Anglican minister and family face imminent deportation back to Iran 18 February 2022 News An Anglican minister who fled Iran six years ago because of constant harassment by intelligence agents and multiple arrests has now been told he is to be deported back to Iran from his city of temporary residence in Turkey. Pastor Hekmat Salimi, who is 72 years old and severely disabled, his wife Mahindokht, 66, and their daughter Sama, 35, have been living as asylum-seekers in Zonguldak, five hours’ drive east of Istanbul, since 2016 but were told last week they must leave the country within seven days or face forcible deportation. Pastor Salimi, who converted to Christianity in his home city of Shiraz in the year of the Islamic revolution of 1979, is the former minister of St Paul’s Anglican Church in Isfahan, one of just four remaining Persian-language churches in Iran, but now used only for special occasions such as weddings or Christmas. And Pastor Salimi explained in a recent interview with Article18 that it was his reopening and refurbishment of this church back in 2009, after it had been closed for 30 years, that led to renewed pressure against him, as well as his work with the house-churches that had opened after the Iranian authorities began banning churches from holding services in the national language of Persian. In late 2011, after two years as the minister of the church, Pastor Salimi explained that he had travelled to the international airport in Tehran on his way to Dubai, where he was to be officially ordained, when his boarding pass and passport were suddenly confiscated, and he was taken in for questioning. Pastor Salimi (far left) alongside former Anglican bishop Iraj Mottahedeh at a church event. Then, on 22 February 2012, intelligence agents came to the minister’s home at 7.30am, and after confiscating all Christian items, detained him for more than two months, during which time he was beaten, interrogated for hours on end, accused of apostasy, and forced to sign a statement promising to have no further contact with any Christians, nor involvement in any Christian activities. Clearly, as a minister, this was difficult to accept, and yet Pastor Salimi says he abided by these restrictions to his life and faith. Nevertheless, the pressure continued, and intelligence agents came back to raid the minister’s home again in the summer of 2015, accusing him of continuing to meet with Christians. Eventually, the pressure and restrictions on his life and faith became too much, and in March 2016 Pastor Salimi travelled to Turkey, where he filed his claim for asylum. His wife and daughter followed him later that year. But in the years since, as with so many other Iranian Christian asylum-seekers, Pastor Salimi and his family have not even been acknowledged as refugees, let alone offered resettlement to a safe country. After years of waiting, in December 2020 the family’s application was finally reviewed, but rejected. Pastor Salimi with wife Mahindokht and daughter Sama. And while their appeal was initially successful, a further appeal by the Turkish immigration authorities backed up the court’s initial decision. Two reasons were given: firstly, that the pastor and his family were not considered to be at real risk of persecution if they returned to Iran, and secondly that the pastor had failed to correctly remember the precise date of his arrest at the Imam Khomeini International Airport in Tehran. Then, just last week, Pastor Salimi and his wife and daughter were served their deportation notice, giving them seven days to leave the country or be forcibly deported. Article18’s advocacy director, Mansour Borji, gave this reaction: “We urge the UNHCR and international monitoring bodies to ensure proper processes are put in place so that genuine asylum-seekers are not so unfairly treated and unjustly deported to countries where they may face severe harm, and possibly even risk to life.” Meanwhile, an Iranian Anglican minister now based in the UK, Rev Mohammad Eghtedarian, has set up a petition calling on the Turkish authorities to stop the deportation of Pastor Salimi and his family, and on the “UNHCR and international monitoring bodies to ensure Hekmat and his family are protected”. https://twitter.com/articleeighteen/status/1496150082110070793
‘We are just Christians worshipping according to the Bible,’ say converts in last defence 17 February 2022 News Left to right: Ahmad Sarparast, Morteza Mashoodkari, and Ayoob Poor-Rezazadeh. Three converts facing up to 10 years in prison for alleged “deviant propaganda” and ties with foreign organisations have denied all the charges against them and said they are “just Christians worshipping according to the Bible”. Ahmad Sarparast, Morteza Mashoodkari, and Ayoob Poor-Rezazadeh, who were giving their last defence this morning at Branch 2 of the Revolutionary Court of Rasht, in northern Iran, added that they “have not engaged in any propaganda against the regime or any action against national security”. They also denied receiving any funds from abroad, while their lawyer, Iman Soleimani, told the court the accusations against the three men, who are all part of the non-Trinitarian “Church of Iran”, were based only on the information provided by intelligence agents of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), and nothing else. The case has now been sent back to the prosecutor’s office, which must decide whether there is any grounds for a conviction. Background Ahmad, Morteza and Ayoob, who were first arrested in September 2021, are the second group of converts to face charges under Article 500 of the penal code since it was amended last year. In June last year, three other converts, from Karaj, were sentenced to five years in prison under Article 500, later reduced to three years on appeal. Ahmad, Morteza and Ayoob were officially charged on 25 January at the 4th Branch of the Civil and Revolutionary Court of Rasht with “engaging in propaganda and educational activities for deviant beliefs contrary to the holy Sharia”, and “connections with foreign leaders”. And it is the last element – alleged organisational links or funding from abroad – that could be the difference between a five or 10-year prison sentence. In bringing the charges, the prosecutor, Hassan Rajabi, specifically referenced the trio’s membership of the “Church of Iran”, and went on to label them “Satan-worshippers who believe in the end of the world, the divisions between sects and races, the return of the Jews to their promised land, and the superiority of this race [Jews] to others, which proves the claim that they are working for foreign elements”. And while this denomination has non-traditional views regarding the Trinity, much of the rest of its teachings are entirely in keeping with the wider Church, making allegations of “Satan worship” seem an obvious attempt to vilify the group and lessen public sympathy for them. Article18’s advocacy director Mansour Borji commented: “This kind of labelling of a religious group, whatever their belief, in an official court document, shows a clear disregard by the Iranian authorities to their responsibilities as signatories to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which protects the rights to freedom of belief for all citizens, whatever those beliefs are. “Even the wording of Article 500 is at odds with Iran’s responsibilities in this regard, as it is clearly not the state’s job to decide whether an individual’s beliefs are ‘normal’ or not, let alone to prosecute them for these beliefs.”
Ramin Hassanpour, Saeede Sajadpour, Moslem Rahimi and Mehri Behjati 16 February 2022 Case Studies (Last updated: December 2023) Left to right: Ramin Hassanpour, Saeede Sajadpour, and Moslem Rahimi. Case referenced by Article18, Jubilee Campaign, HRANA, United For Iran, Middle East Concern, International Institute for Religious Freedom, The Christian Post, Iran Press Watch, Open Doors, CSW, Voice of the Martyrs, International Christian Concern Summary Hadi (Moslem) Rahimi, his aunt Sakine (Mehri) Behjati, and married couple Ramin Hassanpour and Kathrin (Saeede) Sajadpour – all converts – were given prison sentences in August 2020 of between two and five years for “acting against national security” by belonging to a house-church and “spreading Zionist Christianity”. Moslem began serving his sentence in January 2022, and the three others were summoned to begin their sentences a month later. The Supreme Court rejected the appeals of Hadi and Mehri for a retrial. Case in full Moslem, Mehri, Ramin and Saeede, all members of the non-Trinitarian “Church of Iran”, were first arrested in February 2020 for their membership of a house-church in Rasht, northern Iran. On 14 May 2020, they were taken to Lakan Prison after being unable to afford the bail set for them – of 500 million tomans (around $30,000) – when they were officially charged at Branch 10 of the Revolutionary Court in Rasht. Ramin and Saeede’s two sons – who were aged 16 and seven at the time – were forced to fend for themselves during their detention, the older staying at home by himself and the younger going to stay with his grandfather. They were eventually released a week later on reduced bail of 200 million tomans ($11,500). On 1 August 2020, the converts were sentenced to between two and five years in prison for “acting against national security” by belonging to a house-church and “spreading Zionist Christianity”. Ramin was given a five-year sentence, Moslem four years, and Mehri and Saeede two years. Their appeals were rejected in September 2020. On 9 January 2022, Moslem left behind his nine-month-old daughter to begin serving his four-year sentence at Tehran’s Evin Prison so that the property deed submitted by a friend to secure his bail may be released. A month later, the three others were told they must hand themselves in to the authorities in Tehran by the end of February. On 16 February 2022, Moslem and Mehri were told their applications for a retrial had been rejected by Branch 9 of the Supreme Court. On 16 April 2022, Mehri handed herself in to the authorities in Tehran to begin her sentence, and was later permitted a transfer to Lakan Prison in Rasht, so she could be closer to her children. However, in July 2022 she was denied access to a scheme that would have allowed her to spend most of her time outside prison – either working or looking after her children. On 15 February 2023, Moslem was released as part of a wider amnesty of prisoners on the occasion of the 44th anniversary of the Islamic Republic. That same month, Mehri was also pardoned and released from the remainder of her two-year sentence. Recommendations Article18 requests that the international community and Christians worldwide: Call for the immediate acquittal of Moslem, Mehri, Ramin and Saeede. Call for the swift application of due process in the cases of all who are detained and/or awaiting charges, trials, sentences or appeal hearings on account of their Christian faith and activities in Iran. Western countries should prioritise human rights in negotiations with Iran, especially freedom of religion or belief, and urge the government of Iran to recognise all minority-faith adherents, including converts to Christianity, as full citizens before the law, enjoying their full human rights. The international community should hold the Iranian government accountable for failing to uphold its international and constitutional commitments to protect the freedom of Christians in its territories. Closing churches, appropriating church property, arresting church leaders and threatening churchgoers are violations of freedom of religion or belief, as prescribed in Article 18 of the ICCPR, to which Iran is a signatory, without reservation, and therefore legally bound to uphold. Meanwhile, Article 13 of Iran’s Constitution states that Zoroastrians, Jews and Christians are recognised religious minorities, who are free to perform their religious rites and ceremonies. And Article 23 says “investigation of individuals’ beliefs is forbidden, and no-one may be molested or taken to task simply for holding a certain belief.” Background There has been a significant increase in human-rights violations in Iran in recent years, and particularly in the persecution of religious minorities, principally of Christians from the Iranian house-church movement. Ethnic Christian communities (Assyrian and Armenian) are permitted a degree of freedom to worship, although it is illegal for these churches to conduct services in Persian (the national language of Iran and the common language of converts). Bibles and other Christian literature are also illegal in Persian and those found in possession of such materials, especially in sufficient quantities for distribution, can expect severe treatment and prison sentences. Therefore, the growing community of Christian converts are not permitted to attend recognised churches and they have to gather for worship in secret house-churches, risking arrest and imprisonment. In the past few years, a number of Christians have been handed down sentences of between 10 and 15 years, charged with offences such as “acting against national security”. These political charges are used to help avoid an international outcry at more clearly religiously-motivated charges such as “apostasy”. Those detained or charged often have to obtain and hand over exorbitant amounts for bail, which are often forfeited as some choose to flee the country in the knowledge that they are very unlikely to receive a fair trial and just verdict. Those awaiting trial who flee the country are tried in absentia. Many will face a gruelling legal process, and until their case is heard, which could take several years, their lives are in limbo. The majority of the Christians arrested in the last few years have been released, either after finishing their prison sentences or temporarily released on bail with severe warnings and threats against any further Christian activity. Once released, they are closely monitored, and risk re-arrest and imprisonment if they engage, or are suspected of engaging, in any Christian activity. Iran was 9th on Open Doors’ 2022 World Watch List of the 50 countries where it is hardest to be a Christian. Article18’s 2022 annual report noted that Iranian Christians “continue to suffer widespread violations of their rights”. Of the publicly reported cases alone, 30 Christians endured imprisonment or exile in 2021 on charges related to their faith or religious activities, and 21 were still serving these sentences at the end of the year – 18 in prison, one in exile, and two more serving the remainder of their sentences at home with an electronic tag. Many others faced ongoing legal battles, while Christians continued to flee the country to seek asylum elsewhere, despite worsening conditions for refugees in neighbouring countries such as Turkey. Meanwhile, the first Christians were charged, sentenced and imprisoned under the controversial new amendments to Article 500 of the penal code, for “engaging in propaganda that educates in a deviant way contrary to the holy religion of Islam”. There was also great inconsistency regarding which prisoners were permitted release with an electronic tag – a growing trend in 2021 – and which were rejected the opportunity; or which prisoners were offered parole, and which were cruelly denied it.
Ahmad Sarparast, Morteza Mashoodkari and Ayoob Poor-Rezazadeh 15 February 2022 Case Studies (Last updated: December 2023) Left to right: Ahmad Sarparast, Morteza Mashoodkari, and Ayoob Poor-Rezazadeh Case referenced by Article18, Premier Christian News, IranWire, Iran News Wire, HRANA, International Christian Concern, CSW, Middle East Concern. Summary Ahmad Sarparast, Morteza Mashoodkari, and Ayoob Poor-Rezazadeh were the second trio of converts to have been imprisoned as a result of convictions under the amended Article 500 of the penal code, for “engaging in propaganda and educational activities for deviant beliefs contrary to the holy Sharia”, and “connections with foreign leaders”, for which they were sentenced to five years in prison. Case in full Ahmad, Morteza, and Ayoob, all members of the non-Trinitarian “Church of Iran” in Rasht, were first arrested on the evening of 5 September 2021, and transferred to an unknown location. It emerged later that all three had been taken to a detention centre belonging to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and placed in solitary confinement. But while Ahmad and Morteza were transferred to Lakan Prison on 18 September, then released on bail on 22 September, there were concerns about Ayoob, who was not heard from until a month after his arrest. Finally, on 3 October, Ayoob was also released from Lakan Prison on bail of 400 million tomans (around $15,000). During their detention, the families of the three men were threatened by IRGC intelligence agents for publicising information about the arrests of their loved ones, while at least one family member and several other house-church members were summoned for questioning. Meanwhile, the three men were accused of “acting against national security”, while their interrogators repeatedly referred to the recently amended Articles 499 and 500 of the Islamic Penal Code, relating respectively to membership or organisation of “anti-state” groups, and “propaganda” against the regime. They were also treated very harshly by their interrogators, who ridiculed them for their beliefs and forced them to listen to broadcasts of Quranic verses for at least three hours every day. On 25 January 2022, at the 4th Branch of the Civil and Revolutionary Court of Rasht, the three men were officially charged with “engaging in propaganda and educational activities for deviant beliefs contrary to the holy Sharia”, and “connections with foreign leaders”. The court document, signed by prosecutor Hassan Rajabi, specifically referenced the trio’s membership of the “Church of Iran”, and went on to label them “Satan-worshippers who believe in the end of the world, the divisions between sects and races, the return of the Jews to their promised land, and the superiority of this race [Jews] to others, which proves the claim that they are working for foreign elements”. And while this denomination has non-traditional views regarding the Trinity, much of the rest of its teachings are entirely in keeping with the wider Church, making allegations of “Satan worship” seem an obvious attempt to vilify the group and lessen public sympathy for them. Article18’s advocacy director Mansour Borji commented: “This kind of labelling of a religious group, whatever their belief, in an official court document, shows a clear disregard by the Iranian authorities to their responsibilities as signatories to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which protects the rights to freedom of belief for all citizens, whatever those beliefs are. “Even the wording of Article 500 is at odds with Iran’s responsibilities in this regard, as it is clearly not the state’s job to decide whether an individual’s beliefs are ‘normal’ or not, let alone to prosecute them for these beliefs.” On 17 February 2022, the three men denied all the charges against them as they gave their last defence at Branch 2 of the Revolutionary Court of Rasht, saying they were “just Christians worshipping according to the Bible” and “have not engaged in any propaganda against the regime or any action against national security”. They also denied receiving any funds from abroad, while their lawyer, Iman Soleimani, told the court the accusations were based only on the information provided by intelligence agents of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), and nothing else. The case was then sent back to the prosecutor’s office to decide whether there was any grounds for a conviction. On 9 April 2022, the three men and their lawyer were summoned to return to Branch 2 of the Revolutionary Court of Rasht, and informed that they had been sentenced to five years in prison and fined 18 million tomans (around $750). They lawyer complained that his clients had been convicted only on the basis of the claims of intelligence agents of the Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC); that the judge, Mohammad Hossein Hosseinpour, had also taken on the role of accuser; and that there was no legal justification for the sentences, as his clients’ only “crime” had been to meet together for Christian prayer and worship. A religious assembly, Mr Soleimani said, could not be considered an “action against the state”, while although Iran’s constitution forbids “inquisition” into a person’s beliefs, the judge’s very first question had been about their beliefs, and their confirmation of them drew an angry response. Their beliefs were later also referenced in the verdict. The three men appealed against the sentences, despite being told by the judge that if they accepted them and “remained quiet”, their sentences would be reduced by one-quarter, and they may also be more favourably treated in prison, such as being eligible in time for furlough, conditional release, or freed to serve their sentences at home with an electronic tag. However, the converts maintained that they have done nothing wrong, and therefore were not willing to simply remain quiet and accept their lot. Mr Soleimani, writing on Twitter, said: “I’ve been involved with this case from the beginning, and volumes of unspoken stories could be written regarding the shortcomings of how the arrest and preliminary investigations took place, the illegal proceedings in the Revolutionary Court in Rasht, and even the way my defendants were wrongfully condemned for someone else’s interview about them with Iran International.” In another post, he wrote: “Unfortunately, in political and ‘security’ cases, the judges are under a lot of pressure from the arresting agents, and some independent judges have openly stated this in the presence of lawyers and defendants, and complained about this situation and the fact that they can also face charges themselves if they do not comply.” Mr Soleimani added that the judge in Ahmad, Morteza and Ayoob’s case had even indicated to him that he was under pressure to give Christians the maximum possible sentences. Article18’s advocacy director, Mansour Borji, commented: “The verdict in this case is typical of arbitrary sentences, stating only that the individuals were convicted because they had remained ‘persistent in their beliefs’. This is clearly a violation of the Iranian constitution, and contrary to the repeated claims of regime officials that ‘no-one is imprisoned because of their beliefs’. The conviction is also based only on the reports of interrogators – nothing more – and is therefore entirely devoid of any legal justification. The proceedings in this case also clearly debunk Iranian officials’ claims, repeated constantly to international media, that the judiciary is independent.” On 8 May 2022, Ahmad and Ayoob were re-arrested alongside two other Church of Iran members, Behnam Akhlaghi and Babak Hosseinzadeh, and taken to an IRGC detention centre. Morteza had not been at home during the concurrent raids on their homes, but was detained two days later. When their families went to 4th Branch of the Prosecutor’s Office in Rasht to ask about their situation, they were told their loved one’s appeals against their five-year sentences had been rejected, even though the official hearing had yet to take place. Their appeals were officially rejected a month later. Then on 11 July 2022, they were told they must return to court on 19 July 2022 to face a second trial on identical charges. They gave their second “final defence” via video link from Lakan Prison on 5 July 2022, stating that they wanted to be “dealt with according to the constitution”, under which Christianity is a recognised minority faith. “We are Christians,” they said, “and we reserve the right to have a place for prayer and collective worship.” They again denied engaging in “any activities contrary to the country’s laws”. On 2 November 2022, the 2nd Branch of the Revolutionary Court of Rasht – the same court that issued five-year prison sentences in their first trial – this time cleared the men of wrongdoing. However, despite the identical charges in the two cases, the second ruling had no impact on the first. On 9 November 2022, Morteza was told he had been granted a “partial pardon” and a reduction of his sentence to two and a half years. Ahmad and Ayoob, however, received no such pardon. The three men were released from Lakan Prison in mid-2023, but ordered to report back daily for the remainder of their sentences to work without pay at a factory adjacent to the prison. Recommendations Article18 requests that the international community and Christians worldwide: Call for the convictions to be immediately overturned. Call for the swift application of due process in the cases of all who are detained and/or awaiting charges, trials, sentences or appeal hearings on account of their faith and activities in Iran. Encourage Western countries to prioritise human rights in negotiations with Iran, especially freedom of religion or belief, and urge the government of Iran to recognise all minority-faith adherents, including converts to Christianity, as full citizens before the law, enjoying their full human rights. Call the international community to hold the Iranian government accountable for failing to uphold its international and constitutional commitments to protect the freedom of Christians in its territories. Closing churches, appropriating church property, arresting church leaders and threatening churchgoers are violations of freedom of religion or belief, as prescribed in Article 18 of the ICCPR, to which Iran is a signatory, without reservation, and therefore legally bound to uphold. Meanwhile, Article 13 of Iran’s Constitution states that Zoroastrians, Jews and Christians are recognised religious minorities, who are free to perform their religious rites and ceremonies. And Article 23 says “investigation of individuals’ beliefs is forbidden, and no-one may be molested or taken to task simply for holding a certain belief.” Background The controversial amendments to articles 499 and 500 – relating respectively to membership or organisation of “anti-security groups”, and “propaganda” against the state or in support of opposition groups – were signed into law in February 2021. ARTICLE 19, an organisation dedicated to the protection of freedom of speech, called the changes to Article 500 in particular “a full-on attack on the right to freedom of religion and belief”. The amended version of Article 500 provides for up to five years’ imprisonment for “any deviant educational or proselytising activity” by members of so-called “sects” that “contradicts or interferes with the sacred law of Islam” through “mind-control methods and psychological indoctrination” or “making false claims or lying in religious and Islamic spheres, such as claiming divinity”. The amendment to Article 499 provides for up to five years’ imprisonment for “anyone who insults Iranian ethnicities or divine religions or Islamic schools of thought recognised under the Constitution with the intent to cause violence or tensions in the society or with the knowledge that such [consequences] will follow”. In both cases, the punishment can be doubled to up to 10 years’ imprisonment if the groups in question have received either financial or organisational help from outside the country. Article18’s advocacy director, Mansour Borji, called the amendments “a catastrophe” and “disservice to justice”. “These amendments will bring more ambiguity to an already ambiguous set of charges,” he said, “and decrease the chance that a judge may act in a more tolerant way towards house-church members, by providing greater scope within the law to bring charges on these vaguely-defined grounds. “This news will be celebrated by Iran’s intelligence agencies, who are always in the background in court cases against Christians, pressuring judges to impose the harshest possible sentence.” Human rights lawyer Hossein Ahmadiniaz previously warned that the bill, if passed, would “facilitate the repression and punishment of Christian converts and others belonging to unrecognised religious groups”. “The law should protect citizens, including Christian converts and Baha’is, against the government,” he said. “But in Iran the law has become a tool to justify the government’s violent treatment of converts and other unrecognised minorities.” Meanwhile, Hamid Gharagozloo from the International Organisation to Preserve Human Rights (IOPHR) cautioned: “By making it a crime to be part of a sect, and banning a group as a ‘sect’, it gives them an open hand to crush any form of uprising or dissatisfaction with the government… Any form of defiance will be labelled as a ‘sect’, and then it will be punishable by law.” In June 2021, three other “Church of Iran” members, from Karaj, Amin Khaki, Milad Goodarzi and Alireza Nourmohammadi, became the first converts to be sentenced under the new amendments. They were initially given the maximum sentences of five years for “engaging in propaganda that educates in a deviant way contrary to the holy religion of Islam”, but the sentences were reduced on appeal to three years.
Converts absolved by Supreme Court now face ‘propaganda’ charges 14 February 2022 News Behnam Akhlaghi (left) and Babak Hosseinzadeh. Two of the nine converts cleared by a Supreme Court judge of “acting against national security” have now been charged with “propaganda against the state”. Just six weeks after they were released from prison pending a review of their five-year sentences, Behnam Akhlaghi and Babak Hosseinzadeh were summoned last week to see a Tehran prosecutor, who on Saturday told them to return today with pay slips so they could be officially charged and released on bail. The new charges come just one week ahead of the review of their five-year sentences – and those of the seven others imprisoned alongside them – scheduled to take place on 22 February at Branch 34 of Tehran’s appeal court. The appeal court judge must decide whether to uphold the Revolutionary Court’s initial decision in October 2019 to imprison the men for their membership of house-churches, or whether to side with the Supreme Court judge who ruled in November 2021 that “merely preaching Christianity” or even promoting the “Evangelical Zionist sect” does not amount to an “action against national security”. The case has the potential to impact all other current and future cases involving Persian-speaking Christians. However, early optimism has dissipated in recent weeks – not only with today’s news about Behnam and Babak but also with the re-imprisonment last month of another of the nine men, Abdolreza (Matthias) Ali-Haghnejad, to serve a separate six-year sentence – of which he had already been acquitted seven years previously – following the intervention of a different Supreme Court judge.
UN rapporteur highlights Iran’s arrest of Christians ‘for practice of beliefs’ 10 February 2022 News Javaid Rehman (UN Web TV) The UN’s special rapporteur on human rights in Iran has reiterated his “concern” at the regime’s “continued repression of religious minorities”, including arresting Christians “for the practice of their beliefs”. In his latest report, released ahead of the 49th session of the UN Human Rights Council later this month, Javaid Rehman specifically references the arrest of at least 53 Christians between 1 January and 1 December last year “for the practice of their religious beliefs”. He also highlights the “forcible closing of houses of worship on national security grounds”, and calls for the “release of all individuals arrested for the exercise of their rights to freedom of opinion, expression, association and peaceful assembly”. Mr Rehman adds that Iran should “ensure in law and practice the rights to freedom of opinion and expression, peaceful assembly and association” and “that any limitation on these rights is in accordance with international law”. “[Iran’s] Government stated that minorities were respected and that Christians, Jews and Zoroastrians were free to perform their religious rites under article 13 of the Constitution,” he adds. The primary focus of Mr Rehman’s latest report is “accountability for human rights violations” in Iran. Previous reports have focused on other issues including the persecution of Christian converts. However, in October last year Article18 joined seven other Christian organisations in publicly calling on Mr Rehman and the UN secretary-general, António Guterres, to “include specific reference to the main victims of FoRB [freedom of religion or belief] violations”, including Christians, in every report. In joint letters to the two senior UN figures, we noted how neither the secretary-general’s report on Iran in May 2021, nor the special rapporteur’s January 2021 report, contained a single reference to Iran’s persecution of Christians, though both called more broadly for Iran to “end discrimination” against religious minorities. In the letter to the secretary-general, we further queried why his report made no mention of the concerning amendments to Articles 499 and 500 of Iran’s penal code, which have been called a “full-on attack on the right to freedom of religion and belief” and are increasingly being used in the prosecution of Christian converts. There was also no mention of these amendments in Mr Rehman’s latest report.
Converts summoned to begin prison sentences for ‘spreading “Zionist” Christianity’ 9 February 2022 News Three converts from the northern city of Rasht have been summoned to begin serving prison sentences of between two and five years for “acting against national security” by attending a house-church and “spreading ‘Zionist’ Christianity”. Ramin Hassanpour, his wife Saeede, and another woman, Sakine (Mehri) Behjati, have until the end of February to hand themselves in to Branch 1 of the Office for the Execution of Judgments in Tehran’s 33rd district. The two women are to serve two-year sentences, while Ramin’s sentence is five years. A fourth member of their group, Hadi (Moslem) Rahimi, is already serving his own four-year sentence. The four, all members of the non-Trinitarian “Church of Iran”, were first arrested in February 2020. In May 2020, they spent a week in Lakan Prison in Rasht, having been unable to afford the 500 million toman bail ($30,000) set for them after the charges against them were read out at Branch 10 of the Revolutionary Court in Rasht. They were eventually released on reduced bail of 200 million tomans ($11,500). However, they were sentenced in August 2020, and their appeals were rejected in September 2020. Moslem, who has a 10-month-old daughter, began serving his sentence exactly one month ago today, so that the property deed submitted by a friend to secure his bail could be released.
‘Converting to Christianity or any other religion is really a heroic act in Iran’ 9 February 2022 News The “heroic act” of converting to any other religion than Islam was the central talking point in yesterday’s webinar on “The Persecution of Christians in Iran”, hosted by IranWire’s Maziar Bahari and featuring Article18’s Mansour Borji and three Christian former prisoners of conscience. “Conversion is a massive obstacle in most Muslim-majority countries, including Iran,” Mr Borji explained. “When the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights was being signed by member states, Iran and some of the other countries had objections to this one particular article, Article 18, which provided and guaranteed the right to choose one’s religion and exercise it freely – personally and also privately and publicly. But nevertheless, Iran signed it and later on adopted it through parliament … and that is now an obligation for Iran to respect this right for all its citizens.” Yet while Iran continues to claim that it does provide this right, the testimony of the three Christian former prisoners of conscience on the panel painted a different picture, leading host Maziar Bahari to conclude: “Converting to Christianity or any other religion in Iran is really a heroic act!” What else did the panelists say? All three former prisoners of conscience, Shadi Noveiri, Kavian Fallah-Mohammadi, and Vahid Hakani, explained how they had been arrested only because of their decision to convert to Christianity and subsequent membership of a house-church because, as Kavian explained, “the government of Iran had started to shut down the official churches that speak Persian all around the country”. Here are some of the other highlights of the discussion: Shadi Three Iranian #Christian converts from #Islam discuss the persecution of #Iran’s Christian religious minority in our latest webinar."After eight years serving in a house church, I was arrested."WATCH NOW: https://t.co/jEeiwn1ovb pic.twitter.com/LE1tJdTsuY— IranWire (@IranWireEnglish) February 17, 2022 Shadi explained that Ministry of Intelligence agents who arrested her told her: “Your crime is even worse than murder! By converting to Christianity you have committed an even more severe crime!” During interrogations, Shadi said she was “threatened with torture and could hear women in the next rooms being beaten up and tortured … and hear the screams of different women”. “One of the worst things was the fact that everyone who worked for the Intelligence Ministry office in Rasht were men, and there were no women,” Shadi said. “Sometimes I had interrogations all day and then they would take me to solitary confinement in that office, which was a very scary and frightening experience.” Shadi added that she was later “held in a communal cell with common criminals – with murderers, with drug dealers – who were fighting each other all the time, and witnessed certain things in that jail that I did not even know existed. And that was a painful experience for me as well.” Shadi also explained how she had asked during her detention for a copy of the New Testament: “I said that I would like to read the Bible, and they started to humiliate me, mock me, and insult me, and say that I have no right to ask for such thing!” After Shadi was released, she said she was “regularly monitored by different intelligence agencies, and police cars were circling my house. So this created an atmosphere of fear – and not only for me and my family, but also for everyone who was living around that area. And it was a very unpleasant feeling, because people did not want to associate with us or remain friends with us. And this was very disappointing and depressing.” Kavian “I know many whose families disowned them because they converted to Christianity.”Three Iranian Christian converts from Islam, with firsthand experience of persecution and imprisonment in Iran, discuss their experiences in our webinar: https://t.co/jEeiwn1ovb #minorityreligions pic.twitter.com/EidDGWl7J6— IranWire (@IranWireEnglish) February 19, 2022 Kavian said his experience was “different from many other Christian [converts] in Iran, because my parents had also become Christians, so I was not ostracised by my family … unlike most people who convert to Christianity in Iran”. However, he said that he “knew that I had to hide my Christian faith because I was living in a Muslim society, which was not tolerating conversion to Christianity. “I only confided to my very close friends, because at that time I was at university, and even at university I did not talk about my Christian faith.” He added that this way very difficult, saying: “It’s natural for someone who has a faith not to be able to conceal his beliefs, and not to be able to hide what he believes in.” "We were praying and singing hymns… forces of the Ministry of Intelligence knocked on the door and entered. They were armed."Watch IranWire’s webinar on the persecution of Christians: https://t.co/jEeiwn1ovb #minorityreligions pic.twitter.com/gwFTzXlNP8— IranWire (@IranWireEnglish) March 4, 2022 Kavian then explained how he was held for 53 days, including one month in solitary confinement, after his arrest at a Christmas gathering in 2014. During his detention, Kavian’s interrogators told him: “It doesn’t matter what you believe in personally, you have no right to tell others about your beliefs!” Kavian later fled the country after being sentenced to 10 years in prison. "Our interrogations began during out arrest in Tehran, including questions on what's the password for your phone and email." Iranian Christians, with firsthand experience of persecution in #Iran, discuss their experiences: https://t.co/jEeiwn1ovb #minorityreligions pic.twitter.com/LOdUk4vVzg— IranWire (@IranWireEnglish) February 23, 2022 Vahid “The first time I found a bible, it took a year of searching."Three Iranian Christian converts from Islam, with firsthand experience of persecution and imprisonment in #Iran, discuss their experiences in our webinar: https://t.co/jEeiwn1ovb #minorityreligions pic.twitter.com/KrLJMRuap6— IranWire (@IranWireEnglish) February 21, 2022 Vahid explained how he spent three years in prison in the notorious Adel Abad Prison in Shiraz following his arrest at a house-church meeting in 2012. And during his first year in prison, Vahid explained that he was held in a separate cell with other people from religious minorities. “There were Baha’is, there were Jews. There were Sufis, and they were also Christian converts like myself,” he said. Vahid said that during that first year, some Shia clerics came to prison and told him: “If you confess against your own faith, and if you convert to Islam, you’re going to be released immediately.” He said that some Nigerian drug dealers were imprisoned alongside him, who had received lengthy sentences, but they were also told that their sentences would be reduced if they converted to Islam – and that after they agreed to convert, their sentences were reduced. "If you want to think differently in our country, this is treated as a crime." #Iran Three Iranian Christian converts from Islam, with firsthand experience of persecution in #Iran, discuss their experiences in our webinar: https://t.co/jEeiwn1ovb #minorityreligions pic.twitter.com/4NkYZ4OPFV— IranWire (@IranWireEnglish) February 22, 2022 Vahid added: “We felt like hostages in the prison in Iran because they were using us in their political negotiations with other countries. And when Iran was negotiating the nuclear deal, the JCPOA agreement, in 2013 to 2015, they released certain political prisoners and religious minorities as well. “I was put under constant pressure to go and pray with other Muslims. And even though I respect our Muslim compatriots, I have other beliefs.” Vahid said that when he had decided to convert to Christianity, he “did not know that it would be such a big misdemeanour in Iran to believe in something else and try to practice another religion. “And I didn’t know that it would be such a difficult task to find a book about Christianity. It took me one year to find a copy of the New Testament!” Vahid added that while there was one Persian-speaking church in his city, “Across the road from the church is the intelligence agency’s office, and also the office of the morality police, so it is very difficult for people to attend that Persian-speaking church because they are being constantly monitored by these different intelligence agents across the road from them.” .@articleeighteen's @mansourborji: "When you hear news of arrests, one of the first things they take is their #Bibles and #Christian literature, and even symbols of #Christianity… And all the Christian literature produced in #Farsi is forbidden." #Iran #Converts #Persian pic.twitter.com/FrMtP17Ydq— Article18 (@articleeighteen) February 8, 2022
‘If I ever took off my blindfold an officer would beat me with a stick’ 4 February 2022 Features Ali Shahvari was detained for a year, including two months in solitary confinement, following his second arrest for his Christian activities. The former drug addict, who now likes to be called Iman (meaning “faith”), had become a keen evangelist after experiencing a life-changing transformation following his conversion to Christianity, and was arrested on both occasions during visits to the homes of other new converts. He was detained for a month, including 22 days in solitary confinement, after his first arrest in Semnan, east of Tehran, in September 2009. But it is his treatment following his second arrest – in the southeastern city of Zahedan in June 2010 – which is particularly shocking. Iman was taken to the notorious Haj Davood detention centre, run by the Ministry of Intelligence, which Iman describes as a “famous place where prisoners are taken to be tortured and forced to confess”. Iman says his first solitary cell there, where he was detained for about a month, was “very dark, warm, and full of insects. For 24 hours a day, there was a noise in the cell like that of a helicopter, putting pressure on my nerves and psyche. I wasn’t allowed to remove my blindfold in the cell. There was a camera, and if I ever took off my blindfold an officer would come and beat me with a stick!” A month later, Iman was transferred to a second solitary cell, and this time the conditions were even more grim. “I felt very cold,” Iman explains, “so I asked: ‘Please can you increase the temperature of the AC.’ “‘Sure,’ the officer said, but then he decreased the temperature even more, so the cell became even colder. I felt frozen until the morning.“In the morning, I told the officer: ‘You mistakenly decreased the temperature of the cell last night, and I was freezing from the cold.’“‘I’m sorry,’ the officer said, and decreased the temperature even further.“I realised at that moment that I was in a torture cell.” Iman spent 36 days in this second solitary cell and says that when he later chatted to a fellow inmate – who had made a forced confession after six days to escape that same cell – “he was very surprised and said, ‘It’s impossible you came out of there alive!’” During his time in solitary, Iman was taken for interrogations on three occasions, and during one of them he was badly beaten after failing to provide his interrogator with the answer he had been looking for. “He punched and kicked every part of my body,” Iman says, “while my hands were tied to the chair behind my back. I fell to the floor, along with the chair, and broke my tooth.” After two months in solitary, Iman was transferred to a “dark cell” containing a group of mentally disturbed prisoners, whose “arms and legs had been bound because they’d attacked the officers”. “These prisoners had been tortured mentally and brought to the brink of insanity,” Iman says. “I was in this cell for about a month.” Next, Iman was taken to a cell for prisoners on death row, whose arms and legs were also bound, “to prevent them from committing suicide”, according to Iman. In his time in that cell, before his transfer to Zahedan Central Prison, Iman says he witnessed “more than 100 prisoners being taken away to be executed”. But Iman’s torturous experience didn’t end there. In fact, it intensified. “The interrogators [at Zahedan Central Prison] knew I had been addicted to drugs in the past,” he explains. “They thought that although I had been successful in enduring torture in the Ministry of Intelligence detention centre, I would definitely succumb if offered drugs again. “This was when they truly began to torture me – by transferring my to a particular cell – cell number five, in Ward 5 … which was actually the drug-dealing centre for the whole prison.” Iman says that of the 2,200 prisoners there, “I was the only one who didn’t smoke cigarettes or do drugs.” And beyond the challenges Iman faced inside prison, there was also pressure from outside. One day, he received a call from his sister, telling him their father had been called by an intelligence agent, who had said to him: “One of your sons has been martyred [in the Iran-Iraq War], and another has become an infidel!” After hearing this, their father had had a stroke. Iman asked for leave to visit him, but was told, “You’re more harmful to society than addicts! You’re an infidel and you should thank us you’re even still alive!” His father died shortly afterwards. Iman was not able to attend the funeral, while his wife and three children had to make their own way there and were ignored during the ceremony, having been ostracised from the rest of the family. “After my father died, my brothers and sisters divided the inheritance among themselves,” Iman says. “They told me: ‘You’re an infidel; this inheritance doesn’t belong to you!’” After five months in Zahedan Central Prison, on top of the four months he had spent in the Haj Davood detention centre, Iman was taken to a Revolutionary Court, where he was denied access to a lawyer and sentenced to a year in prison under Article 513 of the Islamic Penal Code, on charges of “insulting the sacred” (blasphemy), “acting against national security”, and “evangelical activity with the aim of attracting others and promoting deviant thoughts”. The judge insulted him, saying: “Why don’t you stay quiet, instead of going from town to town like a crow and talking about Christianity everywhere you go!” Having served more than two-thirds of his sentence already, Iman says he decided not to appeal. But after his release, for the next year Iman says he was advised by church leaders to stay away from Christian activities and to devote himself to his wife and children. He was later encouraged to leave the country, and in June 2012, two years after his second arrest, Iman left for Turkey, where he and his family have been recognised as refugees. You can read Iman’s full Witness Statement here.
Iman Shahvari 4 February 2022 Witness Statements For a summary of Iman’s story, you can read our feature article here. Background and conversion 1. My name is Ali Shahvari, known by the name Iman, and I was born in Tehran in 1968. In 1996, I met my wife, Azam, who lived in our neighbourhood, and we married. We have three children: Amir Hussein, Ferzaneh, and Yeganeh.2. I grew up in a traditional and religious Muslim family. I loved God and had a special devotion to the “Ahl al-Bayt” [Muhammad’s family]. Twice I volunteered at school to go to the front-line during the Iran-Iraq war. My other two brothers were also on the front-line as fighters. One of my brothers was shot and wounded, and my other brother was martyred in 1986. I was exempted from military service because I was part of a martyr’s family. 3. I was an athlete and a wrestler, but I got very depressed after my brother was martyred. At a friend’s gathering, one of my friends offered me drugs. After that I started taking drugs and became an addict. For 20 years I took all kinds of drugs. I was physically weak, to the point that I became incapacitated. In an attempt to break my addiction, I exercised, went to NA [Narcotics Anonymous] meetings, turned to Islamic rituals – my mother recited Islamic prayers for me – but none of these things freed me from my addiction. 4. Then one day, 21 July 2006, I went to the roof of my home and raised my hands to the sky and said: “God, where are you? Why don’t you hear mine and my mother’s prayers? None of the things I did to free myself from drug addiction have worked. Come and save me from this situation!” After two hours, my hands got tired, I was discouraged and disappointed. I said to myself, “Either God doesn’t exist, or I am so sinful that God will have nothing to do with me.” I went back to the living room, turned on the TV and started searching for music on satellite channels. While changing the channels, I came across a Persian-language channel, where the speaker was saying: “Whoever asked God to save him, God wants to save you.” I was very surprised. The channel was called “Nejat [Salvation] TV”. Hearing this sentence confirmed to me the fact that God had heard my prayer and wanted to do something for my freedom. In that programme, a man told the story of his life, and how he used to use drugs in the past but that Jesus Christ the Lord saved him. I was very upset they were calling Jesus “Lord” and complained: “How crazy and lost are these people that in the 21st century a person named Jesus is known and introduced as God!” But then I said to myself: “If these infidels can do something for my recovery from my addiction, I’ll pray with them!” Then the person who had been freed from addiction said: “You have two choices: either you can continue on your current path, or you can accept Jesus as your Saviour.” I told myself: “I don’t want to go on in the way I have been. I’ve reached a dead end and I’m tired. It’s now 2 o’clock in the morning, there’s no-one watching; I’ll try this thing and if Christ frees me from my addiction, I’ll speak about this freedom to the whole world. But if I remain in my current situation, I’ll contact the Christian channels and demand they take responsibility for their lies!” 5. The pastor speaking on the TV said: “Anyone who wants to be saved should kneel down and pray with me. The more you open your heart to God, the more you will enjoy God’s presence and blessings.” I said: “God, I repent from my mistakes. If I knew Jesus as a prophet to this day, I’ll accept him as God from now on.” Then a strange voice inside me said: “It’s finished.” I didn’t know until later that this sentence was a verse from the Bible. 6. After I was healed, I wanted to tell everyone: “Jesus is Lord! Believe and be saved!” But because of my history of drug addiction, everyone I talked to about Jesus Christ not only didn’t agree to convert, but they also made fun of me. They thought I was crazy and delusional because I’d used different kinds of drugs. I was very disappointed. No-one believed the true story that happened to me. 7. After I became a Christian, I changed my name from Ali to Iman [which means “faith”], and everyone has called me by that name since then. House-churches 8. When I became a Christian, I decided to hand over everything I owned to my wife, such as my house and my car, because I knew there would be suffering ahead in this path that I had chosen. My wife [a Muslim at the time] also knew that I would never return to Islam, and that I was eager to do Christian activities. 9. I contacted the Christian TV Network, “Mohabat [Love]”, and spoke with pastors Rev Hormoz Shariat and Rev Kamil Navai. I told them about my conversion and said I would like to know more about Christianity. I gave them my mobile number and asked them to connect me to a house-church. Then someone in Tehran called me, and so I was connected to a house-church. 10. I had a great passion for evangelism and delivering the gospel message to people. That’s why I started to work as a driver, so that I could talk to more people about Christianity. Each time we had a house-church meeting, I would name 20 new people I had talked to about Christianity, so that the other Christians would pray for them. I also regularly asked the house-church leader for Bibles and copies of the “Jesus film” so I could give them to the people I evangelised to. 11. I also voluntarily drove house-church leaders to meetings in my own car, without receiving any money for my expenses. They taught, and I talked to church members about different experiences I’d had with God, such as being freed from addiction. In these meetings, I learned a lot from the leaders. Several times they entrusted me with the teaching portion of the service, and church members said my teaching was easy to understand. For this reason, after doing some training courses, I started leading different house-churches on my own in 2007, and I was baptised in 2008. 12. During 2007 and 2008, I was in charge of house-church groups in Tehran, Karaj, Zahedan, Zabol, Garmsar, Semnan and Qom. There was only one family present at each house-church meeting, and we weren’t allowed to put two families who didn’t know each other in the same group, due to security concerns. Every Thursday I would drive to Garmsar to visit different Christian families and hold weekly house-church meetings. Then I would drive to Semnan and do the same thing. I was in Garmsar and Semnan for 48 hours every week, and returned to Tehran on Saturdays early in the morning because my wife was a teacher and I had to take her to work. Arrest in Semnan 13. One Friday in September 2009, at 1pm, I was worshipping with the couple I was visiting, as well as another family member, when someone rang the doorbell. As soon as the door was opened, four male officers and two female officers entered the house, carrying weapons and walkie-talkies. They didn’t show us any warrant but still searched the whole house. 14. They confiscated my MP3 player, on which I had saved all my sermons, as well as my laptop and Bible, and all our mobile phones and Christian CDs. Then they blindfolded all of us and, in separate cars, with our heads held down, they took us to the intelligence office. Detention 15. I was taken to a very dirty solitary-confinement cell. The officers told me: “You’ll be detained for 10 days.” Because I had become a Christian, all my relatives and friends considered me an infidel and my household “impure”, so I was worried no-one would take care of my family, and said to God: “I give my wife and children to you. I don’t want to worry about my family’s situation during the interrogations.” 16. Every second day I was taken for questioning. I was interrogated almost 10 times in all. The interrogator asked me questions like: “How did you become a Christian? What organisation do you belong to? Who teaches you, or supports you?” And so on. They wanted to accuse me of collaborating with “major foreign networks acting against Iran’s security”. 17. I told them: “I was an addict and didn’t believe in Christianity. But I was prayed for during a Christian TV programme, and I was freed from addiction. That’s why I became a Christian and talked to a lot of people about what happened to me. If you receive healing from Imam Reza [a descendent of Muhammad], you’ll share it with everyone! I also tell you, Jesus Christ is the Saviour, Healer, and Redeemer. I encourage you also to accept this. As long as I live, I’ll talk about Christ and Christianity wherever I go. Now you call it evangelism, but I know one thing: I was dead in addiction, and Christ raised me up. I watch Christian TV programmes and they teach me. The family that you arrested together with me in Semnan has also been freed from addiction by God. We are the rescued addicts whom you arrested while praying and worshipping!” Family 18. After 10 to 12 days, they allowed me to call my wife, who told me: “One of our relatives, whose child is the same age as ours, takes our daughter to school by car every day.” I thanked God for providing the best support to my family. I had been taking her to school on a motorbike, but now she was getting to travel there in a car! My brother also came to the prison to visit, and brought me some toiletries, but the officers wouldn’t let me have them. They wanted to pressure me through the dirty environment of the prison to return to Islam. Temporary release 19. I was detained in solitary confinement for 22 days, then in the general ward of Semnan Prison for eight days. In the general ward, I prayed: “God help me in this place every morning, noon and night so that I can talk to the prisoners about Christianity.” In those 30 days I talked to 23 people about Christianity and they all became Christians! Three of them were facing the death sentence. After 30 days’ detention, I was released on bail of 100 million tomans [approx. $30,000], which was deposited in the form of a property deed by one of our relatives. 20. It was our house-church network’s practice to email a report about the service to the group’s leaders every night, so 12 days after my release from prison I sent a report to the senior church leaders about what had happened. Because 23 of the prisoners had become Christians, and I was convinced that God had taken me to prison for this service, I also wrote at the end of the email that I was ready to continue my Christian activities. They decided that I shouldn’t go to the cities of Semnan and Garmsar but that I could continue to teach in other cities. Court 21. On 18 February 2010, the Semnan Revolutionary Court officially charged me and a member of the family I had visited with “forming a propaganda group for the benefit of Christianity, with the intention of disrupting the security of the country”, “evangelising and spreading Christianity”, and “disrupting the Islamic beliefs of young people”, and under Article 500 of the Islamic Penal Code we were sentenced to one-year’s imprisonment, suspended for five years, and I was banned from entering the province of Semnan for five years. We also had to pay a fine of 5 million tomans [around $1,500], but the judge said we would receive 3 million tomans back at the end of the five years if we didn’t “reoffend”. However, because I was arrested again I never received anything back. 22. During the hearing, the judge said: “You were in a ‘team house’ [a place where opposition groups meet] with other members of the group, and when the agents arrived, the two women present didn’t observe Islamic decency and didn’t wear hijab!” I responded that proper hijab was the covering of a person’s heart and eyes. 23. The judge said: “I’ll ask you three questions. If the answers are acceptable, you’ll be acquitted, and if not, I’ll issue a death sentence. It doesn’t matter at all to me that you are from a martyr’s family!” I prayed and asked God for wisdom. “First question,” the judge said. “What is the Quran?” I answered: “The word of Allah.” “Second question: who is Muhammad?” I said: “The Messenger of Allah.” “Third question: who is Ali?” I said: “The first Imam of the Shiites.” I just prayed he wouldn’t ask me what I thought about Allah, but he didn’t ask any other questions, and because I had no criminal record I was only warned that propaganda about Christianity in Iran was a crime. “You aren’t allowed to talk about Christianity with anyone!” he said. Then he added: “You don’t have the right to enter the province of Semnan for five years, and if you come to this province in these five years, you’ll be sentenced to one to five years in prison.” The judge also warned the family I had visited that they weren’t allowed to contact me at all, and that they would be sentenced to imprisonment if they let me into their home. But we are still in touch via Facebook. Appeal court 24. The appeal hearing took place at Branch 4 of the Appeal Court of Semnan Province, under Judge Mohammad-Hossein Salami and court counsellor Hadi Abbasnejad, and the judge acquitted us, ruling there was no evidence we had acted with “malicious intent to disrupt national security”. The appeal court’s verdict was issued on 7 February 2011. Arrest in Zahedan 25. But before this, I had also been arrested in Zahedan, on 27 June 2010, during a house-church meeting with another family who had also become free from their drug addiction. The mother of the family, her two sons and her young daughter, as well as one of their friends, were there when at 11 o’clock in the morning, the doorbell rang. One of them opened the door and about seven or eight male agents aggressively entered the house, carrying walkie-talkies and weapons. They created a terrifying atmosphere by shouting loudly and in a sharp tone. Everyone in the family was scared, and the mother of the family cried. I told her: “Don’t be afraid; they are here because of me.” Each of us was blindfolded and taken away in a separate car. Detention 26. At the prison they took off my clothes and gave me prison clothes, then took me, blindfolded, to the Haj Davood detention centre and placed me in solitary confinement. The Haj Davood torture centre in Zahedan is famous: prisoners are taken there to be tortured and to confess. It is outside the prison, and under the control of the Ministry of Intelligence. I don’t know its exact location, but it was about 40 minutes away. 27. On my first day there, they gave me an information form to fill out, and I wrote, when asked about my wife’s religion, that she was a Muslim but that I wished her to become a Christian and do Christian activities together with me. The agents didn’t believe what I had written. For this reason the intelligence agents twice went to the school where my wife worked, and investigated whether she was a Muslim or a Christian. 28. One of the interrogators also called my wife three days after my arrest. At first, he spoke in a harsh tone with her, but after realising that she really was a Muslim, his tone softened and he said: “Why don’t you take care of your husband? Do you know where he goes and what he does?” My wife replied: “He has chosen his own path and I can’t bring him back from the path he has chosen.” The interrogator said: “You have to get divorced! Your marriage is haram [forbidden]!” My wife answered: “We have three children. I can’t get divorced.” They also called my family and summoned my brother, who told them: “Ali was on the front-line during the war and is mentally ill. Please release him.” 29. During the second interrogation, the interrogators had found out from my record that I had been arrested once before in Semnan. They said: “You didn’t learn your lesson after your first arrest! You are a Christian evangelist; your goal and mission is to preach about Christianity! After you were released from Semnan Prison, we followed you like a shadow!” But four months after my release from Semnan Prison, I had attended a Christian conference, and the Ministry of Intelligence was unaware of it, so I knew they were lying about following me. 30. People think the Ministry of Intelligence knows everything about our lives, but they don’t; they only pay spies and informants to spy and report information to them. They asked me to cooperate with them too, and said: “You have been enslaved by Western ideas! You should be ashamed of yourself for acting this way in front of your wife and children! We can provide jobs for you, but you must stop doing these things!” By making these promises, they wanted to bring me back to Islam. Solitary confinement 31. The first solitary cell they placed me in was very dark, warm, and full of insects. For 24 hours a day, there was a noise in the cell like that of a helicopter, putting pressure on my nerves and psyche. I wasn’t allowed to remove my blindfold in the cell; there was a CCTV camera and if I ever took off my blindfold an officer would come and beat me with a stick. There was a shower, but even when washing my face I was only allowed to raise my blindfold a little so I couldn’t see the ceiling, the wall and the camera. I was taken in for questioning once a week. They wanted to bring me back to Islam through threats and psychological torture. They said: “We know that you are determined in your choice, but we aren’t in a hurry; we have many ways and techniques to bring you back!” I was kept in this cell for about a month. 32. One day, at 3pm, I was taken to another solitary cell that was cooler and cleaner. At 6pm, they threw food into the cell. I was very cold and said: “Please can you increase the temperature of the AC in here? “Sure,” the officer said, but then he decreased it even more, so the cell became even colder. I felt frozen until the morning, when I told the officer: “You mistakenly decreased the temperature last night, and I was freezing from the cold!” “I’m sorry,” he said, and decreased it even more. I realised at that moment that I was in a torture cell. 33. Then I exercised for about half an hour to warm up, but I became out of breath, so I prayed to God and asked Him for help. I knew that although my physical strength had weakened, I wouldn’t ever deny Him in any way, and I started to praise God in the cell and exercised with the strength He had given me, Once I even felt so hot that I was able to unbutton my clothes for about four hours. When I was taken for interrogation, I saw that the interrogator had a cold, because he was sitting under the AC, which was blowing warm air. He asked me: “Do you still want to resist, and not return to Islam?” He continued: “If you’re telling the truth, ask Jesus to show me a miracle!” I replied: “Is there a bigger miracle than the fact that you caught a cold while sitting under that heater, while I’m in full health even though I’ve been in that cold torture cell?” 34. I was in that second cell for 36 days, and during that time I was interrogated three times and taken about five times to get some fresh air in a yard which had iron bars all around the sides and above. Whenever they took me there I would happily roll up my trousers and the sleeves of my shirt, and say: “God, flood my body with the scorching Zahedan sun, so that I can endure the cold of the cell!” Later, in the public prison, I met a man who said: “I was kept in a cold torture cell for six days and had to falsely admit that I bombed the Imam Ali Mosque [a Shia holy site in Iraq] to get me out of there!” When he heard I had been in that cell for 36 days, he was very surprised, and said: “It’s impossible you came out of there alive!” Interrogations 35. On the first and second day of my interrogations, when the interrogator spoke to me aggressively, I answered him: “You are disrespecting me, even though I’m being quiet and writing down the answers to your questions.” But there was another interrogator, who was from Tabriz, who had a great knowledge of the Bible and Christianity, and had interrogated many Christian converts. Once, on a Friday, this interrogator said, with his Tabrizi accent: “You don’t want to answer the questions?” Then he punched and kicked every part of my body while my hands were tied to the chair behind my back. I fell to the floor, with the chair, and broke my tooth. 36. The severity of this beating was unusual, and it seemed like he was upset about something else. I thought maybe that it was because it was a Friday and that he had had to come to this place on his day off. So I said: “Forgive me for taking away your day off from you, and that on this Friday you have had to come here.” He said: “Are you making fun of me?” I said: “No, I act according to the Word, which tells us ‘Bless your enemies’.” 37. I said: “My friends and I are addicts who survived drug addiction. We gather together to worship and pray for the freedom of other addicts. The government doesn’t have a problem with what we are doing, so why are you bothering us?” He replied: “You’re lying! You’re a preacher of Christianity, and you want to overthrow this regime – that is your plan!” Then he lifted up my blindfold and showed me a video of one of our house-church meetings on his tablet. 38. About a month before my arrest, a young boy from a house-church group in Zahedan had talked to his father about Christianity, and his father had said: “I won’t come to the meeting, but ask my questions to the person in charge, and film the answers for me so I can listen to them.” I didn’t know that the young boy was filming me, but it turned out his father was a spy who worked for the Ministry of Intelligence and received relatively good pay, and that he’d sent the film to the intelligence service. 39. Once, the imam of the Zahedan Friday prayers came to visit me in prison. He asked the officers to take off my blindfold. During the four months I was detained, I always wore a blindfold, and that meeting was the first time I spoke without one. The imam intended to convert me to Islam by persuading me, but I explained my reasons for becoming a Christian and didn’t accept his invitation to return to Islam. 40. After more than two months in solitary confinement, I was thrown into a dark cell alongside prisoners who had mental problems. The prisoners in there didn’t blindfold themselves, nor eat their food. Their arms and legs were bound, because they had attacked the officers. These prisoners had been tortured mentally and brought to the brink of insanity. I was in this cell for about a month. There was one young, dishevelled prisoner in there, with a hairy face, who had his hands and feet bound. The first night I talked to him for two hours about Christianity. Then I prayed for him and asked for God to bring him comfort, strength and healing, and he started crying. A week later, officers were surprised by his calmness. I asked them to cut his hair and beard, and unbind his hands and feet. His face changed a lot when he had had his hair cut, and I didn’t recognise him when he returned to the cell. The officer said: “We’ll loosen his hands and feet, as you ask, but if something bad happens to you, we won’t take responsibility.” 41. Later, one of the people in charge of the MOIS [Ministry of Intelligence] Prison, who was from Tehran, was told that I was talking to other prisoners about Christianity. They also relayed all the conversations I had had with that young man in my cell. The head of the prison said: “You are from a martyr’s family; what harm do you want to do to yourself, your spouse and your children? Why don’t you watch your tongue! Why do you brainwash the other prisoners and those outside?” I replied: “God wants me to share the message of truth with these prisoners, and you!” 42. The fourth cell I was taken to was for prisoners who were to be executed. The officers bound these prisoners’ arms and legs to prevent them from committing suicide. I wasn’t worried about my wife and children; I knew God would protect them. And in one way I was glad they wanted to execute me, because I would go to my Lord. But at the same time, I repented in the presence of God with tears and said: “God, forgive me if I wasn’t a good Christian!” In those days, I saw more than 100 prisoners taken away to be executed. 43. “We have other ways to make you talk!” one interrogator threatened me one day. “We’ll tear your beautiful wife and children to pieces!” I said: “I have given my life to Christ, as well as those of my wife and my children, and all that I have, and I won’t turn away from my faith.” The interrogator from Tabriz, hearing my words, said: “This is one of those Christians who has remained so sure of his faith!” Then he continued: “You are poison to Iran! You are making a mistake staying in Iran and causing trouble for the Iranian people! If you stay in Iran, we’ll kill you secretly. It’s better for you to leave Iran after your release, and go to a Christian country!” 44. I was in detention after this second arrest for a total of about four months, and the interrogators discovered I wouldn’t return to Islam despite any torture, threats or pressure. Zahedan Central Prison 45. After four months in that place, I was taken to Zahedan Central Prison, where for five days I was placed in a cell within a ward that had 230 prisoners, despite having a capacity of only 120. The sleeping area was so cramped and small that I had to sleep on my side. The interrogators there knew I had been addicted to drugs in the past, and thought that even though I’d endured torture in the MOIS detention centre, I would definitely succumb if offered drugs again. 46. This was when they truly began to torture me, by transferring me to a particular cell – cell number five, in Ward 5, which was very different from the other wards. In my cell there were 12 beds, and just 11 of us. The other prisoners used the extra bed as a kitchen cupboard, and stored fruit there, which had been brought to them in a wheelbarrow. But then I found out that this cell was actually a drug-dealing centre for the whole prison, and that this was the reason why the prisoners received extra things. There were 2,200 prisoners in the prison, and I was the only one who didn’t smoke cigarettes and do drugs. 47. The prisoners in my ward were packing all kinds of different drugs, which I also used to take. “I know you’re tired. Take some of these drugs,” said one of the other prisoners. I said: “I used all these drugs for 20 years, but when I became a Christian, I stopped.” All my fellow prisoners laughed and said: “Prisoners have come here who didn’t even smoke, but after four or five months they began using drugs, alcohol, and so on – let alone you who have a history of being a drug addict!” 48. One of the interrogators there, whose brother had also been martyred on the front-line, asked me: “How can you have used drugs for 20 years and still be able to resist the urge to use drugs in this prison?” I told him: “I attended classes to quit and participated in many addiction treatments, but none of them helped me. I also performed many Islamic prayers and made many promises to Allah, but my prayers weren’t answered. Only Jesus Christ healed me of my addiction and sickness.” Family 49. From the first day I became a Christian, I told my wife that if one day I was taken to prison, she and our children shouldn’t visit me, because the prison environment wasn’t suitable for them. In prison, I witnessed many crimes against other prisoners and their families, such as rape and other immoral acts. That’s why I talked with my family on the prison phone, instead of asking them to visit. But my brother, my nephew, and my sister’s son-in-law came to visit me from time to time. 50. One day my sister called and said: “One of the intelligence agents called our father and said: ‘One of your sons has been martyred and another of your sons has become an infidel!’ And he had a stroke when they said this!” I asked for leave to visit my father, but the head of the prison said: “You’re more harmful to society than addicts! You’re an infidel, and you should thank us you’re still alive!” Even my brother had asked for me to be given a short leave so I could visit my father, but the officers had told him: “Your brother Iman has no rights! It’s better for you to pray for him to return to Islam!” Shortly afterwards, my father died. 51. During my detention, none of my family members visited my wife or children. Even at my father’s funeral, they had to go by bus because no-one wanted to take them in their cars. Everyone ignored them during the mourning ceremony and behaved inappropriately and coldly. After my father died, my brothers and sisters divided the inheritance among themselves and told me: “You’re an infidel: this inheritance doesn’t belong to you!” Court 52. After five months of being in Zahedan Central Prison, on 3 February 2011 I was sent from prison to the court, but I wasn’t allowed to have a lawyer. Judge Mehran Bameri was the head of the 2nd Branch of the Islamic Revolutionary Court in Zahedan. He said insultingly: “Why don’t you stay quiet, instead of going from town to town like a crow and talking about Christianity everywhere you go!” I replied: “I have a question for you: if your child was paralysed and Imam Reza healed him, wouldn’t you talk about this healing with others?” He answered: “Yes, I would.” I said: “I was addicted to drugs, I was depressed, I had back pain, but Jesus Christ healed me and set me free, so I talk to people about this healing.” 53. But the judge sentenced me under Article 513 of the Islamic Penal Code to one year in prison on charges of “insulting the sacred”, “acting against national security”, and “evangelical activity with the aim of attracting others and promoting deviant thoughts”. After the court hearing my brother came to the prison to visit me. The interrogators told him: “Because Iman is from the family of a martyr and suffered from the impact of the war himself, this time he is sentenced to imprisonment, but next time we’ll issue a death sentence for him.” 54. Because I had already served about eight months – that is, two-thirds of the sentence – and just one-third was left, I didn’t appeal against the sentence. After the verdict was finalised, the property deed which we had submitted for bail in the other court case was released. During the year I was detained, my wife and children didn’t have any financial problems. My wife had a salary from the Ministry of Education, and I leased the garage of our house so she could receive the rent. After release 55. After I was released from Zahedan Central Prison, I emailed a report to the church leaders about my one year in prison. I explained in the email that thousands of people had heard about Jesus Christ and that I was no longer allowed to enter Zahedan or [nearby] Zabol County, but that I was ready to be sent to other cities for church activities. But they answered: “Until further notice, you shouldn’t do any church activities, telephone calls or church-member visits. You’ve been away from your family for a year, so now you have to serve your wife and children. Now is the time for you to rest with your family.” 56. But although I wasn’t involved in any church activities, I was called at home from an unknown number once a month in the middle of the night, and the caller would say: “We’re following you like a shadow! Watch out!” These calls continued for around a year, and I told my leaders about it. 57. I was very upset that I couldn’t do any Christian activities. Of course I talked secretly to people in Tehran about Christianity, but I wasn’t allowed to attend meetings. Then the leaders told me: “It’s better for you to emigrate to Germany. We have a church there, where you can be active.” So on 22 June 2012, I left Iran for Turkey. I went alone so my family wouldn’t be in trouble if I was banned from leaving and arrested. 58. Then, after a few months in Turkey, my family joined me, and we applied for asylum. We were officially recognised as refugees in May 2014. In 2019, my wife converted to Christianity, but even before her conversion she supported me in all my work with house-churches in Iran. She even often reminded me about upcoming meetings. Now she and our children are also active members of our church here in Turkey, and most of my other relatives have also become Christians.