Written Statement
# Written Statement
The written statement was submitted before the Tribunal live session. Wang Leizhan’s Uyghur Tribunal - Witness Statement
# Uyghur Tribunal - Live Hearing 7th June 2021
# Transcription
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Transcription
How long did you serve in Xinjiang as a serving policeman?
- I was there for several months. There are police who are assigned to be there for a year or two or some much longer than that, but I was there for several months.
In that period, you learned about hiring of 150,000 policemen for Xinjiang. You mentioned that they did not receive proper training. Is that correct?
- There are actually not police. They are assistant police. And those people were recruited all over China. And the majority never had a job.
You also refer to a secret committee deciding on the warrants of arrest. Can you explain more about this committee or anything you know about it.
- The committee consisted of the local government officials. Most of them are some from the Department of work, and there’s no non officials from the judicial system. So the main purpose is how to convert or correct the so-called incorrect political view, or people who had the problem with their thoughts.
Have you heard of a computer program called Integrated Joint Operations Platform?
- Yes. The integrated joint platform is used as a major database that collect the data of the Uyghur people. And so all the information including their driving license, and any information related to their daily life is collected in this system. So if someone for example, went to Beijing, then we can detect the person is in Beijing. As soon as they touch their ID card anywhere. We know what they’re doing. The purpose of this is to complete control and the surveil of individuals
Does this program integrated joint platform also flag out the name of the persons that should be arrested?
- Well, the the system management is through the ID card number. So when you go to a train station, buy ticket or in an airport, as soon as you use your ID card immediately who you are and if you are a suspect or if you are someone who has this tendency that you are against the government, that that will be shown on the system and the police can arrest there and then.
During your short tour of duty in Xinjiang, you say that there were 300,000 arrests of Uyghurs. Can you give an idea how this huge number was handled? How many a day on average?
- All the neighborhood committee including schools, all the departments, they must provide the names of the suspects or the people who considered to have problems in their thoughts.
- And all the activities including using their telephone and using the internet, every movement is all completely under surveillance control.
- And other police in all the different neighborhoods or county level or city level, they go to those houses and arrest them so they target the names and that was provided and they would be arrested and detained.
- Through this complete surveillance control system, using the data and information that was provided by different committees, village-level, town-level, including schools if students said something that reveals they have thought that needs reform, or there are information provided by other sources to make us believe these people have thought problems, then we decide this as tendency to commit terrorism and we arrest them and treat them as terrorists.
You mentioned that 300,000 arrests were made during your short stay in Xinjiang. Can you confirm that?
- Yes.
You explain the Uyghurs were treated differently from Han Chinese.
- All the Uyghurs were considered as politically incorrect and also a threat to the state. Therefore they were all treated like political prisoners. They’re very different from ordinary criminals. So the police are always ready to attack hem, because they were considered to be a danger to the state.
You witnessed that Uyghurs were being tortured by the police. Can you confirm that?
- Yes, I can confirm.
Can you let the tribunal know what is in your training the guideline for torturing witnesses or criminals?
- Well, in the past, especially 20 years ago, it was quite common to beat up any new detainees, regardless if they’re criminals or any kind of prisoners.
- But later they have regulized [sic] and there is a department inspection department that after the interrogation, they must have the video of the interrogation video records submitted to this department and then they will check.
- But because Uyghurs are considered to be the political and they are considered to be the ones that all try to overthrow the Party, there is no such procedure. So the police doesn’t have to do any recording of their behavior and the interrogation process. Therefore, the police has the complete power to interrogate to torture and also forced them to confess.
When you were trained some 10 years ago, did they mentioned that you can or cannot torture the criminals for obtaining evidence?
- Well, it completely depends. In general, they say that we are not supposed to a torture prisoners, detainees.
- But if the prisoners are considered to be political, and then we have different methods for example, depriving them from food, from water from sleeping, and in some cases use various methods for them to confess the accused crimes.
What type of tortures are you allowed to inflict, to obtain the confession?
- Basically, there is no written order on how to torture these prisoners. However, the police had the complete power to torture them, as they sit in my statement that these people were tortured severely and forced to forcing the water pipe into their lungs.
When you were being trained, Mr. Zhang, were you also trained for methods of torture?
- Well, it’s quite a secret. I am old policeman. But after arriving in Xinjiang, I witnessed it is a kind of unwritten rules that police has the power to torture prisoners. And you don’t need to learn to be trained to how to torture prisoners, but when you watch what happened, you will know what to do.
Mr. Zhang, in your training, are you permitted to beat the prisoner in order to extract confession?
- The police ranks are different, and the police who are in charge of the interrogation are medium level.
- My role as police is not the interrogation police who are in charge of interrogation.
- I didn’t receive training because I wasn’t the policed trained to interrogate prisoners.
- In Xinjiang the situation is very different. A lot of things are done very secretly. The State Security Police has total power to arrest the Uyghurs and to carry it out according to their rules.
You witnessed that Uyghur prisoners were forced to kneel, punched, the plastic bag will be tied over their head in order to induce suffocation and the bag would only be moved when they begin to struggle for breathe. Can you confirm that?
- Yes.
You also mentioned that sometimes their limbs were tight and water pipes were inserted in their mouth to post water into their lungs. Can you confirm that?
- Yes.
You also witnessed that the police was using electric rods, which are connected to a male penis in order to electrical those parts. Correct?
- Yes.
Also, prisoners were left to starve, and some food was offered in order to turn them. Correct?
- Yes.
Did you witness any witness, any of the prisoners going crazy or mad as a result of the torture?
- Yes.
Did you witness any prisoner dying as a result of torture?
- I didn’t see it with my own eyes.
But have you heard about it?
- Yes.
And did you witness any sexual harassment or rape against the prisoners?
- Well, it is a topic that I never liked to discuss. Therefore I never made any inquiry regarding this. But I believe such behavior exists.
- Well I did hear about the assistant police. They’ve heard about sexual harassment against the detainees.
Finally, Mr Jian referred to state orphanages where the children of the prisoners were taken. Have you seen or witnessed any of those and have you been inside any of these orphanages?
- Well it’s not an orphanage. in Xinjiang the children didn’t have a summer holidays or winter holidays because they lived in those schools. So they’re state boarding facilities. So the children didn’t go home they they remained there.
- They recruited the teachers from mainland and the condition of the so-called schools are extremely bad, very poor facilities. In a small, just over 10 square meter room. There many children slept in bunk beds, and the food also very poor.
Two questions about your experiences in mainland China before going to Xinjiang
What events or factors usually lead to you detaining political or religious suspects?
- For example Falun Gong people and also religious people who practice underground. All were targeted and also surveilled.
Were these multiple ethnic groups?
- They didn’t care whether you belong to different ethnic groups. As long as you participated in those banned religions, you’re a target.
And in the prisons, were there interrogation rooms, without cameras for these political and religious prisoners?
- Well, I didn’t participate in the interrogation process, but I have a knowledge that these people have this different facilities that they were taken and the police in those facilities were in charge of what to do with them.
Can you tell me why you were transferred from the mainland to Xinjiang?
- Well, the program was to recruit police from Mainland China to support and to protect Xinjiang, to support the police in Xinjiang. So different region have to support the different region in Xinjiang. And so, this was the process of bringing a more policemen of all levels, some administrative level and also different levels of of police sent Xinjiang. And in order to help and support the police in in Xinjiang.
You say that when you arrived in Xinjiang, this was the first time you learnt about reeducation camps. Do you mean it’s the first time you learned about their existence or that you learned their true nature?
- Well, I didn’t know I didn’t know about their reeducation at all of arriving there. Then we had the training. We were told that the state is fighting against terrorism and fighting against the separatists. Everything conducted was secretive, we were warned that we are not supposed to disclose any information to, to speak freely about it. And I know many Uyghur police were arrested, after they detected that they spoke about these facilities over the phone. So everything was in very strict secrecy.
With regard to the local committees deciding who should go to the camps, who was responsible for choosing the individuals that were on these committees?
- You cannot separate the Party and the state. The Party is the department who decides and has the absolute power to make that decision.
And is it the party that then trains these individuals as to what to do?
- Yes, correct.
Thank you. In paragraph seven of your evidence, you refer to prison rules, preventing guards from providing Uyghur prisoners with food and drink. Were these written rules?
- It is the rule, it made very clear that no guards or a system (?) police or police show any mercy towards the prisoners or detainees.
And is this a written rule?
- Yeah, every level there is rules that not necessarily can be seen by others. I believe that is written rules in all different levels of management.
In paragraph 10, you say that, because people were labeled as terrorists. You believe that this was an invitation almost to torture. And I wonder if you could expand on that. That link between the name and permission to torture.
- Well, well, the Communist Party, the government consider any forces who are against the power or are labeled as terrorists as the enemy of the people.
- So the enemy of the people not considered as human being, therefore they can treat them how they wish, so they never treated them as a normal human human being. So they received degrading, inhumane treatment.
Where did you go to after you left Xinjiang after a few months?
- First point was Beijing, so I was in Beijing before going back home.
And what were you still working as a policeman in Beijing?
- No, I wasn’t working in Beijing. That was just a place to transfer to come home. Yes, I continued to be a policeman back home.
How did you manage to get to Germany?
- Well, it’s a long story. Some of my actions were against the Chinese Communist Party, and I was at risk. And therefore, I left and arrived in Germany. But the the whole journey was not an easy one and it’s complicated.
Could you say something about the language which was used either by the police or government officials or others? How did they refer to Uyghurs? Was there degrading language or other language which was used as a description?
- Okay, they were refered to as terrorists, separatists and they are forces that are against the state.
I understand that. But was there any slang or informal language which was used as as descriptive of Uyghurs?
- Well, I didn’t hear apart from what I know and what I have told you.
- Well, all they did, the way how they were called while they are there. Terrorist, separatist and enemy of the state.
In paragraph seven of your report, you refer to a national Chinese policy to arrest Uyghurs because they are automatically considered enemies or terrorists. What is this national Chinese policy?
- It is to protect and maintain the power of the Chinese Communist Party in Xinjiang. So all different levels of the management, they have policies to serve this policy.
- So it said very clearly to not give any opportunity for these separatists or so-called terrorists to achieve their own goal. And that is to separate Xinjiang and to achieve their own ideology to build an independent or separate country.
- So the center of the whole policy is to maintain the power of the Communist Party in XInjiang.
So which department would it have come from, the CCP?
- It’s under the leadership of highest level of the Party Committee from the top and then to the bottom. So every department, every level, there is a party Committee. The party committee has the absolute power to implement the policies that they receive from the highest level, including the party committee in village level or county level.
Related to that. You said in your testimony that state powers acted according to their own rules. So that would be under the party secretary in the region. Is that right?
- Yes, correct.
In regard to these policies. Did you receive or were you’re aware of any written instructions in that regard? Or did you at any point receive oral verbal instructions.
- So there was a department established as anti-terror, anti-terror department, from the provincial level to all different levels.
- And the police stations also have a police department specifically called the anti terror police department.
- So all the documents that are under the policies is about how to basically branding all the Uyghurs as terrorists and act accordingly.
From what year did this policy start?
- I believe existed even 10 years ago. And especially after the July 5 incident in 2009, the level of control increased.
Did it increase also from 2014 or 2016?
- Especially after Chen Quanguo became the party secretary in Xinjiang. He carried out complete control policy.
Under which department did the anti terror department sit? What was the senior organization to the anti terror department?
- The highest level of this anti terror department or bureau is in Beijing and then it comes down to all different levels.
In paragraph 11, you link the national policy of having Uyghurs seen as terrorists and the enemy, to their being tortured once they had been arrested. But once they’ve been arrested, this is no need to torture them. So why would they torture?
- Well, the method of torture, the reason to torture these people is to remove any kind of disagreements or their own opinion after putting them through the worst treatment, degrading treatments, to make them completely obey the party. And so afterwards they have no thoughts left, so completely in line with the Communist Party. And that is the purpose of all the torture and inhuman degrading treatment, because the people who are arrested, these detainees, there are some educated who had a strong own opinion, and only through such cruelty could this purpose be achieved.
In paragraph 13. You speak of the Chinese government wishing to destroy the identity of the Uyghurs and promote Han Chinese identity, but you also speak of natural resources claimed by Uyghurs and Chinese being a source of disagreement and problem. How important is the economic problem? The resources, how important is that in the way Uyghurs generally were treated?
- It is it is extremely important. The cotton industry and also oil and other agricultural resources. They extract all these resources for their own benefit and power.
- Of course, the economic benefit also involves the labor, for example, the Bingtuan, the Xinjiang Production and Construction Corps that is in charge or manage all the camps and the the forced forced labor.
- So in that sense, the economical benefit is extremely important. The Chinese Communist Party act like they are the empire in that region.
I noticed when you were visible, you had your uniform on. Can I assume from that that you are a patriot who loves China and if you are a patriot in China, are you able to critique any of the state’s conduct?
- When I became a soldier, at the time my dream was to serve my country and protect people. Not to protect the emperor. So gradually from my own experience, seeing through how the system works. I realized that I wasn’t serving the people, I was serving the emperor and protecting their power. Therefore I can say I am a patriot to my people, but not to the fascist regime, how they are ruling the country in the most cruel way.