Iran: No news about the status of a house church pastor in Dezful Pris
By Joseph DeCaro, Worthy News Correspondent
TEHRAN, Iran (Worthy News)– According to the Iranian Christian News Agency (Mohabat News), 10 new Christians from the city of Dezful about to celebrate Christmas Eve with fellow Christians from Ahvaz and Andimeshk were arrested by security forces the day before Christmas.
Intelligence officers posing as security forces began to search the house as they collected cell phones and other personal belongings such as Bibles and Christmas gifts.
They arrested everyone, including Pastor Noorollah Qabitizade, who was hand-cuffed and blind-folded en route to a safe house in the centre of Dezfoul.
The security forces detained Qabitizade separately while they took pictures of everyone else one by one; each was questioned as to how they converted to Christianity, asked to name their Christian friends and how they all came to know Qabitizade. Although they were released after being finger-printed, they were told to report to the office of Ministry of Information in their home towns the very next morning.
According to Mohabat News, Pastor Qabityzade remains in custody with no outside contact.
Mohabat news considers this latest wave of arrests to be an organzied attempt to purge Christianity from the Persian consciousness by preventing its growth among Iranians.