by Steve Dew-Jones | 19 Feb 2019 | Features
By Anahita Babmohammadi On 19 February 1979, just eight days after the revolution, Anglican pastor Arastoo Sayyah was brutally murdered in his church office in Shiraz. Rev Sayyah was the first of several church leaders murdered in Iran in the violent early...
by Steve Dew-Jones | 19 Feb 2019 | News
Shamiram Issavi’s appeal against her five-year jail sentence for “acting against national security” was postponed after a hearing today at Branch 26 of the Revolutionary Court in Tehran. The new presiding judge, Ahmad Zargar, appeared visibly confused at the details...
by Steve Dew-Jones | 18 Feb 2019 | News
The US secretary of state has highlighted the hypocrisy of top Iranian officials sending their children to schools in America while at the same time claiming that Iran offers its citizens all the freedom and opportunities they need. “You have the very people...
by Steve Dew-Jones | 17 Feb 2019 | News
A Tehrani woman who converted to Christianity has been told she could face a ten-year prison sentence for “disturbing public order, propagating Christianity and connecting with foreign entities”. Simin Soheilinia, 40, was arrested on 30 January and transferred to Evin...
by Steve Dew-Jones | 12 Feb 2019 | News
Three converts from Islam standing in for the imprisoned pastor Yousef Nadarkhani in leading services in their church in Rasht have been detained by officers from the Ministry of Intelligence. Abdolreza (Matthias) Ali-Haghnejad was arrested on Sunday, 10 February,...
by Steve Dew-Jones | 11 Feb 2019 | Analysis
By Mansour Borji When Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returned to Iran in February 1979 as the face of the Iranian Revolution, he found a nation longing for social justice, freedom and equality. In his initial speeches, the former exile rode this wave, speaking about...
by Steve Dew-Jones | 8 Feb 2019 | Analysis
By Fred Petrossian Despite four decades of state-run repression, Iran’s Christian community of just a few thousand Muslim converts in 1979 has grown to several hundred thousand, or even one million according to some sources. Churches have been closed down, the...
by Steve Dew-Jones | 4 Feb 2019 | News
Sixty-four-year-old Iranian Christian convert Esmaeil Maghrebinezhad has been released on bail after being charged with “propaganda against the state and insulting the sacred Iranian establishment”. Esmaeil, who was arrested on 25 January at his home in Shiraz, was...
by Steve Dew-Jones | 31 Jan 2019 | News
(Middle East Concern) A 61-year-old woman who converted to Christianity has been forced to visit an Islamic cleric to receive religious “instruction” and be offered the chance to revert to Islam. Rokhsareh (Mahrokh) Ghanbari has also been charged with “propaganda...
by Steve Dew-Jones | 30 Jan 2019 | News
The UK government today launched an independent review into the persecution of Christians globally. Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said the review would focus especially on “key countries” in the Middle East, Asia and Africa, where the severest persecution of...
