In Memory of Fellow Practitioner Zhang Fengyun, A Great Cultivator As unshakable and Indestructible As diamond

(Clearwisdom.net) It has been two months since our fellow practitioner Zhang Fengyun was tortured to death in the Xiguoyuan Detention Center in Lanzhou City, Gansu Province. Her 14-year-old son has lost a good mother, her work unit has lost a good employee, and our team that clarifies the truth and exposes the evil has lost a kind and courageous fellow practitioner. [to read the details of her death: Dafa Practitioner Zhang Fengyun from Lanzhou Dies after Incarceration at Xiguoyuan Detention Center]

Zhang Fengyun, female, 42 years old, was an employee of Gansu Province Architectural Engineering Bureau's Timber Mill (formerly the Seventh Bureau Timber Mill). Before obtaining the Fa, she had suffered from various diseases and had been in very poor health. She started to practice Falun Dafa in 1996, and as a result all her diseases disappeared. She was very grateful to Master Li and Dafa, and became a steadfast Dafa practitioner.

On July 20, 1999, upon hearing that Dafa was framed and Master Li listed as wanted, Zhang Fengyun, (who was in Qinghai Province visiting her mother), resolutely stepped forward to clarify the truth. She went with other practitioners to the Qinghai provincial government offices to appeal and was illegally arrested and detained.

In early July 2000, on their way to Beijing to appeal, Zhang Fengyun and several practitioners were caught at Lanzhou Railway Station. Facing a large number of railway policemen and local police, Zhang Fengyun firmly resisted the illegal detention. She fearlessly spread the Fa with a loud voice to several hundred passengers gathering around, and didn't give in even after her nose and mouth bled due to the beating she received from the police.

In mid-October 2000, Zhang Fengyun again went to Beijing to appeal. In Tiananmen Square, she fulfilled her vow by shouting the earthshaking declaration: "Falun Dafa is good!" She firmly refused to cooperate with the evil and was beaten by vicious Beijing police until she was almost on her last breath and her body was covered with cuts and bruises. The police threw her out of the police station for fear that she would die on the spot. Later, a kind-hearted person carried her to the railway station.

At the end of December 2000, Zhang Fengyun again boarded a train to Beijing. Since it was a "sensitive time" of year, there were many plainclothes policemen on the train. She and several of her fellow practitioners were identified when the train was near Xi'an City, Shaanxi Province. The police forcibly dragged them off the train to arrest them. In order to demonstrate their determination to safeguard the Fa with their lives, they recited loudly Teacher's poem "Non-existence:" "To live with no pursuits, To die with no regrets; Extinguish all illusory thoughts, Cultivating Buddhahood is not difficult," [not official translation] while dashing themselves against the concrete poles on the platform in defiance. The Xi'an police were dumbfounded by their heroic spirit and dared not to hold them locally in Xi'an City. Instead, they forced them onto a train back to Lanzhou City.

On the train, Zhang Fengyun and others unfurled a large banner that read, "Falun Dafa is good!" and chanted loudly "Falun Dafa is good! Suffocate the evil!" They also actively spread the Fa to passengers. After hearing the principles of Dafa, seeing the practitioners of grand benevolence and forbearance, and feeling their great righteous spirit, the passengers chanted together with practitioners: "Falun Dafa is good!" After being escorted back to Lanzhou, Zhang Fengyun and other practitioners were illegally detained in Taoshuping Detention Center. They still didn't surrender to the evil and continued to spread the Fa and clarify the truth to inmates and guards. They began a hunger strike and were released one week later.

On July 23, 2001, Zhang Fengyun and two other practitioners went to Xiguhekou area to distribute truth-clarifying materials. The Hekou Police Station illegally detained all three of them after a local villain turned them in, and they were later sent to the vicious Xiguoyuan Detention Center.

In Xiguoyuan Detention Center, Zhang Fengyun always kept a righteous mind, and completely opposed everything arranged by the evil old forces. She never said "Report" (according to the rules, detainees should say "Report" before speaking to the guards), and refused the roll call. Thus the guards considered her a thorn in their side and put her into the toughest cell, Cell No. 9, and threatened to have the tough criminals in the cell punish her. Zhang Fengyun, however, was always peaceful and smiling. With great compassion she clarified the truth about Falun Gong to the inmates, warned them about retribution, and exposed the evil. She also took care of them in their daily lives. As a result, instead of torturing her, all the inmates respected her and took care of her and the cell became peaceful and harmonious.

Zhang Fengyun knew that prison is by no means a place meant for practitioners. The battle between the righteous and the evil has reached the crucial last moment. As Dafa disciples, assisting Teacher in the Fa rectification is the great responsibility that history has bestowed upon us. Thus we should be in the mighty current of the Fa rectification instead of passively waiting in the prison. To oppose the evil's arrangements, on July 30, 2001, Zhang Fengyun resolutely announced the start of a hunger strike and decided to validate Dafa with her own life.

On the 10th day of the hunger strike, she was dehydrated and had a high fever, and could not take care of herself. The guards force-fed her with tubes while cursing her, and then left her without care. On the morning of the 11^th day of the hunger strike (August 10), after hearing reports from Zhang Fengyun's inmates, the chief guard on duty, Zhang Lingling, ordered them to carry her out for interrogation, but Zhang Fengyun could no longer speak. Instead of carrying Zhang Fengyun out for an emergency treatment, the chief guard Zhang Lingling cursed Zhang Fengyun with profane words and wickedly slandered her as "playing dead," then threw her next to the trash dumpsters and left. During the time when prisoners were outdoors for exercise or for fresh air, other practitioners anxiously ran over to check her. One practitioner with medical knowledge found that she was in shock and had to be treated immediately. The practitioners told the guards several times but got no response. Finally, under the practitioners' strong requests, the guards allowed Zhang Fengyun to be carried to the gate to wait for a doctor to check. When the doctor came, Zhang Fengyun had no pulse or blood pressure. Not until then did they start the infusion and emergency treatment, but nothing could be done any more. At this point, the detention center officials hypocritically sent Zhang Fengyun's body to the Labor Reeducation Hospital for "emergency treatment." Thus, another life parted forever from her family, relatives and friends, leaving this world.

After Zhang Fengyun passed away, the evil forces used their customary tactics such as claims of "committing suicide," "secret hunger strike," etc., to try in vain to shirk the responsibility. Zhang Fengyun's death is completely due to the persecution, the torture, and Jiang Zemin's state-run terrorism!

Zhang Fengyun reached Consummation and left with a smile. Looking back at her short 5-year cultivation path, the glorious radiance of a Dafa particle shone throughout. Teacher said, "All this will be recorded in the history of the cosmos. The great Fa and the great epoch are forging the greatest Enlightened Beings" ("The Disciples' Magnificence").

The evil forces thought they had succeeded in killing Zhang Fengyun, but they didn't know that "Never in history has someone who persecuted those with upright faiths ever succeeded" ("Coercion Cannot Change People's Hearts"). Inspired by her spirit, many practitioners stepped forward. They continue to chant "To live with no pursuits, To die with no regrets; Extinguish all illusory thoughts, Cultivating Buddhahood is not difficult," and continue to join the mighty current of Fa rectification.

October 12, 2001