(Minghui.org) A Tianshui City, Gansu Province resident was secretly sentenced to two years and seven months after being detained incommunicado for over a year for practicing Falun Gong.

Falun Gong, also known as Falun Dafa, is a spiritual discipline that has been persecuted by the Chinese communist regime since 1999.

Mr. Yan Hujiu, 56, was at his agricultural supply store on June 25, 2021, when four plainclothes officers suddenly showed up and ordered him to sign a statement to renounce Falun Gong. He refused to comply and was arrested. The police ransacked his home and confiscated his Falun Gong books, a computer, a cellphone he used for business contacts, and several hundred yuan in cash.

After Mr. Yan was taken to the Zaojiaoxiang Detention Center, the authorities denied his family visit, with the excuse that he didn’t give up Falun Gong. His family recently learned about his prison sentence. It’s not clear whether he has been taken to prison or remains at the detention center at the time of writing.

Mr. Yan took up Falun Gong in 1998. He changed from an idler to a hardworking person. In 2001, two years after the onset of the persecution, he went to Beijing to appeal for the right to practice Falun Gong, only to be arrested and given two years of forced labor.

Mr. Yan was arrested again on April 1, 2008. While he was still in custody, his wife Ms. Ma Xiaohong was forced to live away from home to hide from the police. Their elderly parents and two young children struggled to care for themselves.