that she would be risking her life by practicing Falun Dafa. The day that the government ban was announced "was the most bitter day of her life," said her daughter, Ms. Zhang. "She couldn't accept that they criticized Falun Gong and called it an evil cult." Shocked, Ms. Chen traveled to Beijing to peacefully appeal to the government. On December 4, 1999, one day after she arrived in Beijing, she was walking through the Temple of Heaven Park when a plain-clothesed security agent asked if she was a practitioner. "Yes", she answered truthfully and was arrested.

Ms. Chen's ordeal began. According to witnesses, local officials used plastic truncheons to beat her on her calves, feet, and lower back, and assaulted her head and neck with a cattle prod. They yelled at her repeatedly, and tried to coerce her to give up Falun Dafa and to curse Mr. Li Hongzhi. Each time, Chen refused.

The day before Chen died, her captors again demanded that she renounce her faith in Falun Dafa. Barely conscious after repeated jolts from a cattle prod, the 58-year-old woman stubbornly shook her head.

Enraged, the local officials ordered Ms. Chen to run barefoot in the snow. Two days of torture had left her legs bruised and her short black hair matted with pus and blood, said cellmates and other prisoners who witnessed the incident. She crawled outside, vomited and collapsed. She never regained consciousness, and died on February 21, 2000.

Her crime was traveling to Beijing in an attempt to peacefully appeal to the government against the ban on Falun Dafa, and refusing to renounce her belief in Truthfulness, Benevolence, and Forbearance.

Zhang Zhenggang was a former contact person of the Falun Dafa Assistance Center in Huaian. In November 1999, Zhang wrote a letter to the local government explaining that Falun Dafa is a righteous cultivation way. He also wrote a letter to the central leadership requesting a return to justice for Falun Dafa. As a result, he was interrogated by the police department on November 24, 1999. He was tortured during the interrogation. The police officers took turns beating him. Three days later, the police sent him home, and he was put under house arrest.

On March 2, 2000, Zhang was taken again to the Huaian police station. On March 25, he was brutally beaten, resulting in fatal injuries to his brain. He was sent to the First Hospital of Huaian City for emergency treatment, and fell into a coma. On March 30, he was still alive with a weak heartbeat and shallow breathing. Suddenly, about 50 police officers appeared, and they imposed a curfew at the hospital. Officers pushed Zhang's family members and other patients away and took Zhang, who was still thought to be alive, to the crematorium. Zhang was cremated without the consent of his family members.

Zhang's crime was exercising his right to write to both local and central governments to appeal the innocence of Falun Dafa.

Zhou Zhichang, practitioner of Falun Dafa in Heilongjiang province, was the head officer of the Department of Armed Forces of a district in Shuangcheng. He was an excellent officer and party member widely known in the area. On the morning of July 22, 1999, he and some other Falun Dafa practitioners went to appeal to the local government, requesting the release of the four Falun Dafa assistants who had been taken away by force. He was thus detained until August 28, 1999, when he was released at the strong urging of the district government.

On September 9, 1999, Zhou Zhichang went to Beijing with 50 other practitioners to appeal for Falun Dafa. They wanted to tell the truth about Falun Dafa to the central government. They requested the return of innocence of Mr. Li Hongzhi and Falun Dafa. Mr. Zhou was detained for 8 months. During this time he went on a hunger strike and 9 days later he died on May 6, 2000.

The local government tried to coerce his family into signing a statement that Zhou had died of a heart attack. However, there were many wounds on his head and body. His fingers and toes were black, and the skin on his head was red and separating from the skull. His family refused.

Being the head officer of a district Armed Forces, Zhou could easily protest with ways other than appealing. Instead, he chose to peacefully seek justice from the government, which cost him his life.

Su Gang, 32, was a software engineer of Qilu Petrochemical Company and a practitioner of Falun Dafa. Since January 2000, he was detained three times by the police stationed at his company in order to prevent him from going to Beijing to appeal.

On April 25, 2000, Su successfully escaped the police watch and went to Beijing alone to appeal to the central government. As a result, he was arrested, escorted back, and detained for one month.

On May 23, 2000, he was placed in Changle Mental Hospital. His family was not told of his whereabouts. He was released on May 31 because his uncle, also a Falun Dafa practitioner, had gone on a hunger strike upon learning that his nephew was being injected, twice daily with toxic drugs.

With a dazed look in his eyes, and an expressionless pale face, Su returned home. He simply could not recover from the severe damage, both mentally and physically, regardless of the good care that he received from his family. After a rather painful struggle, he died on the morning of June 10, 2000.

Su was persecuted for practicing Falun Dafa and having peacefully appealed to the government.

An was an elementary school teacher in Hengshui, and a Falun Dafa practitioner. She was removed from her job merely for practicing Falun Dafa, and fined 2,800 Yuan (US $340). On May 21, 2000, An went to Beijing to appeal. She was escorted back and detained. An refused to sign the paperwork for her detention and declared that she would reserve her right to appeal. Later she was sent to another detention center. Her feet were bound with iron shackles for refusing to recite the rules of the detention center. To protest the ill treatments against her, An began a hunger strike.

On June 11, 2000, she died of suffocation as police tried to force-feed her on the sixth day of her hunger strike.

An's peaceful appeal and silent hunger strike had caused her to be choked to death. An became the 30th practitioner to die in detention since the government outlawed Falun Dafa. To date, at least 142 death cases have been reported due to maltreatment under the police custody.

All happened in a common place, China, a country known for its ancient civilization.

These men and women shared a common name: Falun Dafa practitioners. They were persecuted for a common crime: Practicing Falun Dafa - no offense beyond this. They were all tortured to death for two reasons: peacefully appealing to the Chinese government the ban on Falun Dafa and refusing to renounce their belief in Truthfulness, Benevolence, and Forbearance.

What is Falun Dafa that inspired these people, and millions of others, to practice?

And why are the principles of Truthfulness, Benevolence, and Forbearance considered paramount by these people, and millions of others?