Original report to be found at http://tagesschau.de/ausland/china1762.html. Translated by Google Translator, fixed some grammar manually.

Torture in China's labor camps - Mistreated on "tiger bench" and "deathbed"



About 300 re-education and labor camps exist in China. The security authorities can hold people there for up to four years without trial. The human rights conditions in the camps have often been denounced, but there is often lack of evidence. To ARD former prisoners confirmed that they suffered torture and ill-treatment there.

Ruth Kirchner, ARD radio studio in Beijing

The labor and reeducation camps Masanjia in Liaoning Province can be found on almost any map. But in the villages of the region, everyone knows where it is located: behind stubble fields outside the town Masanjia. Four-story white and red blocks behind walls and barbed wire. At the gate in yellow gold letters: Liaoning - women re-education and labor camps. Who was imprisoned here, is marked for life. Thus this 50-year-old woman: "I was the second work brigade assigned the same day I was brutally beaten by a police officer, it took 20 minutes I was hit in the face with an electric stick on the ears, the temples... the arms, legs and on the belly., it was unbearable. I whimpered and cried. "

Strapped or hung up suspended

The former prisoners who were imprisoned 2003-2011 Masanjia, describe the interviews with the ARD radio studio in Beijing various forms of torture and ill-treatment: the "tiger bench", had been tied up for hours at the prisoners in extremely painful positions to a chair .The "deathbed" detainees had been for days strapped to a bed, legs and arms stretched motionless on his own. Or "hanging": "They have tied my wrists to the upper rack of a bunk bed, so that my feet could not touch the floor," says a 57-year-old former detainees. "But that was not enough. Pieces of wood have been tied to my legs to keep me from kicking with my feet. Eventually I became unconscious. I do not remember when they took me down."



Hard work, seven days a week

The work was extremely hard. Seven days a week - from morning at six-thirty, often late into the night. For this, the prisoners were supposed to get 1.20 euros per month, but most never saw a cent. "We were not allowed to sleep until we had fulfilled our responsibilities," said a woman who was a loyal party workers at a tax authority to their detention. "Basically, no one could meet quotas, no matter how fast someone was. The requirements were simply too high." The women had to sew clothes and make covers for car seats, or Halloween decorations. What of it for the Chinese, which was meant for the foreign market, the prisoners did not know. If there was to fulfill orders, they sometimes have to work all night, they tell, as camp as Masanjia earn with the work of prisoners apparently a lot of money.

"It's about you take your dignity"

Besides the notorious women's camp there is a smaller one for men. Also there have been similar abuses, says a man, who was released in 2011: "In the labor camps it comes to you to take your dignity You are known as an enemy of the people, therefore you will not be treated like a civilized human being you.. only needs to obey. "

Masanjia many followers of the banned Falun Gong meditation movement were imprisoned in the past ten years, but also drug addicts, petty criminals and stubborn "petitioners" - people who petition for the injustice suffered by the authorities and therefore are regarded as troublemakers. During peak time, there should have been 5,000 prisoners.



Report provides outcry

A detailed report on the conditions in the camp, to put a Chinese magazine ten days ago the Internet was immediately deleted by the censors. Nevertheless, there was an outcry that a few days ago forced the authorities to submit comments. You have the allegations investigated, it said in an online report of the "legal newspaper" "Fazhi Bao". Everything is fictitious: "The re-education camp Masanjia protects the rights of prisoners - also with regard to the standards of the meals. Medical care, working hours and pay all met the requirements of the Ministry of Justice, there are no violations of the rules.."



Ex-prisoners fear reprisals new

For the former prisoners who have spoken with ARD, sounds like mockery and ridicule. They had felt encouraged by the continuing debate on a reform or even abolition of re-education camps to speak to both Chinese as well as foreign journalists. Now they fear that they might be punished for their openness. At least one interviewee had been repeatedly visited by the police. Human rights lawyers in China, meanwhile, are wondering whether Masanjia is a very individual case or worse just the tip of the iceberg.