Britannia Radio

Steel On Steel Persecution Update

February 24, 2010

          Edited by:  Donald McElvaney, www.missionbarnabas.org

Top Stories:   

     1.  Push for Islamic Courts in Kenya Alarms Christians
     2.  Assailant in Street Attack in Turkey Ordered Released
     3.  Baseless Case Against Turkish Christians Further Prolonged
     4.  Another Copt Killed as Alleged Shooters Plead Not Guilty in Egypt
     5.  Ethiopian Authorities Concoct New Charge against Christian
     6.  Pakistani Christian Beaten for Refusing to Convert to Islam
     7.  Anti-Christian Sentiment Marks Journey for Bhutan’s Exiles
     8.  Turkish Court Pushes to Close Malatya Murder Case


1.   Push for Islamic Courts in Kenya Alarms Christians

Emergence of Somali-related Islamic extremists puts authorities on high alert.

By Simba Tian

NAIROBI, Kenya, February 11 (Compass Direct News) – A constitutional battle to expand the scope of Islamic courts in Kenya threatens to ignite religious tensions at a time when authorities are on high alert against Muslim extremists with ties to Somalia. Constitutional provisions for Islamic or Kadhis’ courts have existed in Kenya since 1963, with their jurisdiction limited to the coastal province, but in a hotly debated draft constitution they would expand across the nation and their scope would increase. The proposed constitution has gathered enough momentum that 23 leaders of churches and Christian organizations released a statement on Feb. 1 asserting their opposition to any inclusion of such religious courts. The heated debate erupted as security officials went on high alert when sympathizers of the Islamic terrorist al Shabaab militia appeared in a protest in mid-January to demand the release of radical Muslim cleric, Abdullah Al-Faisal, who entered the country on Dec. 31. Al-Faisal had been imprisoned from 2004 to 2008 after a British court convicted him of soliciting murder and inciting hatred. Eyewitnesses to the protests in Nairobi told Compass one demonstrator clad in fatigues with his face masked by a balaclava waved the black flag of Somalia’s al-Qaeda-linked al Shabaab militia and passed his finger across his throat in a slitting gesture, taunting passersby. Al Shabaab-affiliated operatives appear to have targeted Christians in Kenya, according to an Internet threat by a group claiming to align itself with the Islamic extremist militia seeking to topple the Transitional Federal Government in Somalia. In an e-mail message entitled, “Fatwa for Infidels” to Christian and governmental leaders in Kenya, a group calling itself the Harakatul-Al-Shabaab-al Mujahidin threatened to kill Muslim converts to Christianity and those who help them.


2.  Assailant in Street Attack in Turkey Ordered Released

Court ignores ‘religious hostility’ of Turk who held knife to Christian’s throat.

By Barbara G. Baker

ISTANBUL, February 12 (Compass Direct News) – An Istanbul court has ordered the release of a jailed Turk who publicly threatened and held a knife to the throat of a Christian he attacked six months ago. In a ruling on Wednesday (Feb. 10), the Kadikoy Seventh Court of First Instance convicted Yasin Karasu, 24, of making death threats and mounting an armed attack against Ismail Aydin. Shouting to attract passersby as he held a knife to Aydin’s throat on Aug. 3, Karasu had denounced the Christian as a “missionary dog” who had betrayed Turkey by leaving Islam and evangelizing others. The crime is punishable by four years in prison, but Justice Tahsin Dogan ruled that Karasu should be released unconditionally, without serving the remainder of his sentence. “It seems that the judge did not take into account at all that this crime was committed with religious hostility,” one member of the legal committee of Turkey’s Association of Protestant Churches told Compass. “That, in my view, should have aggravated the crime and sentence.”


3.  Baseless Case Against Turkish Christians Further Prolonged

Justice Ministry receives international inquiry about progress of trial.

By Barbara G. Baker

SILIVRI, Turkey, February 15 (Compass Direct News) – Barely five minutes into the latest hearing of a more than three-year-old case against two Christians accused of “insulting Turkishness and Islam,” the session was over. The prosecution had failed to produce their three final witnesses to testify against Hakan Tastan and Turan Topal for alleged crimes committed under Article 301 of the Turkish penal code. At the Jan. 28 hearing, the court issued instructions for one witness to testify at the next hearing, another to submit his “eyewitness” testimony in writing, and no further action was taken to summon the third witness. Judge Hayrettin Sevim informed the plaintiff and defense lawyers that recently his court had been requested to supply the Justice Ministry with a copy of relevant documents and details from the case file. An inquiry outside Turkey about the progress of the case, he said, prompted the request. Seven different state prosecutors have been assigned to the case since Prosecutor Ahmet Demirhuyuk declared at the fourth hearing in July 2007 that “not a single concrete, credible piece of evidence” had been produced to support the accusations against the Protestant defendants. After Demihuyuk recommended that the charges be dropped and the two Christians acquitted, he was removed from the case.


4.  Another Copt Killed as Alleged Shooters Plead Not Guilty in Egypt

Coptic carpenter killed outside building that Muslims feared would be used as church.

By Will Morris

ISTANBUL, February 16 (Compass Direct News) – Three men accused of killing six Coptic worshipers and a security guard pleaded not guilty on Saturday (Feb. 13) as the Coptic community mourned the loss of yet another victim of apparent anti-Christian violence. The three men allegedly sprayed a crowd with gunfire after a Christmas service in Nag Hammadi on Jan. 6. On the evening of Feb. 9, Malak Saad, a 25-year-old Coptic carpenter living in Teta in Menoufia Province, was walking outside a meeting hall that police had seized from Christians when he was shot through his chest at close range. He died instantly. Officials at the Interior Ministry said Saad was killed by mistake when a bullet discharged while a police guard was cleaning his weapon. The Interior Ministry said the shooter has been detained and will be tried in a military court. One of Saad’s cousins disputed the Interior Ministry’s version of the incident, saying the guard had used the bathroom inside the meeting hall and had come outside of the building when he exchanged a few words with Saad and shot him at close range. The building in question had been Coptic-owned for 16 years, but two days prior to the shooting, police seized it after a group of Muslims started a rumor that the owners planned to convert the hall into a church building. Following the Jan. 6 shootings, in a move that Christian leaders said was designed to silence the Coptic community’s protests, police went door to door and arrested Coptic men in their late teens and 20s. Reports vary widely on the numbers of how many men were arrested, but 15 arrests have been confirmed.
 

5.  Ethiopian Authorities Concoct New Charge against Christian

Holding convert from Islam without formal charges since May, police seek ‘terrorism’ evidence.

By Simba Tian

NAIROBI, Kenya, February 18 (Compass Direct News) – Prosecutors and police are trying to concoct a terrorism case against an Ethiopian convert from Islam who has been jailed since May without formal charges, Christian leaders said. Bashir Musa Ahmed, a 39-year-old Ethiopian national, was arrested on May 23 when police found him in possession of eight Bibles in Jijiga, capital of Ethiopia’s Somali Region Zone Five, a predominantly Muslim area in eastern Ethiopia. Zonal police arrested him after he was accused of providing Muslims with the Somali-language Bibles, sources said, though Ethiopia’s constitution protects such activity. A state official joined Christian leaders in stating that Islamist interests have kept Ahmed in jail in spite of the state’s failure to find any legitimate charge against him. Initially the Christian was arrested for “malicious” distribution of a version of the Bible that is widely available in Ethiopia and is commonly used by Somali Christians inside and outside of the country. Police have submitted the terrorism charge to prosecutors, prompting the prosecutors last month to ask police to find some evidence for the accusation, according to a church leader. “Police have submitted their investigation results to the prosecutor’s office accusing Bashir of terrorism,” said the church leader. “We heard that the prosecutors asked police to solidify their accusations with evidences of Bashir’s connections [to a terrorist group, and to specify] which terrorist group. Prosecutors seem to feel they need to have some evidence to charge him with terrorism.”
 

6.  Pakistani Christian Beaten for Refusing to Convert to Islam

Brothers converted by Muslim cleric who raised them leave him for dead.

By Jawad Mazhar

KALLUR KOT, Pakistan, February 22 (Compass Direct News) – The four older Muslim brothers of a 26-year-old Christian beat him unconscious here earlier this month because he refused their enticements to convert to Islam, the victim told Compass. Riaz Masih, whose Christian parents died when he was a boy, said his continual refusal to convert infuriated his siblings and the Muslim cleric who raised them, Moulvi Peer Akram-Ullah. On Feb. 8, he said, his brothers ransacked his house in this Punjab Province town 233 kilometers (145 miles) southwest of Islamabad. “They threatened that it was the breaking point now, and that I must convert right now or face death,” Masih said. “They said killing an infidel is not a sin, instead it’s righteousness in the sight of Allah almighty.” He said Akram-Ullah and his brothers offered him 1 million rupees (US$11,790), a spacious residence and a woman of his choice to marry in order to lure him to Islam, but he declined.  The Muslim cleric had converted Masih’s brothers and sisters in like manner, according to human rights organization Rays of Development (ROD), which has provided financial, medical and moral support to Masih. Adnan Saeed, an executive member of ROD, told Compass that when Masih’s parents passed away, Masih and his siblings were tenants of Akram-Ullah, who cared for them and inculcated them with Islamic ideology. ROD began assisting Masih after a chapter of the Christian Welfare Organization (CWO) brought the injured Christian to ROD. A spokesman for CWO who requested anonymity told Compass that Akram-Ullah had offered Masih’s brothers and sister a large plot of residential land, as well as 500,000 rupees (US$5,895) each, if they would recite the kalimah, the profession of faith for converting to Islam.
 

7.  Anti-Christian Sentiment Marks Journey for Bhutan’s Exiles

Forced from Buddhist homeland, dangers arise in Hindu-majority Nepal.

By Sudeshna Sarkar

KATHMANDU, Nepal, February 23 (Compass Direct News) – Thrust from their homes in Bhutan after Buddhist rulers embarked on an ethnic and religious purge, Christian refugees in Nepal face hostilities from Hindus and others. In Sunsari district in southeastern Nepal, a country that is more than 80 percent Hindu, residents from the uneducated segments of society are especially apt to attack Christians, said Purna Kumal, district coordinator for Awana Clubs International, which runs 41 clubs in refugee camps to educate girls about the Bible. “In Itahari, Christians face serious trouble during burials,” Kumal told Compass. “Last month, a burial party was attacked by locals who dug up the grave and desecrated it.” Earlier this month, he added, a family in the area expelled one of its members from their home because he became a Christian. Bhutan began expelling almost one-eighth of its citizens for being of Nepali origin or practicing faiths other than Buddhism in the 1980s. The purge lasted into the 1990s. “Christians, like Hindus and others, were told to leave either their faith or the country,” said Gopi Chandra Silwal, who pastors a tiny church for Bhutanese refugees in a refugee camp in Sanischare, a small village in eastern Nepal’s Morang district. “Many chose to leave their homeland.”


8.  Turkish Court Pushes to Close Malatya Murder Case

Judges reject request to investigate links to suspected masterminds.

By Damaris Kremida

MALATYA, Turkey, February 24 (Compass Direct News) – On Friday (Feb. 19) judges eager to wrap up the trial over the murder of three Christians here rejected plaintiff appeals to investigate the suspected masterminds behind the stabbing deaths. At the 24th hearing regarding the 2007 murders of Turkish Christians Necati Aydin and Ugur Yuksel and German Christian Tilmann Geske in this city in southeastern Turkey, the prosecution demanded three life sentences without chance for parole for each defendant. Judges and prosecutors pushed for a conclusion to the case that has lasted nearly three years. In the last few weeks the Istanbul prosecutors sent a police report to Malatya’s Third Criminal Court linking the murders to a larger “deep state” operation led by a cabal of retired generals, politicians and other key figures called Ergenekon. The judges, however, rejected plaintiffs’ requests that the Malatya court further probe into the possible links between the two operations. “They requested the highest possible penalty, however, we are defeated in this case when we consider that these five guys are part of a bigger plan,” said plaintiff lawyer Murat Dincer in a press briefing after the hearing. If by the end of the Malatya murder case the Istanbul prosecutors have not outlined an action plan directing the court to pursue Ergenekon leads, plaintiff lawyers said they are ready to take the case to the Supreme Court of Appeals