With only a week left until the 20th Third Plenary Session of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), Shanghai petitioner Yu Zhonghuan escaped from Shanghai due to authorities’ “stability maintenance” actions against him.
More than a month ago, Yu Zhonghuan was originally scheduled for a two-week hospital stay for treatment of various severe illnesses. However, he left the hospital 10 days early, arranged for his disabled daughter, and fled to another city.
On the evening of July 7th, Yu Zhonghuan told a reporter from Epoch Times, “I just contacted the foster care institution, my daughter hasn’t eaten for two days due to illness, and the foster care institution asked me to take her to the hospital. However, based on my experience last year – in early July last year, I returned to Shanghai to see my daughter when she was sick and was arrested at the entrance of the foster care institution’s residential area. So if I return to Shanghai this time to take my daughter to the hospital, I will definitely be arrested, and they won’t allow my daughter to receive medical treatment.”
During these days, Yu Zhonghuan has been seeking help from the Secretary of the Municipal Party Committee, the Mayor, reporting to the municipal and district discipline inspection commission, lodging complaints, and seeking help, but has not received any response.
He left a message on the Shanghai Municipal Government website for the Secretary of the Municipal Party Committee, Chen Jining, stating, “I beg you not to forward the letter layer by layer to the Jinqiao Town Government’s petition office (department), that is a terrifying organization. The director of the department, Zheng Daorong, would sneer and say, ‘You want to sue? Sue! All complaints would be forwarded to me, hahaha…’. As a result, my daughter and I would suffer more retaliation, persecution, and harassment.”
In the letter, he also wrote, “I cooperate with the authorities in ‘stability maintenance’, never going to Beijing to petition during sensitive periods, and my daughter often needs medical attention and care and cannot be away from home. However, the petition department of Jinqiao Town disregards the facts, unusually keen on ‘stability maintenance’.”
Yu Zhonghuan said that escaping from Shanghai was a last resort based on lessons learned from past experiences. In the past two years, he was illegally detained and kidnapped by the petition office of Jinqiao Town, Pudong New Area, for more than three months.
Yu Zhonghuan suffers from severe diseases such as stage 3 hypertension (extremely high risk), liver, heart, kidney, etc. The authorities’ “stability maintenance” measures against him over the past two years have worsened his condition.
He said, “Two years ago, around the time of the 20th National Congress of the CCP and the China International Import Expo in Shanghai, I was imprisoned in a secret detention center for nearly two months due to ‘stability maintenance’; my daughter could not receive medical care, leading to severe consequences.”
“At the beginning of February last year, I had already made an appointment with a tertiary hospital in Shanghai, but on the day before the appointment, despite my repeated assurances not to go to Beijing, leaving my daughter alone at home for medical treatment, etc., the petition office forcibly kidnapped me to Chongming Island’s secret detention center, took away the keys I had with me, illegally entered my home, prevented my daughter from seeking medical treatment, and forcibly sent her to a foster care institution for the disabled. To cover up their crimes, they even forced me to write a letter of authorization to have them send my daughter to the foster care institution.”
“When I returned home from the secret detention center after more than a month, I found the house ransacked, with 20,000 yuan (money reserved for my daughter’s medical treatment) and a laptop missing.”
During his time in the secret detention center, Yu Zhonghuan was frequently beaten, mistreated, insulted, and given rotten and spoiled food. He said, “Not only was I injured from the beatings, but I also had a fever, obvious signs of illness, yet they refused to let me seek medical treatment. After leaving the secret detention center, I went to the hospital and my blood pressure reached 228mmHg, and my liver, heart, kidneys, etc., showed signs of illness. This was clearly caused by torture in the secret detention center.”
In his letter to Chen Jining, Yu Zhonghuan also accused the Shanghai Pudong Petition Bureau of not only ignoring his housing demolition compensation issues but also deducting all the living difficulties subsidies for his entire family.
More than ten years ago, the Pudong New Area government promised to provide Yu Zhonghuan with compensation for housing arrangements, but the petition department refused to handle it, and his entire family faced suppression and persecution.
Due to his efforts in safeguarding rights, his wife was sentenced to eight months in prison, subjected to cruel torture, her condition worsened, and she passed away in 2022, still uncremated. His daughter already had a medical appointment but was forcibly deprived of the right to seek medical treatment by the Jinqiao Town petition office due to “stability maintenance,” leading to a deterioration of her condition. Yu Zhonghuan has been illegally kidnapped, detained, beaten, abused, poisoned multiple times, leading to severe illnesses, and due to frequent disruptions from “stability maintenance,” he cannot receive proper medical attention.
Yu Zhonghuan said, “My daughter is sick again this time, and I will rush back to Shanghai. Will I be arrested like last time? Please pay attention to this.”