New York (CNN) -- Painting, simple painting is what caused Samten Dakpa to become a victim of terror. For painting classic Tibetan images as a teenager, Dakpa says, Chinese police -- intent on suppressing Tibetan culture -- arrested, beat and tortured him, shoving his hands into a coal-burning oven. "It was like a barbecue," he said, describing the painful burns on his hands. Cheikhna Mahawa of Mauritania says he was arrested and tortured because he organized protests to improve education for the poor and lobbied for instruction of classic Arabic rather than the local Hassaniya dialect. Police, Mahawa says, shoved a rifle butt into his mouth, forced him to stare at the sun and beat him when he was unable to keep a cockroach within a small circle, using a stick.
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Samten Dakpa says he was tortured for painting classic Tibetan images
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Cheikhna Mahawa says he was tortured over education
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Survivors of torture from all over the world participate in the New York program
Doctors operated on @placeholder's right hand, allowing him to hold a paint brush without pain for the first time in years.