(Minghui.org) Starting around April 20, 2025, the Beijing Prison Administration Bureau dispatched guards to the Jinzhong Prison in Shanxi Province, to help launch a new torture campaign aimed to force detained Falun Gong practitioners to renounce their faith.
All Falun Gong practitioners who were recently admitted to the prison were brought to solitary confinement on the fourth floor. They were forced to stand all day long without sleep. The guards also beat them and pepper-sprayed them. After this round, all other practitioners in the prison were also taken to the solitary confinement section and tortured.
Mr. Hou Lijun started a hunger strike in April 2025. The prison began to force-feed him in June. He resumed eating for a few days in August before starting a new round of hunger strike again.
Mr. Hou, 54 and of Taiyuan, was given a two-year forced labor camp in 2000. He suffered brutal torture in custody and had his term extended by six months. He was arrested again in October 2002 and was shocked with two electric batons of 180,000 volts for long hours after he started a hunger strike to protest. His body was severely burnt. He managed to escape from custody and was forced to live in displacement for the next 20 years to hide from the police.
After Mr. Hou was arrested on April 25, 2023, he was sentenced to 10 years and admitted to the Jinzhong Prison in early June 2023. He started a hunger strike on the day of his arrest and continued after his prison admission.
Mr. Hou was initially assigned to the strict management team to undergo “intensive training” aimed to force him to renounce Falun Gong. An inmate named Guo Chunlei beat a 74-year-old Falun Gong practitioner and Mr. Hou reported the incident to team lead Zhou Dongyan.
Instead of disciplining Guo, Zhou slapped Mr. Hou in the face sixteen times and instructed Guo to restrain him on a bench with his hands cuffed and ropes wrapped around his neck. Guo also sprayed pepper in his eyes three times, flicked his eyes, and slapped him in the face. For three nights in a row, he was not allowed to sleep. He started a hunger strike in protest and was placed in solitary confinement.
Mr. Hou was repeatedly deprived of sleep for days on end. He was also forced to sit on a small stool motionless for long hours, causing him to have difficulty passing urine and he suffered severe back plain. As he continued his hunger strike, the guards force-fed him. He almost suffocated during each force-feeding session.
Mr. Hou was later moved to Division Two of the prison and forced to do hard labor without pay. The guards only allowed him to spend 100 yuan on daily necessities each month and barred him from calling his family or having them visit him in person. He continued his hunger strike and was force-fed every day. His blood pressure shot up to 220/130 mmHg at one point (a normal range is 120/80 or lower). The prison hospital issued critical condition notices twice.
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