Scores arrested as Iran further cracks down on Christians
Some 25 people have been convicted this year, compared to 15 for the whole of last. Likewise, 58 people have been arrested in the first half of 2022, against 72 for the whole of 2021. Iranian authorities uses spurious charges to silence minorities, and arrest people on national security and espionage charges. Muslim converts and Farsi speakers are particularly targeted. For Muslims, joining another religion is strictly prohibited.
Tehran (AsiaNews) – Despite claims that religious freedom is protected in Iran, government repression against Christians (and others) is getting worse, following a recent wave of arrests and convictions that far exceeds what happened in the past.
So far in 2022, Iranian courts have sentenced 25 people, compared to 15 for the whole of 2021. In the first half of the year, at least 58 Christians have been arrested and detained, compared to a total of 72 last year.
Human rights groups have appealed to the international community, urging them not to “remain silent”. They note that Iranian authorities use spurious national security and espionage charges to “silence minorities” or “remove them from their homes and effectively force them into internal displacement.”
According to Article18, a London-based advocacy group, the government has shut down almost all Persian-language churches over the past decade, except those whose members were Christians before the 1979 revolution. New members “are strictly prohibited”.
The latest documented cases concern a 63-year-old man with advanced Parkinson's disease, arrested in mid-August with his wife, and another two in their 40s and 50s, detained in early September. All four were sent to the infamous Evin prison, just outside the capital, Tehran.
All of them were taken into custody because they were practising Christians, but for Iranian authorities only one of them, Joseph Shahbazian, a 58-year-old Iranian-Armenian, is as “true Christian” because of his “Christian” ethnicity. By contrast, the other three – Homayoun Zhaveh, his wife Sara and Malihe Nazari – are ethnic Persian, born Muslim. In the eyes of the government, they do not have the right to convert to other religions or practise them.
While Iranians of Armenian (and Assyrian) origin have some degree of freedom to worship in their respective churches, they cannot teach in Farsi (Persian), the national language, nor admit newcomers.
The crackdown that has led to an escalation in arbitrary arrests has prompted several human rights groups to sound the alarm about the fate of the country’s Christians, Baha'is, Gonabadi dervishes, and atheists.
Knowing how many Muslims have converted is hard to do. According to one estimate, perhaps as many as a million have embraced Christianity. What is certain though is that they have no place to worship or simply meet, and are often forced to pray and hold their services in private homes (house churches), which exposes them to police raids.
In 2010, Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, spoke about the house churches, calling them “fake schools of mysticism” that must be pursued as “enemies of Islam” since their aim is “undermining religion in society”
In doing so, Khamenei has legitimised the crackdown and more arrests, something directly connected to the fate of Joseph, Malihe, Homayoun and Sara, the latest Iranian Christians to be arrested, charged and jailed for attending a house church.
For his “crime”, the Iranian-Armenian man will serve up to 10 years in prison; Sara, eight; Malihe, six; and Homayoun, two.
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09/11/2022 17:18
