University Librarian Arrested For Faith Seventh Time

On October 16, 2020, Mr. Zhang Huaping, a librarian at Hubei University of Technology, was illegally arrested. He has since been held at The Hubei Province Brainwashing Center in Wuhan City.

It was the week after October 1-8 and Zhang had just returned to work after the national holiday, when he was approached by police and school administration. They ordered him to give up his faith in Falun Gong and threatened to fire him or take him to a local brainwashing center. Zhang refused to comply and was arrested on October 16. His family found out many days later he had been taken to the Hubei Province Brainwashing Center.

The authorities claimed that his arrest was part of their nationwide “zero-out” campaign, launched earlier this year as a coordinated effort to force Falun Gong practitioners to give up their belief.

The Hubei Province Brainwashing Center, also known as the Banqiao Brainwashing Center and Nanhu Brainwashing Center, is a major brainwashing center that carries out severe persecution of Falun Gong.

Since its establishment in February 2002, over 1,000 practitioners have been detained at the Hubei Province Brainwashing Center, and some have been tortured to death. Infamous techniques such as sleep deprivation, long hours of standing, force-feeding, beating, deprivation of food and water, electric shocks, and forced drug administration, originated from this center and are used by many other brainwashing centers as well. These techniques, in combination with brainwashing and mental torment, are used to force practitioners to renounce their faith.

Some practitioners, such as Zhang, have been repeatedly targeted and taken to such brainwashing centers.

Past Persecution

After the Chinese communist regime began its persecution of Falun Gong in 1999, Zhang has been subjected to multiple arrests and detainments for upholding his faith.

He was first arrested in August 2000. The police ransacked his home and beat him in the police station.

In November 2001, Zhang was again arrested and his home ransacked. Due to his arrest, the university administration downgraded his annual performance rating in 2002, withheld his salary for a month, and forbade him from being promoted for three years.

Zhang was arrested once more in February 2002 and detained for a month.

Four months later, the university’s security personnel took him to the Hubei Province Brainwashing Center. He was released a month later, but remained in a delirious state a long time after.

Zhang’s fifth arrest was on September 5, 2004, after being reported for distributing Falun Gong-related materials. The police ransacked his home and took him to the Yangyuan Brainwashing Center.

On May 18, 2010, he was arrested for the sixth time and taken to the Hubei Province Brainwashing Center.

By a Minghui correspondent in Hubei Province, China