The pastor of Iran’s largest Persian speaking Pentecostal church has been “conditionally released” from prison but his congregation in the capital Tehran remains closed, Iranian Christians told Worthy News.
Human Rights Watch described it as “a giant prison” and Reporters without Borders called it “the most repressive nation on earth”.
Religious persecution in Eritrea is at its highest ever and getting even worse, according to World Watch Monitor, the news outlet of Open Doors, a Christian charity that ranked Eritrea 10th on its World Watch List.
A pastor of the Central Assemblies of God (AoG) Church in Tehran was detained Tuesday, May 21, as part of Iran’s wider crackdown on evangelical believers, Christian rights activists confirmed. The arrest of Reverend Robert Asserian came as his church prepared for possible closure by the end of June due to pressure from the feared Iranian Intelligence Ministry, said advocacy group Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW).
A new report by the International Campaign for Human Rights shows that many Christian customs in Iran are criminalized by the authorities, according to Barnabas Aid.
Although the government of Pakistan promised to rebuild nearly 200 Christian homes destroyed by a Muslim mob in Lahore on March 9, many doubt it will bring the rioters to justice because anti-Christian violence perpetrated in Pakistan often operates with impunity.
Two Christian converts are already over 50 days in Tehran’s feared Evin prison as part of a crackdown on spreading Christianity in heavily Islamic Iran and it remains unclear when they will be released, Worthy News learned.
Supporters of an American pastor imprisoned in Iran for his faith have appealed to the UN for help.
An Algerian Christian was heavily fine by an appellate court in Tindouf Wednesday for proselytizing.
A Christian woman has won a court case concerning her right to visibly wear a cross in the workplace.
An American pastor already imprisoned in Iran for evangelizing was sentenced Sunday to eight years in prison for attempting to entice Iran’s youth away from Islam through his network of underground house churches.
In their battle to topple the Assad regime, rebel jihadists of the Free Syrian Army have also looted religious sites in Northern Syria, according to Human Rights Watch.
Iran has launched the “systematic persecution and prosecution” of “Protestants and Christian converts” with a Muslim background, closing churches, detaining believers and threatening some with execution, a new report claims.
Iran on Monday, January 7, released Iranian Pastor Youcef Nadarkhani, who was jailed on Christmas Day to serve the remainder of a sentence for evangelism among Muslims, his evangelical house church movement confirmed.
Beleaguered Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was to deliver a speech on Sunday, January 6, a day after rights activists said a shell hit a Christian area of Damascus and a car bomb exploded elsewhere in the Syrian capital.
In Iran, an Iranian-born American pastor with dual citizenship remains behind bars in Evin prison for the holidays.
Minority Christians in Syria’s largest city Aleppo said they face starvation after dozens of believers already died in targeted attacks rocking Christian areas of the war-torn country.
A Protestant pastor who faced deportation from Kazakhstan to his native Uzbekistan and up to 15 years imprisonment for leading an unregistered house church has been flown to safety, his supporters confirmed.
One of the largest evangelical congregations in Belarus confirmed that authorities at the last moment decided not to evict them from their building, following years of judicial wrangling.
A Pakistani court has dismissed blasphemy charges against a Christian girl for allegedly burning pages of the Qu’ran.