Dervishes share photos appearing to reveal police brutality 13 January 2019 News Photographs have emerged appearing to show 10 Gonabadi dervishes with bandaged heads and bruised faces posing for police mugshots. The photographs, published by the BBC, are purported to show injuries sustained by the dervishes during their recent arrest and transfer to jail. “We were surrounded by police officers and Basijis,” one of the dervishes is reported to have said. “The corridors were full of smoke; they’d used tear gas, so I held my breath and climbed to the roof. A number of us and our wives and children were there, but then the Basijis attacked. One of them said, ‘Throw them off the roof!’ They subjected us to the most vulgar insults. One after another they took us into the corridor of the building, where death seemed to await us. With iron bars, batons, knives and swords, they attacked us. On the stairs, I was drowning in blood. On the walls were the bloody handprints of dervishes. I lost consciousness. In the yard of the building they threw us down and I remember them standing over me and saying, ‘See if he is alive or dead.’ Then I was taken to the hospital.” Gonabadi dervishes, Iran’s largest Sufi order, have long complained of mistreatment at the hands of Iran’s law enforcement agencies, and these new photographs would seem to provide a rare piece of concrete evidence of their claims. There are many similarities between the claims made by the dervishes and members of other religious minorities, such as Christians, Zoroastrians and Bahá’ís. In the past decade, dervishes claim to have had their houses of worship destroyed, to have seen hundreds of their members arrested, and dozens sentenced to lashes, time in prison or exile. They say they have been beaten and tortured by police, and then in prison have faced rape, solitary confinement and denial of medical care. Dervishes claim they have been fired from government jobs, refused university education and faced constant harassment by members of Iran’s intelligence agency. They have also faced accusations of being a threat to national security and of being used by foreign powers to undermine the regime. Their situation has been highlighted by rights groups such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch, as well as the UN’s Special Rapporteur on Human Rights in Iran. Yet while there are clear similarities between the harassment faced by dervishes and other religious minorities, there is an additional political element to the dervishes’ troubles. Gonabadi dervishes believe that religion and politics should remain separate, which puts them instantly at odds with the foundations of the Islamic republic. The dervishes’ popularity with the Guardian Council was further damaged during the 2009 presidential elections when they supported a candidate not favoured by the council and began to be seen even more as a potential threat in mobilising support against the regime. Their tactics, of public protests, sit-ins and hunger strikes, and widely publicised clashes with police in defence of their leader, Nurali Tabandeh, have also made life uncomfortable for the authorities.
Sisters released on bail after paying 1 billion tomans 6 January 2019 News Shokoufeh (left) and Shima Zanganeh (Mohabat News) Two sisters who were arrested in Ahvaz earlier this month and charged with “action against Iran’s national security through evangelism” have been released on bail. Shima and Shokoufeh Zanganeh, who are aged 27 and 30 respectively, were arrested on 2 December by plainclothes Revolutionary Guards and after interrogation at the Intelligence Office transferred to Sepidar Prison. Shokoufeh was released on Christmas Day and Shima on New Year’s Eve, after their family paid a combined sum of one billion tomans (around $110,000). The two sisters, who are both converts to Christianity, were assaulted during their interrogation and had many of their personal items confiscated, including books, phones and computers. For the first few days, it was unclear where they were being held, but after a few days’ detention Shima called her family to let them know that she and her sister were being held at the Amanieh Intelligence Office in Ahvaz. On 12 December the sisters were brought before Branch 12 of the Revolutionary Court in Ahvaz, where they were charged with “action against Iran’s national security through evangelism” and their bail was set at 500 million tomans (around $55,000) each. They were then transferred to Sepidar Prison. The Zanganeh family attempted to pay their bail amount on several occasions, but several times they were told by court officials that “the judge is not in today”. Meanwhile, two other converts arrested on the same day in Ahvaz, Farzad Behzadi and Abdollah Yousef, remain in detention in a prison in Mollasani, just to the north of Ahvaz. It is still unclear on what charges they are being detained.
Two sisters among four converts arrested in Ahvaz 19 December 2018 News Clockwise from top-left: Shokoufeh Zanganeh; her sister Shima; Abdollah Yousefi; and Farzad Behzadi (Middle East Concern) Four Christian converts, including two sisters, have been arrested and detained in the western city of Ahvaz. Shima Zanganeh, 27, and her sister Shoukoufeh, 30, Farzad Behzadi, 30, and Abdollah Yousefi, 34, were arrested in a series of raids by plainclothes Revolutionary Guards on their homes and workplaces on the morning of 2 December. Many of their personal items were confiscated, including books, phones and computers. The two sisters were assaulted during their interrogation, while the families of the two men were verbally abused when they went to the Intelligence Office to ask about their loved ones. For the first few days, it was unclear where any of the four were being held, but after a few days’ detention Shima called her family to let them know that she and her sister were being held at the Amanieh Intelligence Office in Ahvaz. Meanwhile, Farzad, after reportedly being threatened and beaten, called his sister to tell her to bring two Bibles he had hidden in his room to the Intelligence Office. On 12 December the sisters were brought before Branch 12 of the Revolutionary Court in Ahvaz, where they were charged with charged with “action against Iran’s national security through evangelism” and their bail was set at 500 million tomans (nearly $45,000) each. They were then transferred to Sepidar Prison. The Zanganeh family have attempted to pay their bail amount on several occasions, but each time court officials have told them “the judge is not in today”. Farzad and Abdollah are being held in a prison in Mollasani, just to the north of Ahvaz. It is not yet clear what charges they are facing. Recently, Iranian state-sponsored media reported the arrest of a number of citizens, including foreigners, on charges of “affiliation with the Zionist Christianity movement”, and the confiscation of evangelical books and CDs from the detainees, alleging that they sought to “conquer Iran,” and that “documents in this regard, as well as insults to Islam, Shiites, and the Shiite Ahl al-Bayt [Muhammad’s family], have been uncovered.” One of these media outlets, affiliated with the Revolutionary Guard, claimed “the detained gang members … were directly led by the Zionist regime [Israel], while promoting and propagating Christianity in different parts of Iran. They also attracted a lot of people to evangelical Christianity.” Dozens of Christians – possibly in excess of 100 – have been arrested in various parts of Iran in recent weeks, though exact figures are not yet known.
64-year-old convert released on bail after two weeks in solitary confinement 16 December 2018 News Sixty-four-year-old Jamshid Derakhshan has been released on bail after two weeks in solitary confinement in Karaj’s Rajaei-Shahr Prison. Jamshid was interrogated multiple times during his incarceration and told he had been arrested for “spreading evangelical and Zionist Christianity”. “Zionist Christianity” is a term used by the Iranian regime to describe evangelical Christianity as a whole. He was also accused of links with Israel and of playing a role in the “rapid expansion of Christianity in Iran”. Since his conversion to Christianity 30 years ago, Jamshid, whose bail was set at 40 million tomans (around $8,500), has been summoned to court three times and fired from his job as an aviation officer. He was arrested on 30 November at a “house church” gathering in Hashtgerd, but his family received no news of his arrest until he called them from the prison two weeks later, on 12 December, to tell them he was soon to be released on bail.
64-year-old convert who disappeared two weeks ago is in prison 14 December 2018 News A 64-year-old convert to Christianity who failed to come home from a visit to a “house church” in Hashtgerd on 30 November has spent the last two weeks in Karaj’s Rajaei-Shahr Prison. Jamshid Derakhshan, who has been a Christian for 30 years, called home on 12 December to tell his family he will soon be released on bail. Before his call, his family had had no knowledge of his whereabouts since his disappearance. Attempts to find out information from government agencies proved fruitless. Article18 understands that his family are concerned for his health, as he suffers from a stomach illness, and that after his conversion to Christianity he was fired from a job with a government organisation.
114 Christians arrested in one week 5 December 2018 News At least 114 Christians have been arrested in the past week following a series of raids in nine different cities across Iran. Most of those arrested were released after a few hours, but only after they had written down details of their Christian activities and been ordered to have no more contact with other Christians. Their mobile devices were confiscated and they were told they would soon hear from Ministry of Intelligence. Those suspected of being leaders of “house churches” remain in detention. These latest arrests mean that in total at least 142 Christians have been arrested in the past month. The government-sanctioned Mehr news agency reported that some of those arrested were foreign nationals who had assumed Iranian identities, as reported by Radio Farda. Mehr said the Christians, referred to as “Zionists”, had close links with Israel and desired to weaken Islam and especially the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Iranian pastor and wife fled after threat of execution for apostasy 28 November 2018 News Farhad Sabokrooh with his wife Shahnaz, in an undated photo. An Iranian pastor who fled the country with his wife four years ago after they were both threatened with execution for apostasy has shared his story at the US State Department. Farhad Sabokrooh, who was a supervising pastor with Iran’s Assemblies of God network for 25 years, fled to Turkey in March 2014 and resettled in the United States in 2016. He was one of the guest speakers at a roundtable discussion on ‘Religious Freedom in Iran’ at the US State Department on 27 November. The pastor shared how he was arrested and imprisoned three times during his 25 years as a pastor, and that the last of these, when his church in Ahvaz was raided by 40 armed agents on 23 December 2011, led eventually to his and his family’s exit from Iran. Now hearing testimony from three representatives of persecuted religious communities in #Iran:• Anthony Vance (Baha’is)• Hamid Gharagozloo (Gonabadi Sufis)• Pastor Farhad Sabokrooh (Protestant/Assemblies of God) pic.twitter.com/VkuHgutXR1— USCIRF (@USCIRF) November 27, 2018 His full testimony is below: “Hello everybody. I am Pastor Farhad Sabokrooh, minister of Iran’s Assemblies of God church and supervising pastor of a number of churches in Iran for 25 years. I am grateful for the opportunity that has been given to me to share part of our story. Although I know that it is difficult to relay all the persecution accounts that the Iranian church has faced during these years in such a short time, but I will try to explain what has happened during these last years to our ministry. I have to mention that during these 25 years I have been arrested and imprisoned three times and during this time I have been threatened and interrogated numerous times by security services. But today I want to talk about our last arrest, which led to our deportation from Iran, our own country. On 23 December 2011, in the Ahvaz Assemblies of God Church, along with more that 70 men, women and children, we were worshiping. Suddenly armed agents with covered faces entered the church. They had three cameras and climbed the church’s walls and surrounded the whole church from inside out with 40 agents. They even had some agents on the rooftop. Immediately after their invasion they seized all cell phones, cut off all communication and took the cameras which were recording our session. Their invasion caused severe distress among our congregation, so much that children were crying and women were terrified. Unfortunately one of the woman who had a hard time to get pregnant and was pregnant at the time lost consciousness. When it happened we rushed to help her but those agents stopped us and did not allow anybody to take her to hospital. The amount of distress was so forceful that some women in our congregation in that day or following days had serious internal bleeding problems which to this day its aftermath affects their daily lives. Agents separated men and women, then started to record each person and each room on their cameras. Another group of agents searched each room in the church thoroughly and collected anything they needed as evidence. This evidence included my personal library (containing rare and old books), all the documents and church-related and personal letters, Bibles, worship songbooks, photos, the church’s PCs and even personal laptops. They took men to one side and women to the other and started filming them one by one, and while doing so they threatened them about what is going to happen to them. They did the same to women and threatened they would inform their family and their husbands about their conversion to Christianity and order them banned from work or education. They also had children locked up in one room and one of the agents was watching them. The children were terrified and all of them were sobbing. It made the agents take the children out of the church and, with my persistence, they accepted to take children to one of our member’s homes, which was close by. They accepted my request under the condition that one of their agents must stay with them at that home. The increasing tension caused verbal and physical confrontation between the church members and agents. One of the women who was not cooperating was attacked by an agent and was stopped by one of our young members. But that young man was beaten up by agents. Their operation took so long and each second was causing more distress and after three hours they had everybody on buses. They took the whole congregation to the local Enghelab [Islamic] Court and after interrogations and acquiring all ID cards and signing an oath that they wouldn’t return to church, they released everybody, one by one. Though they had started to summon each person one by one and interrogated them for long hours. Later on they asked for our non-Christian friends and interrogated them for just being friends with us. But it did not end there. After taking all the people from the church, they took me and my wife [Shahnaz], with two other leaders of the church, blindfolded. They took us to one of the Iranian intelligence service’s secret jails. As we were leaving they said that they have something on their mind for our children later. For two months we had been under lots of pressure, long hours of interrogation and harassment. An interrogator told me: ‘We have to find answers and until then you will stay locked up.’ The effect of prison, threats and interrogations were so harsh. Therefore after seven years our family still sees nightmares related to those days. We were under pressure in jail and our two children were being harassed outside of jail. They were repeatedly interrogated and threatened by security agents. In one of the interrogations they told my daughter: ‘Your Father has to cooperate. If not, he will end up like Bishop Haik Hovsepian.’ (Bishop Haik was one of the senior pastors in Iran’s Assemblies of God church who was stabbed to death 25 years ago.) The pressure and threats were not exclusive to us in Iran but also they had threatened our son who was studying in Armenia. He was harassed, followed and was under surveillance. They deprived him of of scholarship rights and were hardly cooperating with him in the embassy. After two months they freed us on bail. But later we were sentenced to one year of imprisonment. And so me, my wife and two other leaders of the church were imprisoned separately. Before being released from prison, me and my wife were forced to sign agreements. According to this agreement we had to leave Iran, otherwise we will be sentenced to apostasy and executed. We signed those agreements without seeing each other. On March 2014 we left Iran and sought asylum in Turkey and were resettled in the USA on June 2016. We are thankful to be in this country, safe and sound, but we still carry scars of our bitter past on our souls. Currently, there are lots of known and unknown imprisoned believers in Iran. We hope to see Iran again and that one day every race, religion and belief could live in peace alongside each other in that land. Thanks for the time you have given me.”
‘Converts’ isolation leads to reliance on satellite TV to stay connected’ 3 October 2018 News Article 18’s Mansour Borji (second from left) was among the speakers at this morning’s event (SAT-7) Article18’s advocacy director, Mansour Borji, was one of the speakers at a panel discussion on religious freedom in London this morning. Borji explained how the Iranian government has limited Christian converts’ right to freedom of assembly, leading to isolation and a reliance on satellite television as a means of staying connected to their faith community. However, he added that the Church in Iran continues to grow, despite this repression. “Faith endures,” he said, sharing how he had spoken just yesterday with four Christians currently incarcerated in Tehran’s Evin Prison for holding church services in their homes. Another of the speakers at the event, which was co-sponsored by by Middle East broadcaster SAT-7 and the Conservative Christian Fellowship, was the UK’s Minister of State for the Middle East, Alistair Burt. Mr Burt said that incidents of religious intolerance and discrimination were “on the rise across the globe” – and not only against Christians. He stressed that while Christians should be able to share their faith freely, there was also a need to understand the context in which they were doing so. “If you are working in the Middle East, where the infusion of faith with everyday life … runs right through societies, through governance and everything else, not to have a sensitivity for the cultural context is harmful,” he said. He also celebrated the recent appointment of Tariq Ahmad as the Prime Minister’s Special Envoy on Freedom of Religion or Belief, saying the UK government had “become aware of the need to advocate more firmly for [religious freedom] and, in a non-threatening manner, to try and raise the issue”. “I know that the Conservative Christian Fellowship and others have campaigned for a long time that the government should have an advocate, as they do in some other countries,” he said. “And I’m sure friends here will be pleased that this is something the Prime Minister has done.”
‘Converts at constant risk of arrest’ 19 September 2018 News Article18’s Mansour Borji addresses the conference (Norge IDAG) Iranian converts to Christianity are at “constant risk” of arrest, Article18’s Advocacy Director, Mansour Borji, told a conference in Norway today. “I want to ask Christians all over the world to insist on full rights for Christians in Iran,” he said. “Human rights are indispensable and must be respected for everyone.” Borji explained that while ethnic Armenian and Assyrian Christians are able to worship freely in Iran, they must do so only in their own ethnic languages and are strictly forbidden from evangelising to Muslim-born Iranians. This wasn’t always the case, Borji explained, but a sharp rise in conversions to Christianity in recent years has led to a crackdown by the authorities. Several churches have been closed, and heavy prison sentences of up to 15 years have been given to converts as well as ethnic Assyrian or Armenian Christians found to have been active in evangelism. At the time of the 1979 revolution, there were a number of Catholic and Orthodox, and even some evangelical denominations, in Iran, Borji explained. And for a long time after the revolution, many of these churches continued to operate and it was possible for converts with a Muslim background to connect with some of them. He added that as long as converts kept a low profile and did not take on a leadership role within the church, they were largely free from danger. However, in the past decade, stringent measures – such as banning church services and Christian literature in the Farsi-language – have been taken to ensure converts are kept away from the official churches, meaning only underground churches in private homes, known as “house churches”, are available to them. “These are the only available form of Christian community for Iranian converts,” Borji explained. “And there you are at constant risk of arrest, leading to imprisonment, ill treatment in prison, torture, tough interrogations, no legal assistance, surveillance and harassment, losing your job or being denied access to education, and at worst losing your life.” He shared the example of one “house church” meeting that was raided by officers from Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence, who arrested most of those present, sentencing them to an average of three and a half years in prison. “All they had done wrong was to meet for worship,” Borji noted. Rob Duncan from Article18’s partner organisation Middle East Concern was another of the speakers at the event. He explained how the number of known converts in Iran had risen from around 500 at the time of the 1979 revolution to as many as 360,000 today, according to figures from Elam Ministries. But he added that there is now “no opportunity for Christians to gather freely” and reiterated that all members of “house churches” are at “constant risk” of arrest. Duncan said that he knew of Iranian Christians who had been summoned for questioning by the intelligence service “every single day for years in a row”. “Others are systematically summoned for questioning each time important family events occur. For example, one was summoned for interrogation just as his son was getting married,” he said. Duncan explained that there has been a “massive increase” in conversions to Christianity in Iran – “especially among young people, and despite the persecution of the Islamic regime”. “Even Islamic leaders recognise that this is happening,” he added. But with the increase in conversions has come an increase in persecution, which has in turn led many Christians to flee Iran, seeking refuge in countries such as Norway. The question of how best to deal with the growing numbers of converts claiming asylum in Europe was raised. And Norway was criticised for seeking to gauge how likely a returning convert would be to keep their faith secret and therefore avoid persecution. Duncan said that it was “not realistic that someone could avoid this threat just by being silent about their faith”. “If you’re part of a ‘house church’ meeting, you’re in constant danger of being discovered,” he said. “Although people are very careful about how they behave, they are still in danger. If you speak to someone one to one, you cannot know if the other person is informing the police or intelligence agency.” Ketil Larsen, the Deputy Director General of Norway’s Immigration Appeals Board, acknowledged that no-one should be sent back to Iran only to face persecution, and said that no-one should be forced to keep their faith hidden.
Amnesty International calls for repeal of Christians’ prison sentences 23 August 2018 News Clockwise from top-left: Hadi Asgari, Shamiram Issavi, Amin Afshar-Naderi and Victor Bet-Tamraz. Following the publication of numerous reports by Article18 on the violation of the rights of a group of Iranian Christians, Amnesty International today issued an urgent campaign for their sentences to be repealed. Amnesty International said the sentences against the pastor Victor Bet-Tamraz, his wife, Shamiram Issavi, and Christian converts Amin Afshar-Naderi and Hadi Asgari – of between five and 15 years in prison – were “solely for practising their Christian faith, including through attending Christmas gatherings and organising house churches. If imprisoned, they would be prisoners of conscience”. Amnesty said that in sentencing the Christians, the Iranian authorities had “cited peaceful activities such as holding private Christmas gatherings, organising and conducting house churches, and travelling outside Iran to attend Christian seminars, as ‘illegal church activities’ which ‘threaten national security’ in order justify their convictions”. They noted that the Christians, who are all currently on bail, are awaiting the results of their appeals. Amnesty appealed to its supporters to call for Iran to “stop the harassment, arbitrary arrest and detention, and imprisonment of Christians, including converts”. Victor was first arrested on 26 December 2014, along with Amin and another convert, Kavian Fallah-Mohammadi, as they celebrated Christmas together at the pastor’s home. After several months, they were released on bail, awaiting sentencing. Amin was then re-arrested on 26 August 2016, alongside Hadi and three others (including Victor’s son, Ramiel), at a private house in Firoozkooh, Tehran province. In July 2017, Branch 26 of the Tehran Revolutionary Court sentenced Victor, Hadi, Amin and Kavian to 10 years in prison each for “constituting a house church with the aim of disrupting the security of the country”. The same court sentenced Amin to five years’ extra imprisonment for “insulting Islamic sanctities”. Victor’s wife, Shamiram, was summoned to the prosecutor’s office in Evin Prison on 19 June 2017 and charged with crimes related to her Christian faith. In January 2018, Branch 26 of the Islamic Revolutionary Court of Tehran sentenced her to five years in prison for membership of a group that aimed to disrupt national security. Amnesty International called for its supporters to write to the Iranian authorities, demanding that they: “Respect the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion, including the freedom to have or to adopt or change a religion or belief of one’s choice, and freedom, either individually or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest one’s religion or belief in worship, observance, practice and teaching, as guaranteed under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Iran is a state party.” Supporters are told to send their protest letters to the head of the Iranian judiciary, the Tehran Public and Revolutionary Prosecutor, and the Deputy for Human Rights and International Affairs, before 4 October 2018. Mansour Borji, Article18’s advocacy director, welcomed Amnesty’s campaign, saying: “The protests of Iranian citizens and Christians throughout the world can be a positive step in a long road towards recovering the trampled rights of Christians and other religious minorities.” He added: “There are even more Christians – like Ebrahim Firouzi, Sevada Aghasar, Nasser Navard Gol-Tapeh, Yousef Nadarkhani, Mohammad Reza Omidi, Zaman (Saheb) Fadaie, Mohammad Ali Mossayebzadeh, and Majid Reza Souzanchi – who have been sentenced to 5-10 years in prison, and we also want to see them freed.”