The Labor Camp Guard Director Who Protected Dafa Practitioners

(Minghui.org) I was arrested in April 2001 for going to Beijing to appeal for Falun Dafa and was later given a labor camp term. The director of the guards, Yang, was a strongly-built man who used rough language. An inmate told me that Yang had been transferred to this labor camp specifically to persecute Falun Dafa practitioners and that I should be careful of him. 

On the second day of my term, Yang ordered me to go to his office. He asked me why I used my break time to do the laundry for the over 100 inmates and cook for them. I told him that the inmates worked very hard and when they came back to the cell in the middle of the night, they were too exhausted to wash themselves, let alone their laundry. Some even had lice on them. I felt sorry for them and wanted to help them. 

This conversation opened up the opportunity for me to clarify the facts about Dafa to Yang. I told him how the communist regime manufactured the Tiananmen self-immolation hoax to demonize Falun Dafa, in an event involving several people setting themselves on fire on January 23, 2001, the eve of Chinese New Year. The state-owned media repeatedly played a video showing the horrific scenes of the self-immolation, stirring up fear and hatred towards Falun Dafa. I broke down several obvious suspicious points in the self-immolation video, including three different faces alleged to be the same self-immolator, the plastic bottle allegedly filled with gasoline that sat in between the legs of a self-immolator but didn’t burn when he set himself on fire, and the little girl, another self-immolator, who sang in a TV interview right after she allegedly had a tracheotomy.

Yang also asked me about the appeal on April 25, 1999, when 10,000 Falun Dafa practitioners peacefully gathered outside the State Council’s Appeal Office in Beijing. I told him that the practitioners were merely seeking their basic right to practice their faith. I also told him that in 1998, Qiao Shi, a then retired member of the National People’s Congress, conducted a comprehensive survey of Falun Gong and concluded that, “Falun Gong provides the country and the people only benefits and does no harm.” 

Yang was convinced by what I told him. 

Months later, when an inmate was about to be released, another guard, Zheng, found several letters on him. It turned out the letters were written by some of the detained practitioners and the inmate had offered to deliver the letters to practitioners’ family members. Zheng refused to let the inmate go. As we tried to reason with him, he began to beat one practitioner. 

Zheng called Yang for his instruction. As soon as Yang arrived, he ordered Zheng to release that inmate. He also rejected the proposal to put us in solitary confinement. In terms of the complaint against us for doing Dafa exercises, he said we had been doing the exercises all along. When Zheng asked him whether they should organize us to watch brainwashing materials smearing Falun Dafa, Yang responded wisely that this would give us opportunities to clarify the facts about Dafa and that it would make it even more difficult for him to handle the situation. 

He warned Zheng that things would become more difficult for them to handle if practitioners went on a strike or protested in other forms. He said that both of them might lose their jobs as a result. Another guard, Chen, also spoke up for us practitioners and Zheng gave up his plan to further persecute us. 

One morning, two practitioners got up late and missed the morning roll call. Zheng handcuffed them and hung them up on a high metal bar. I asked him to let them down, but he said they might do the Dafa exercises again. He called Yang, who immediately ordered him to let the two practitioners down. 

Yang later kindly said to me that I shouldn’t get involved in the matter. With more practitioners getting involved, it would make it harder for him to resolve such issues. I understood his situation and apologized to him. Zheng didn’t persecute any other practitioner after that. 

Yang’s wife later gave birth to a boy. He said he believed it was his support of Dafa practitioners that blessed him with a son. He promised to try to help us as much as he could and said he may practice Dafa himself one day. 

After Yang was promoted and left the labor camp, guard Chen who supported us took Yang’s position. 

Before Yang left, he thanked me for the blessings. I told him that he should thank Master Li, the founder of Falun Dafa, and wherever he is, he should treat Dafa practitioners kindly and try to help us. He agreed.