Communist China's Policy of Oppression in East Turkestan

180
Examples of Mao-style Torture
he name of Mao Tse Tung is remembered
today for cruelty and
brutality. He had unimaginable
tortures inflicted on, not just the
people of East Turkestan, but on his own
people as well. The actions of the Red
Guards under Mao's instructions during
the barbaric period known as the Cultural
Revolution in particular, were crimes
against humanity. The following are just
a few of them:
To put those special handcuffs tightly on
the wrists of a prisoner was a form of torture
commonly used in Maoist China's
prison system. Sometimes additional
chains were put around the ankles of the
prisoners. At other times a prisoner might
be manacled and then have his handcuffs
tied to a bar on the window so that he
could not move away from the window
to eat, drink, or go to the toilet. The purpose
was to degrade a man in order to
destroy his morale… Since the People's
Government claimed to have abolished
all forms of torture, the officials simply
called such methods "punishment"' or
"persuasion." 1
The whole people were invited to public
trials of "counterrevolutionaries," who almost
invariably were condemned to
death… Everyone participated in the executions,
shouting out "kill, kill" to the Red
Guards whose task it was to cut victims
into pieces. Sometimes the pieces were
cooked and eaten, or force-fed to members
of the victim's family who were still
alive and looking on. 2
T
In The Black Book of Communism an observer
described the inhuman treatment
Communist China’s Policy
of Oppression in East Turkestan
meted out to university professors detained
during the days of Mao:
Hanging from their necks were pails filled
with rocks. I saw the principal: the pail
around his neck was so heavy that the
wire had cut deep into his neck and he
was staggering. All were barefoot, hitting
broken gongs or pots as they walked
around the field crying out: "I am black
gangster so-and-so." Finally, they all
knelt down, burned incense, and begged
Mao Zedong to "pardon their crimes."…
A few girls nearly fainted. Beatings and
torture followed. I had never seen such
tortures before: eating nightsoil and insects,
being subjected to electric shocks,
being forced to kneel on broken glass,
being hanged "like an airplane" by the
arms and legs. 3
The same book also mentions the prisons:
The most varied and sadistic tortures
were quite common, such as hanging by
the wrists or thumbs…. The most brutish
people were allowed to operate with impunity.
One camp commander assassinated
or buried alive 1,320 people in one
year, in addition to carrying out numerous
rapes. 4
1. Nien Cheng, Life and Death in Shanghai,
Macdonald, London, 1986, pp.224-226, cited
in The Black Book of Communism, Harvard
University Press, Cambridge, 1999, p.509.
(emphasis added)
2. Ibid., p.470-471. (emphasis added)
3. Ken Ling, Miriam London and Lee Tai-
Ling, Red Guard: From Schoolboy to "Little
General" in Mao's China, Macdonald,
London, 1972, pp. 18-21. cited in The Black
Book of Communism, p. 525. (emphasis added)
4. Ibid, p.482. (emphasis added)