[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 62 (Tuesday, April 4, 1995)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E774-E776]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
TESTIMONY OF LIU XINHU
______
HON. FRANK R. WOLF
of virginia
in the house of representatives
Tuesday, April 4, 1995
Mr. WOLF. Mr. Speaker, yesterday, I submitted for the Record the
testimony of three survivors of the Chinese laogai. The witnesses
testified before the International Relations Subcommittee on
International Operations and Human Rights on April 3.
The stories are powerful accounts of brave Chinese men and women who
have suffered tremendously because of their religion or political
views. Today, I am submitting the testimony of two more survivors--Mr.
Liu Xinhu, who was imprisoned at the age of 13 because his father was a
so-called counter- revoluntionary and Palden Gyatso, a Tibetan monk who
spent 33 years in the laogai. I hope my colleagues and the American
people will be enlighted and moved by these stories. Many people like
Mr. Xinhu and Palden Gyatso are still suffering in China today. We must
not forget them.
Testimony of Liu Xinhu, Laogai Survivor
My name is Liu Xinhu.
Because my father was an official in the former government,
the Communist Party, on the pretext that he would disrupt
labor discipline, arrested and sent him to a ``reeducation
through labor'' (laojiao) prison camp in 1958. He was sent to
the Baimaoling Farm to serve his sentence. In 1973, having
lost all hope and deeply impoverished in the hell of the hard
labor farm, he committed suicide.
I was born in 1945. When I was 13 years old in 1958,
because I was the eldest son in the family of a counter-
revolutionary, the Communist government found an excuse which
had absolutely no legal precedent, and sent me to live at the
same Laogai prison farm as my father. In 1964, when I had
just turned eighteen years old, the Communist government
sentenced me to two years reeducation through labor because
of what they called ``counter-revolutionary activities''.
After being released from the laojiao sentence at the farm in
1966, I was ordered to continue forced labor at the farm as a
``forced-job-placement'' (jiuye) worker. I was once again
labeled a ``counter-revolutionary element'' in 1974 because
of my ``political attitudes'',
[[Page E775]] and the controls over me at the Laogai prison
farm were further strengthened. I was detained straight
through until my release in 1983. During the twenty-five
years I spent in the Laogai, I suffered innumerable beatings
and torments; I clearly remember one occasion when I was
unable to fulfill my production quota because I was very
sick, the public security police stripped me of my clothes,
tied me to a tree trunk, and allowed the mosquitoes and
insects to bite me for more than two hours.
The Baimaoling Farm is internally known as the Shanghai
Number Two Laogai General Brigade. It is located in the
southeast area of Anhui Province. Its scale is enormous and
it holds, on average, 50,000 Laogai prisoners, laojiao
prisoners, and jiuye personnel. It produces tea, rice,
valves, and toys, as well as other goods. My father and I
were detained in different sections of the farm, and we were
not permitted to see each other. The public security police
only told me in 1973 that he had died, and I had to go and
claim the corpse. Once at the crematorium, I saw his old and
pale body. I was given those clothes. I cried bitterly. I
felt that my father was more brave than I was because he
dared to determine his own end to this difficult life and
gain his freedom.
I now live in the United States and have a family and
children of my own. I deeply hope that my children and all
other children, as well as all future generations, do not
have ever to suffer through these kinds of tortures and
difficulties. Thank you all very much for your concerns about
the Chinese citizens who continue to suffer in the Laogai to
this very day.
____
-Testimony of Palden Gyatso, Laogai Survivor
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I have spent 33 years of my 64-year-old life in Chinese
prisons and Laogai camps in Tibet. During those years I
yearned for a moment such as this one. I express my
wholehearted thanks to you, Mr. Chairman, and to all the
members of this Committee for giving me this great
opportunity to appear before you today. I feel that it is an
honor, but also my responsibility, to inform the United
States Congress about the mistreatment I and other Tibetans
have suffered in the Laogai at the hands of the Chinese
government.
My name is Palden Gyatso. I became a monk when I was ten
years old. At 28 years of age in 1959, at the climax of the
Chinese military invasion of Tibet, I was arrested and
accused of being a ``reactionary element'' and sentenced to a
seven-year prison term to be served at the Panam District
Prison in southern Tibet. This prison was previously a
monestary named Norbu Khyungtse. In the prison, I was made to
do hard labor, ordinarily for nine hours a day, and some
times even more. We prisoners were yoked to plows like
animals to till prison lands. When we got exhausted and
became too weak to pull the plow, we were kicked and whipped
from behind. Since we were never given enough to eat, we were
forced to steal food meant for the pigs in the Chinese pig
sties. We were also driven to chewing and eating things like
used leather items, bones of different kinds of dead animals,
mice, worms, and all kinds of green grasses.
The treatment of political prisoners at the Laogai in Tibet
involves different types of cruel acts. In winter, we were
suspended in the air and then cold water was thrown on us;
during hot summer days, cold water was replaced by building a
fire beneath the suspended prisoner. Other forms of ill-
treatment in this position included being lashed with a
leather belt and being beaten with an electric cattle-prod or
an iron bar. Our feet were also fettered with iron manacles
while self-tightening handcuffs and thumb-cuffs were used to
tie our hands and thumbs. The sharp edges on those handcuffs
often resulted in prisoners hands getting cut completely off.
I still have many scars on my wrists as a result of these
sharp instruments.
In 1962, I managed to escape from Panam District Prison
with six other political prisoners. But we got caught just
when we reached Tonsher township to worship near the Indo-
Tibetan border, and my prison term was increased to 15 years
as result. The imposition of the additional eight year prison
term was preceded by indiscriminate beatings, then the use of
iron shackles on both my hands and feet, night and day for
six months. The leg shackles were not removed for more than
two years, during which I was taught how to, then forced to,
weave carpets.
Mr. Chairman, I completed my Laogai term in 1975 but was
not allowed to return home. Rather, I was sent to the
Nyethang Laogai camp, located some 15 miles west of Lhasa,
the capital of Tibet. Prison life resumed, though with a
slightly relaxed atmosphere. In 1979, I took advantage of
this to sneak out of the Laogai camp in the middle of the
night to go to Lhasa, where I put up a number of posters
calling for Tibetan independence. I was finally caught, and
on August 26, 1983, I was rearrested and sent to the Old
Sangyip Prison in northeastern Lhasa.
In April 1984, I was sentenced to a nine year prison term
during a one hour trial where I was denied legal
representation or opportunity to defend myself. I was taken
to the Outidu Prison Fourth Unit, which is today a part of
the Sangyip Prison Administration in the remote northeast
valley of Lhasa, in April of 1985. In that Laogai, we had to
do all sorts of filthy work, including the handling of human
excrement used to grow vegetables. Sometimes we were forced
to do the personnel work of the prison guards. But the guards
routinely expresses dissatisfaction with our work and often
beat us afterwards. We were also often subjected to other
abuses by drunken prison guards.
Other forms of ill-treatment at the Laogai were rampant.
For example, in November 1987, a prison official poked me
with an electric cattle-prod and poured boiling water over me
just because he said he did not like my attitude. No medical
treatment was given after that.
Throughout my 15 year imprisonment that started in 1959 and
the nine year confinement in the Laogai thereafter, I was
never allowed any visits or meetings with my relatives and
family members.
In November 1987, five prisoners from Guojo District in
eastern Tibet, imprisoned at Gutsa Prison in Lhasa, were
sentenced and two of them put to death. On the day of the
announcement of the sentences, all of the prisoners of Gutsa
Prison (near Sangyip) were ordered to attend. The two
prisoners who were sentenced to death were told by the
Chinese police that since the were to be executed in two
days, they should sing loudly and dance in front of the crowd
of other prisoners. They were forced to comply with this
order with their iron leg and hand shackles on. Many
prisoners cried spontaneously and even the Tibetan officials
looked saddened by the spectacle. I was told this story by a
number of nuns and others who were in that prison at that
time. Such a sorry state of affairs clearly shows that there
really are no rights at all for prisoners in Tibet.
In another incident around that time, police guards at
Gutsa Prison repeatedly raped nun political prisoners then
sexually violated them with electric cattle-prods. Before
thrusting the cattle-prod into the sexual organ of one, the
assailant said, ``You have not yet experienced this.'' The
name of this prison guard is Sonam Tsering; he was still on
duty when I escaped from Tibet. Such is the conduct of the
police, who we are also told are humanitarians.
Mr. Chairman, I was transferred from Outidu Prison to the
nearby Drapchi Prison, known as the ``Tibet Autuonmous
Region'' Number One Prison on October 13, 1990. Immediately
upon my arrival, the chief administrator of the prison's
Fifth Unit, a man named Paljor, asked me, ``I see you have
been imprisoned three times. What brought you here this
time?'' I replied, ``I was arrested because I had put up
posters saying Tibet is an independent country, separated
from China.''
He replied, ``I will give you Tibetan independence.'' He
then proceeded to give me a number of vicious kicks and
intermittently jabbed the electric cattle-prod on various
parts of my body. Finally, after about half an hour, he
rammed the cattle-prod into my mouth and pushed it in with
great force. I passed out. When I regained consciousness,
I found myself in a pool of blood and excrement and in
extreme pain. No medical treatment was given. I lost most
of my teeth.
In April 1991, Ambassador James Lilley, then Ambassador to
China, came to visit the Drapchi Prison. I, along with some
of my fellow prisoners, presented him with a petition
detailing the torture and suffering at the prison. But it was
snatched away from his hand and given over to the head of
prison administration. After the ambassador left, two
political prisoners, Lobsang Tenzin and Tenpa Wangdak, were
detained in solitary confinement while being interrogated.
Together with three other prisoners, they were later
transferred to the Powo Tramo Laogai Camp in southeastern
Tibet. That day, the Army was called in and all of us
political prisoners were beaten with rifle butts or stabbed
with bayonets. The sticks and electric prods used to beat us
were almost all broken from the verocity of the beatings.
Ngawang Kunga, a political prisoner, was beaten until he lost
consciousness with an iron chain used to tie a prisoner's
legs. Ngawang Phuljung lost consciousness after he was beaten
with a rifle butt to his temple. Phurbu Tsering was stabbed
with a bayonet, causing a deep vertical cut in the back of
his head which bled tremendously. The list of those beaten is
too long to enumerate. The latter two are still in the same
prison today.
I would humbly request, Mr. Chairman, that in the future
visits to the prisons by US officials, that there be
substantial follow-up to ensure that these sorts of
atrocities are not committed against political prisoners who
are simply trying to provide information about the true
situation and conditions of prisons in Tibet.
I have recounted only a few instances of the inhumane
atrocities committed against Tibetan prisoners in the Laogai.
Tibetans still continue to be subjected to untold terrors day
and night, and I appeal to your conscience to seek their
freedom. Many instances of brutal ill-treatment of prisoners
in Drapchi Prison in Tibet have come to light recently. In
June 1993, for example, fourteen nuns were found to have
clandestinely composed and recorded a freedom song, resulting
in a brutal beating. A 20-year-old nun named Phuntsok Yangkyi
died. The other thirteen suffered varying degrees of
permanent physical impairments, with one 18-year-old nun
named Ngawang Sangdol having both hands deformed.
Despite the sweltering heat and the fetid atmosphere,
prisoners are required to remain in the greenhouses all day,
year round, to grow vegetables and sell them in the market in
Lhasa. While not being paid for their
[[Page E776]] work, the prisoners who fail to fulfill their
quotas are punished and liable to have their prison terms
extended. The health of many prisoners has been effected by
continual exposure to the greenhouse atmosphere, rendering
them barely conscious of the surroundings.
On August 25, 1992, I finished my prison term and was
finally released from prison. Thirteen days later I escaped
from Tibet. Before escaping, I made arrangements to acquire
some of the instruments of torture in order to show them to
the outside world. I have brought a few of them here to show
to you. One is the type of electric cattle-prod that was
rammed into my mouth and also the sexual organs of nun
political prisoners. This is the type of thumb-cuff that is
used to tie the detaineees diagonally across their backs by
the thumbs. This is one of the special type of knives used by
the Chinese police to stab prisoners. These are just some of
the torture instruments used in the Laogai of Tibet.
Mr. Chairman, the Tibetan people have been suffering under
the repressive Chinese rule since 1949. Thousands and
thousands of innocent Tibetans have lost their lives and the
six million that remain are struggling to keep the Tibetan
culture alive under very difficult conditions.
As the power dynamics in Beijing shift over the next
several months, there will be a tremendous opportunity for
the international community to foster a more democratic
society in China. I appeal to you and to the United States
government to remain vigilant in your effort to hold China
accountable for its actions against the Tibetan people.
Just a few weeks ago, I testified before the United Nations
High Commission on Human Rights, where a resolution
condemning China's human rights violations against both
Tibetan and Chinese people was narrowly defeated. This was a
very important effort, and I humbly urge your government to
return to Geneva next year with a renewed effort concerning
human rights in Tibet and China. I sincerely believe that
unless there is strong international condemnation of the
Chinese government's treatment of the Tibetan people, they
will continue to commit such horrors as described earlier
against innocent political prisoners who insist on the
fundamental rights of freedom of speech, association, and
religion, as well as the recognized right of self-
determination.
I am exceedingly grateful to you Mr. Chairman, and to all
members of this Committee, as well as all others for
listening to this short description of my life in the Laogai
in Tibet. I am only one of the few lucky ones who survived
and managed to escape to the outside world. Many of my
friends and other political prisoners died in the prisons and
Laogai in Tibet. With them also went the story of their
untold sufferings.
I thank you Mr. Chairman. Tashi deleg!
____________________