An Iranian house church Christian was spending another day in brief freedom Thursday, July 21, after he was temporarily released from jail following the payment of a bail amount of some $101,000 in local currency, Iranian Christians said.
Facing a possible death sentence, Eyob Mussie, a Christian refugee living in Saudi Arabia, was instead informed that he will be returned to Eritrea, a nation where returnees often face imprisonment, torture and even death.
An unofficial translation of the Iranian Supreme Court’s decision to execute Pastor Youcef Nadakhani was obtained by Worthy News on Monday, July 18.
The Iranian Supreme Court’s ruling on the appeal against the death sentence of Youcef Nadarkhani by a lower court was finally delivered to his attorney.
The United States has condemned reported plans by Iran to execute an Iranian pastor if he does not abandon his faith in Christ, Worthy News established Tuesday, July 12.
Iraq’s first new church under the US occupation opened its doors in the northern city of Kirkuk, the region’s Chaldean archbishop told AFP.
Farshid Fathi was in solitary confinement for months before he was told that he could be free on $200,000 bail; with great difficulty, his family came up with the cash after selling his father-in-law’s home, but when Fathi was ready to to walk out the prison door, the chief interrogator from the Iranian public prosecutor’s office ordered him back for further questioning.
Christians in Iran have challenged news reports that the death penalty for Pastor Yousef Nadarkhani has been annulled pointing out that in reality the Supreme Court appears to have added a precondition requiring him to renounce his faith or face execution, according to an international Christian rights group.
Iran’s secretive supreme court has reportedly overturned a death sentence handed down to an evangelical pastor for leaving Islam, surprising trial observers who were earlier informed about an execution ruling.
A hard-line Jewish ultra-Orthodox group in Israel has launched a campaign against Christian missionaries and Jewish Christians, known as Messianic Jews, who they view as a security threat.
An Iranian pastor, convicted of apostasy and sentenced to death, may have only hours or days to live, according to a US-based Christian ministry acquainted with the facts of his case.
The general director of comparative religious studies in Iran claimed the enemies of Islam donate approximately $50,000 a year to Iranian house churches that often have memberships of only 15-20 members.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, warned that the vacuum left by failed autocratic regimes was being filled by extremists who have turned the Arab Spring into a “very anxious time” for Christians.
No country in the Middle East has seen more Christians imprisoned in 2011 than in Iran. A recent report by Christian Solidarity Worldwide revealed that 254 Christians were arrested in more than thirty cities across the country since June 2010.
Sunday, June 12, marked the second anniversary of the kidnappings of nine Christian foreigners in Yemen by suspected Muslim militants, but German and British investigators “were understood” to have ended “their active search” for those still missing, advocacy group Middle East Concern (MEC) said.
The fate of an Iranian Christian prisoner remained unclear Friday, June 10, nearly nine months after he was detained by security forces as part of a reported government crackdown on devoted Christians in this strict Islamic nation.
An increase in the arrest of Iranians converting from Islam reveals an abundant harvest resulting from evangelism by clandestine house churches in the Islamic state, according to Iranian Christian leaders.
Eleven members of one of Iran’s largest evangelical house church movements, who were charged with ‘action against the order of the country’ and drinking alcohol, have been acquitted by an Iranian court, Worthy News learned Friday, May 20.
Thousands of Christians have participated in the first known “Christian Revival” meeting in one of the most restrictive Islamic countries of the Middle East, Worthy News established.
Iran has released three Christians who were detained last year during Christian gatherings, but concerns remain over the whereabouts of a Dutch-Iranian believer, rights activists confirmed Friday, May 6.