Several Christian converts go to prison to serve their sentences
A report by Jeffrey Cimino in the Washington Free Beacon
By a court ruling in Iran, four Christian converts who are members of the Church of Iran will soon begin their ten-year prison sentences on charges of promoting Zionist Christianity and running house churches.
According to World Watch, the court recently upheld the convictions of the four men, issuing them prison sentences that exceeded their expectations. They are expected to report to Rasht Prison in the coming days.
One of these individuals is Yousef Nadarkhani, a priest who has been repeatedly arrested by the Iranian government. Nadarkhani was sentenced to death about eight years ago. He was released from prison two years later but was briefly arrested again five years ago.
Nadarkhani and other church members, Mohammad Reza Omidi, Mohammad Ali Mosayibzadeh, and Zaman Fadaei, were arrested about two years ago while performing Christian rituals at a friend's house.
The most recent report by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom lists Iran as a country of particular concern due to its severe violations of religious freedom. The report estimates the number of Christians in Iran at 300,000. Christians in Iran suffer from various forms of persecution, including surveillance, restrictions on church building, and detention.
Sam Brownback, the US State Department's ambassador-at-large for international religious freedom, described the violations of religious freedom in Iran as appalling last week, while releasing the State Department's annual report on religious freedom for 2017.
Source: Voice of America
