http://www.jpost.com/International/Article.aspx?id=276623
Photo: Courtesy
Iran
Pastor facing death for apostasy
By
BENJAMIN
WEINTHAL, JERUSALEM
POST CORRESPONDENT
07/08/2012 02:15
Pastor
Youcef is scheduled to appear in court for unexplained hearing on September 8
after 1000 days in prison.
BERLIN – Iran has scheduled a September
court date for evangelical Pastor Youcef Nadarkhani, whose incarceration for
practicing Christianity reaches the 1,000-day mark on Sunday.
In an email to The Jerusalem Post on
Friday, Jordan Sekulow, executive director of the American Center for Law &
Justice, wrote, “We have confirmed that Pastor Youcef is scheduled to appear in
court on September 8. We do not know the purpose of the appearance or the
likelihood of new charges. We want to dispel any rumors that his current
apostasy charge, for which he was sentenced to death, has been removed. Until
the regime unconditionally exonerates and releases Pastor Youcef, his apostasy
charge stands.”
Related:
The center, which has been the
principal advocate of Nadarkhani’s release, is a US-based organization that
defends religious freedom.
“What we do know is this latest
development occurs just days before Sunday, July 8, which marks the 1,000th day
of captivity for Pastor Youcef. We will continue to closely monitor
developments surrounding this new court date and remain hopeful that growing international
attention ultimately will result in his unconditional release. Our
global support to free Pastor Youcef continues to grow. Our Tweet for
Youcef campaign now reaches more than 2.5 million people a day in more than 220
counties and territories,” Sekulow added.
The case of
Nadarkhani, 35, has shone a spotlight on the Iranian government’s intensified
campaign to shut down churches and imprison advocates of religious freedom.
Nadarkhani
attorney, Muhammad Ali Dadkhah, was issued a nine-year prison sentence and
prohibited from practicing law because of his work for religious freedom.
Markus Löning,
Germany’s federal commissioner for human rights, told the Evangelical Press
Service last week that there is strong persecution of ethnic and religious
minorities in Iran. Christians, Sufis, Bahais, Kurds and Ahwazi Arabs are
“victims of arbitrary Iranian Justice,” he said.
Nadarkhani was
arrested in 2009 because he questioned the mandatory Islamic education
of his children and sought to register a home-based church. The Iranian
authorities sentenced him to death in 2010 for apostasy.
In September
2011, Gholomali Rezvani, the deputy governor of Gilan province, said that
Nadarkhani “is a Zionist and has committed security-related crimes.”
The pastor was
born in born in Rasht, a city with a million inhabitants on the Caspian Sea in
Gilan province, where he was sentenced to death. Court documents
reveal that his conversion from non-practicing Muslim to Christianity was the
reason for the death sentence.
When asked
about reports that new allegations have been leveled, Sekulow wrote, “We have
no evidence the regime has changed or added new charges against Pastor Youcef.
Pastor Youcef was summoned to appear before the court on September 8, but no
rationale was given for this summons. It has always been a possibility that the
regime could bring new or additional charges against Pastor Youcef to justify
its actions. But to speculate that new, unconfirmed charges also means the
regime removed the threat of death creates a danger that the world will stop
paying attention.
"We have
no information that the regime has acquitted Pastor Youcef of the apostasy
charge for which he was sentenced to death. The Iranian regime has been
dishonest repeatedly in the past. Until we see Pastor Youcef walk freely, we
cannot trust anything the regime might say or do,” said Sekulow.
In an email to
the Post on Saturday, Jason DeMars, a representative of the Minnesota- based
Present Truth Ministries, wrote, “Our hope is that people around the world will
continue to tweet about and
share updates about Youcef and in so doing contact their elected officials and
ask them to continue to call for the release of Pastor Youcef.”
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