Egypt: Christian Refugee Released After 3 Years in Prison, “I Thank Everyone Who Prayed for Me”
by Karen Faulkner, Worthy News Correspondent
(Worthy News) – A Christian refugee who was imprisoned in Egypt for belonging to a Facebook group about leaving Islam for Christ has been released after three years of incarceration, ADF International reports. Egypt ranks 40 on the Open Doors World Watch List 2025 of the top 50 countries where Christians are persecuted.
A father of five, Christian Abdulbaqi Saeed Abdo had sought refuge in Egypt after being threatened with death in his home country of Yemen on account of his faith. Abdo was arrested in 2021, while he was living as a UNHCR-registered asylum seeker in Egypt. He was released after the ADF International legal group submitted his case to the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention.
“It isn’t right that a government should tear me away from my family, keep me in these awful conditions, only because of the faith in which I peacefully choose to believe,” Abdo said in a statement. “I endured many hardships in prison. It isn’t right that a government should tear me away from my family, keep me in these awful conditions, only because of the faith in which I peacefully choose to believe.”
“I thank everyone who prayed for me while I was in prison, cared about and followed up on my case, and shared the joy of my release from prison,” Abdo said.
In a statement about the case, Kelsey Zorzi, Director of Advocacy for Religious Freedom for ADF International, said: “The arbitrary detention of this husband and father without a criminal trial, and the lack of an opportunity for him to defend himself against alleged offenses, constitutes a severe violation of human rights. The peaceful expression of one’s religious convictions cannot be a crime – not in Egypt, nor anywhere else in the world. This case shows the extremity of unchecked government censorship in the online age. The world must take note.”
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