#Chinese detective claims Uyghur prisoners beaten, tortured, raped

Chinese authorities subjected Uyghur Muslim detainees to being hanged from cell ceilings, tortured with electric batons and gang-raped by fellow prisoners, a former detective claimed in a bombshell interview.

The ex-officer, who was only identified as Jiang over fears the Chinese government would retaliate against his family still living in the country, described the extreme torture tactics that were used in order to extract confessions as part of a ethnic cleaning campaign, CNN reported.

“If you want people to confess, you use the electric baton with two sharp tips on top,” he said in the interview, which was conducted from Europe where he is living in exile.

“We would tie two electrical wires on the tips and set the wires on their genitals while the person is tied up.”

Jiang said new detainees, who were young as 14 years old, were beaten during their initial interrogation to illicit a “confession.”

“Kick them, beat them [until they’re] bruised and swollen,” he said. “Until they kneel on the floor crying.”

The detainees were also often tortured with methods like China’s infamous “tiger chair,” which involves strapping a subject’s hands and feet to a chair, sometimes for days, as well as hanging them from the ceiling, waterboarding and sleep deprivation, Jiang said.

“Everyone uses different methods. Some even use a wrecking bar, or iron chains with locks,” Jiang said. “Police would step on the suspect’s face and tell him to confess.”

Other torture tactics included ordering prisoners to gang-rape male detainees, he said.

Jiang said he now believes that “none” of the hundreds of prisoners he helped arrest committed a crime — despite them being accused of terror offenses.

“They are ordinary people,” he told the outlet.

China has denied the claims of abuse for years.

Amnesty International in June released a 160-page report that described similar torture experienced by more than 50 former inmates of the camp system.