When they first arrived in the U.S. five year-old Gao Tianyu asked his mother innocently, “Mommy, can I speak now? Can I go out now?” Though young, the child had good reasons to ask such a question. He is the son of a famous Chinese human rights lawyer, Gao Zhisheng.
Gao has been targeted by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for fighting legal battles against the Chinese regime’s treatment of disenfranchised farmers, persecuted Falun Gong practitioners, and others.
“In China, we weren’t allowed to talk or go out,” said Gao’s wife, Geng He, who is now safely in the U.S. with her son Gao Tianyu and 16 year-old daughter Gege thanks to the help of the U.S. government and friends. “Now that we are in the United States, I told him that he may now speak and play, and talk when people try to chat with him. He now feels free and relaxed.”
On Jan. 9, 2009, Mrs. Gao and her children fled from Beijing and the house arrest they had been living under. They eluded the Chinese police and arrived in Thailand on Jan. 16. Mrs. Gao said that she tries not to think too much about anything other than repairing the hearts of her traumatized children, who are still feeling very depressed.
Worried for Gao's Safety
Mrs. Gao knows precious little about her husband’s whereabouts or current condition. But what she does know is not good. He has been tortured by the Chinese Communist regime, and the long term affects have taken a severe toll on his health.
Mrs. Gao was reluctant to leave her husband behind to fend for himself and recover from having been tortured for the work he does.
“[The most recent time he was arrested and tortured] they used smoke to irritate his eyes,” said Mrs. Gao. “Now he is secreting tears almost around the clock. He secretes tears all day long. He often has to wipe off his tears and his eyes hurt all the time. He cannot get anything done because of that.”
According to Mrs. Gao, her husband’s lower back has been injured from brutal beatings. After he gets up in the morning, he cannot move his lower back without being in pain. It is even difficult to sit or rise from a chair.
Gao’s digestive system has also been damaged. “Even on a hot day, even a glass of lukewarm water would give him diarrhea,” said Mrs. Gao. “Even when he is not hungry, he craves for food. Even after a binge, Gao would feel pain yet still feel hungry. He seems to have lost his feeling of fullness. His body seems to be out of control. … It is as though his body is now made of paper.”
Daughter Attempted Suicide
Shortly before the Beijing Olympic Games in 2008, Gao Zhisheng and his family were removed from Beijing and brought to Xinjiang, a sparsely populated northwestern region. It was not until the end of August that the family was taken back to Beijing. However, the family was taken to a remote location again before the Special Olympics.
Since Sept. 1, 2008, Mr. Gao’s daughter Geng Gege (nicknamed Gege) was prevented from attending school. She was under house arrest, cut off from school and her friends. Gege was on the verge of a breakdown. She repeatedly attempted to injure herself and even attempted suicide. Mr. and Mrs. Gao were very worried for her. Mr. Gao was especially heartbroken for his daughter.
Mrs. Gao recounted with a pained expression on her face. There was a small knife for handicrafts on Gege’s desk. She would cut her arms with the knife. She said she felt better when she cut her arms. Some cuts have healed, but others are still healing. She tried to cut herself three times. Mr. and Mrs. Gao caught her trying to kill herself once. Gege cut her artery. She was smiling looking at her own blood. Mr. and Mrs. Gao accidentally saw her doing that in her room. It brought great pain to the couple to see their daughter like that.
Mrs. Gao said, “For the sake of the children, I had to flee from China. Otherwise, we would have felt guilty for the children. It was an emotional blow to Gao. He feels guilty for the kids. We both feel terrible.”
Mrs. Gao talked about an evening when the Chinese police showed up unexpectedly and ransacked their home. The police pointed the flashlight at Mr. Gao.
Mrs. Gao said, “Tianyu made graffiti on the walls. The police pointed the flashlight at the graffiti wall and at Tianyu. Tianyu was very nervous and frightened. He kept hiding from the flashlight.”
Daughter escorted by police
According to Mrs. Gao, Gege’s schoolteacher told her class that they must not carry a mobile phone. If any students should be caught with one, the teacher said, they would have to face the police and the school would wash their hands of the matter. This was how the school intimidated the class. Gege’s class was deprived of computer classes because the Chinese regime feared that Gege might try to get in touch with the outside world via the Internet. Because the class was cut off from computers and mobile phones, her schoolteacher and her classmates isolated her and didn’t want to have anything to do with her.
The discrimination and isolation have had a huge impact on Gege’s mind. Mrs. Gao said Gege would come home depressed and angry. She lost her interest in studying. She would lock herself up in her room, refusing to eat or drink. She felt depressed because there were at least four policemen escorting her to school and following her at school. During the car ride to school, the policemen would insult her father and Hu Jia (a family friend of Gao and a human rights activist) to be spiteful.
If Gege should say anything back, the police would make worse insults. If Gege should leave the school late, the policemen would be angry with her. If Gege should protest, they would grab and drag her.
One day Gege finished school late because the school had a review class. Gege wanted to have dinner with her classmates before returning home, but the policemen would not allow her to do so. They forced Gege to leave with them and Gege refused. The police smashed her dinner box and knocked her unconsciousness. She was then thrown into the car and sent home while still unconscious.
Mrs. Gao said, “It was a very traumatizing experience for her. It has made my husband and I feel terrible.”
One evening Gege didn’t come home from school. It was already close to 8 p.m. Mrs. Gao was very worried. She went to school to look for her. Although the school building was completely dark and abandoned, Mrs. Gao was not afraid to go into the building to look for her daughter. Finally she found the child sitting alone in a park. That day Gege had a flute class. The policemen were sitting in the back of the classroom watching the flute class. Gege was furious and sat alone in the park in the dark.
Mrs. Gao contemplated suicide
Mrs. Gao recalled, “At the time, Gege and I were put under house arrest. Those policemen ransacked our home and left nothing untouched. Afterwards, the policemen came in three shifts and stayed at our home around the clock. There were about seven policemen on each shift. When I demanded to know my husband’s whereabouts and condition, the policemen refused to tell me. So I went on a hunger strike for about four days.”
She continued, “They force-fed me with water. On the fourth day when I agreed to have two sips of water, they finally told me that my husband was in Shandong and was now transferred to Beijing. During that period of time, Gege went on a few hunger strikes as well.”
In mid-November 2006, Gege went to the market for grocery shopping. The police following her were walking very closely to her. Mrs. Gao asked them to keep their distance, but they denied that they were following her. When Mrs. Gao tried to reason with the police, the policemen cursed and one of them hit her in the face.
Two of the policemen followed her to the bus. When Mrs. Gao got off the bus, she saw a police car pull up behind the bus. The police came out of the car and started beating her. They knocked out a tooth. Her face was bleeding, her ponytail came off and her clothes were torn during the beating.
When Gege saw her mother’s condition, she grabbed her music sheet stand, wanting to go out and fight with the police.
Mrs. Gao recalled, “I grabbed Gege. At the time, there was no one but us women and children. Tianyu was just three years old. My mother, who is in her 70’s, was staying with us. We were terribly frightened because we didn’t know what might happen next.”
In order to grab the music sheet stand from Gege, Mrs. Gao accidentally snapped the steel stand into two. She said she had no idea where the strength came from.
Mrs. Gao said, “In order to fight for that music sheet stand, I accidentally cut myself. I didn’t know what else to do. I must not let Gege go out and fight with the police. We couldn’t say anything. We couldn’t do anything. We were very confused. We were in the depths of despair.”
Mrs. Gao thought of ending her life.
“One day I told Gege. Look after Tianyu. I would create a gas leak and blow up the apartment. I don’t want to live any longer. Gege told me, ‘Mommy, don’t die. What would I do without you?’”
“I really wanted to blow up the house because we didn’t have any food bowls, scissors or kitchen knives. We had nothing. Even the knitting needles were confiscated.”
Longing for friends and company
Mrs. Gao said, “There was a group of policemen stationed in our home and outside our home. We lived on the second floor. Between the second and third floors, there was another group of policemen. There was also a group of policemen between the first and the second floors. At night, we could hear policemen outside the door talking to each other on the third floor or the first floor. We could hear everything.”
There were a few times Mrs. Gao was terribly frightened. The police cut off the cable and electricity and made threats. Mrs. Gao said, “I was frightened at home. When I heard someone knocking on the door, I would tremble in fear.”
When Mrs. Gao was doing grocery shopping, she often took a few turns in the market, longing to run into friends and familiar faces, hoping to find an abandoned mobile phone or be handed a note.
Mrs. Gao said, “I was looking for such opportunities, so I would spend a long time in the market.”
One day Mrs. Gao ordered a mobile phone and told the store owner that she would pick it up in 10 minutes. When she returned to the store after she finished grocery shopping, the owner told her that a policeman came as soon as she left, showed his police badge and took the mobile phone.
Mrs. Gao said, “There is no such a thing as privacy. They stood very, very close to you. I felt as though they were checking how much money was in my hand when I was paying for groceries.”
Mrs. Gao added, “One day I accidentally got rid of the police following me. But I realized I didn’t have any money with me, not even coins. I was mad at myself. From then on, I made sure I had some coins in all my pockets. I wished one day I would be able to get rid of the police and make a phone call to learn some news from friends.”
“Every day we waited for each other to return home. We didn’t know what might happen to each other.”
Authorities used Gao’s family as hostages to threaten him
The regime had been using Gao Zhisheng’s family as hostages to threaten him.
Mrs. Gao said, “On Sep. 27, 2008 my husband was arrested again. The police accused me of failing to monitor my husband, so they started to follow me very closely. They said that if I had not given the outside world any information, it might have been better for my husband. Once the outside world knew about his situation, they would make it worse for my husband and us. Then they stopped Gege from going to school. They threatened to pull Tianyu out of kindergarten if I should talk again.”
After the police ransacked her home in September 2008, Mrs. Gao had 300 yuan left. Then Tianyu and Gege both got sick. They didn’t have money for medical treatment, which put Mrs. Gao in a bad mood.
Mrs. Gao said, “I asked for our bank certificate to make a withdrawal, but they told me that they would return it to me when I ran out of money or when I had improved my behavior. They even followed us to the hospital. Finally I had to borrow from the police and pay them back. I didn’t have money to pay for Tianyu’s kindergarten tuition.”
Mrs. Gao said with a sigh, “I lived in modern Beijing, but I could not use telecommunications to contact my friends. I had to walk for a few hours to obtain a little information. I found it difficult to live there. Sometimes when Gege had to go out, I would be very worried for her safety.”
History of Gao Zhisheng
In February 2009, Mr. Gao Zhisheng published an article on the Internet titled, “Dark Night, Dark Hood and Kidnapping by Dark Mafia—My account of more than 50 days of torture in 2007,” in which he told of the cruel tortures he was subjected to during the kidnapping and incarceration.
The article describes the cruel tortures in more than 50 days of incarceration since he was kidnapped by the police in September 2007. The tortures included shocking his genitals with an electric baton. The regime tortured Mr. Gao Zhisheng to avenge his open letter to the U.S. Congress about human rights violations in China. On Feb. 4, 2009, Mr. Gao was taken away from home again by the police. His current whereabouts are unknown.
Read original article in Chinese.
