Steel On Steel Persecution Update
June 16, 2010
Edited by: Donald McElvaney, www.missionbarnabas.org
Top Stories:
1. Christian Professor in Pakistan Beaten for Refusing to Convert
2. ‘Blasphemy Laws’ Used to Jail Elderly Christian
3. Morocco Continues to Purge Nation of Foreign Christians
4. Indonesian Muslims Call for Halt to ‘Christianization’
5. Conviction of Legislator in India Falls Short of Expectations
6. Sealed Church in Bogor, Indonesia Appeals to UN
7. Muslim Mob Kills Wife, Children of Christian in Pakistan
1. Christian Professor in Pakistan Beaten for Refusing to Convert
In another province, three eighth-grade students expelled for declining Islam.
By John Little
PESHAWAR, Pakistan, June 25 (Compass Direct News) – Muslim students attacked a Christian professor at the Peshawar University College this month after he refused their demand to convert to Islam, the instructor told Compass. Psychology professor Samuel John, a father of four who has been teaching at the university for 12 years, said that as he came out of his house on the university campus at 8:30 a.m. on June 14, about 20 to 25 students rushed and assaulted him. When his wife learned what was happening she ran to help him, but the students beat her as well. Both John and his wife were rushed to Lady Reading hospital, where they were treated for their injuries, with John listed in critical condition. “I am still getting threats,” the professor told Compass. “They say, ‘Leave the university or accept Islam – if you don’t convert, we will kill your family.” Police have refused to register a First Information Report on the incident, he said. Separately, in Danna village in southern Punjab Province, Muslim administrators told three Christian students in the eighth grade to leave the school because they refused to convert to Islam. A new teacher of Islamic Studies at Government High School Danna urged students in his class, Sunil Masih, Shazia Masih and Nasir Naeem, to convert to Islam, the father of Sunil, Ejaz Masih, told Compass. The parents complained to the principal, who told them, under pressure from other teachers, to remove their children from the school, Masih said. The families have fled the area with their children.
2. ‘Blasphemy Laws’ Used to Jail Elderly Christian
Muslim vying for same piece of land as Christian accuses him of speaking ill of Muhammad.
By Thomas Kelly
FAISALABAD, Pakistan, June 29 (Compass Direct News) – A Muslim vying with a Christian for a parcel of land here has accused the elderly man of “blaspheming” Islam’s prophet Muhammad, which is punishable by death or life imprisonment, according to the Christian Lawyers’ Foundation (CLF). Jhumray police on June 19 arrested Rehmat Masih of village No. 165/RB Jandawali in Faisalabad district under Section 295-C of Pakistan’s controversial “blasphemy laws,” and he was sent to Faisalabad District Jail on judicial remand by Magistrate Muhammad Sajawal. Christian sources said Masih, who suffers from arthritis, is 85 years old, though the First Information Report against him lists his age as 73. The CLF’s Rai Navid Zafar Bhatti told Compass that hard-line Muslim Muhammad Sajjid Hameed filed the charges after learning that he would not be able to secure the Punjab Province land. CLF President Khalid Gill said local Christian residents led by Masih had applied to the Punjab government to secure the land for construction of a Christian residential area, and Hameed had applied for the same parcel for commercial projects. Masih had argued with Hameed and other Muslims about the Virgin Mary in April. Hameed has testified in court that Masih made derogatory remarks about Muhammad and Khadija, the first wife of the founder of the religion, Bhatti said. Gill said Masih has testified that he said nothing “humiliating” about Muhammad or Khadija. “I am not a blasphemer, nor I can think of such a sinister thing, which is against the teachings of Christ,” Masih testified, according to Gill.
3. Morocco Continues to Purge Nation of Foreign Christians
New wave of deportations raises concerns for foreigners married to Moroccans.
Special to Compass Direct News
ISTANBUL, July 1 (Compass Direct News) – Moroccan authorities expelled eight more foreign Christians from the country last weekend, bringing the total of deported Christians since March to 128. Two foreign women married to Moroccan Christians were included in this third wave of deportations since March, raising concerns that local authorities intend to harass the country’s small but growing Protestant community. “They are all in fear,” a source told Compass, “because this happened to people who are married.” One of the women, a Lebanese national married to a Moroccan, was diagnosed with cancer last month and is the mother of a 6-year old girl whom she was forced to leave behind. A Spanish national, Sara Domene, 31, was also deported on Monday (June 28), according to news sources. Domene was working as a language teacher in the Western Sahara, a territory under Moroccan sovereignty. Authorities called the foreigners to police stations across Morocco on Friday (June 25) and told them they had 48 hours to leave the country on grounds of “threatening public order.” Other nationals who were forced to leave the country over the weekend came from France, Egypt, Lebanon, Switzerland, Nigeria and Spain. A source explained that Moroccan authorities are essentially deporting Christians for “proselytism,” which is illegal in Morocco, but in order to justify the deportations they have claimed that the foreigners pose a threat to the state. The deportations come amid a nationwide mudslinging campaign geared to vilify Christians in Morocco for “proselytism” – widely perceived as bribing people to change their faith.
4. Indonesian Muslims Call for Halt to ‘Christianization’
Forum highlights religious tensions in Bekasi, West Java.
By Sarah Page
DUBLIN, July 2 (Compass Direct News) – Muslim organizations in Bekasi, West Java, on Sunday (June 27) declared their intention to establish paramilitary units in local mosques and a “mission center” to oppose “ongoing attempts to convert people to Christianity,” according to the national Antara news agency. At a gathering at the large Al Azhar mosque, the leaders of nine organizations announced the results of a June 20 meeting of the Bekasi Islamic Congress, where they agreed to establish a mission center to halt “Christianization,” form a Laskar Pemuda youth army and push for the implementation of sharia (Islamic law) in the region, The Jakarta Post reported. “If the Muslims in the city can unite, there will be no more story about us being openly insulted by other religions,” Ahmad Salimin Dani, head of the Bekasi Islamic Missionary Council, announced at the gathering. “The center will ensure that Christians do not act out of order.” Observing an increasing number of house churches, Muslim organizations have accused Bekasi Christians of aggressive proselytizing. The Rev. Simon Timorason of the West Java Christian Communication Forum (FKKB), however, told Compass that most Christians in the area do not proselytize and meet only in small home fellowships due to the lack of officially recognized worship venues. Many Christian seminary graduates prefer to remain on Java rather than relocate to distant islands, Timorason added, making West Java the ideal place to launch new home-based fellowships for different denominations. But neighbors see only the multiplication of churches, he said, and therefore suspect Muslims are converting to Christianity. “The ideal solution is to have one building with a permit to be used by different denominations in each housing complex,” Timorason said. “If every denomination wants their own church in the same area, it’s a problem.”
5. Conviction of Legislator in India Falls Short of Expectations
In murder of Christian, Hindu nationalist sentenced to seven years for causing ‘grievous hurt.’
By Shireen Bhatia
NEW DELHI, July 2 (Compass Direct News) – Christians in Orissa state had mixed feelings about the sentencing on Tuesday (June 29) of state legislator Manoj Pradhan to seven years in prison for causing grievous hurt and rioting – but not for murder. “Pradhan is not convicted of murder, but offenses of voluntarily causing grievous hurt by dangerous weapons and rioting were upheld,” attorney Bibhu Dutta Das told Compass. Kanaka Rekha Nayak, widow of murdered Christian Parikhita Nayak, acknowledged that the judgment on Pradhan and fellow Hindu nationalist Prafulla Mallick did not meet her expectations. She said she was happy that Pradhan was finally behind bars, but that she “expected the court to at least pronounce life imprisonment on Pradhan and Mallick for the gruesome act that they committed.” Pradhan has been charged in 14 cases related to the August-September 2008 attacks on Christians in Kandhamal district, Orissa, of which he has been acquitted in seven and convicted of causing “grievous hurt” in the Nayak murder, with six more cases pending against him. Of the 14 cases in which he has faced charges, seven involved murder; of those murder cases, he has been acquitted in three. After a series of trials in which murder suspects in the 2008 Kandhamal district violence have gone free as Hindu extremist threats kept witnesses from testifying, the testimony of Nayak’s 6-year-old daughter, Lipsa Nayak, helped seal Pradhan’s conviction. Along with the seven years of prison, the Phulbani Court sentenced the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party member of the Legislative Assembly of Orissa to a fine of little more than US$100, as it did for Mallick. “I have the highest regard for the judiciary,” Pradhan told Press Trust of India after this week’s verdict. “We will appeal against the verdict in the higher court.”
6. Sealed Church in Bogor, Indonesia Appeals to UN
In Bekasi, another church is shuttered – again.
By Victor R. Ambarita
JAKARTA, Indonesia, July 6 (Compass Direct News) – The Gereja Kristen Indonesia (GKI) Taman Yasmin Church in Bogor, West Java has filed a religious discrimination appeal with the United Nations Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief, church leaders said. Since April 11 the congregation has held services in stifling heat on the roadside in front of the church sealed by the mayor. The church pastor, the Rev. Ujang Tanusaputra, told Compass that the church had received an official building permit from the Bogor City government. He said that even though the church brought suit against the sealing in court – and won – the congregation is not permitted to worship in the building, which is 80 percent completed. Construction was going smoothly until a Muslim group began demonstrating and the government sealed the building to appease them. Jayadi Damanik, a member of the church’s legal team, said the government wants people to obey the law, yet the government itself is not respecting the rule of law. In Bekasi, government officials on June 20 sealed the house where the Huria Kristen Batak Protestan Podok Timur Indah Church was meeting. The church pastor, the Rev. Luspida Simanjuntak, said the church that was meeting in Mustika Jaya district had attempted talks with the government, but pressure from Islamic organizations, including the Islamic Defenders’ Front, was so strong that the government could not stand up to it. The church has been meeting in the house as the local government has delayed the processing of its application for a building permit.
7. Muslim Mob Kills Wife, Children of Christian in Pakistan
Fearing local religious leader, area police refuse to file murder complaint.
By John Little
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, July 8 (Compass Direct News) – A Muslim mob in Jhelum, Pakistan murdered the wife and four children of a Christian last month, but local authorities are too afraid of the local Muslim leader to file charges, according to area Muslim and Christian sources. Jamshed Masih, a police officer who was transferred 50 kilometers (31 miles) from Gujrat to Jhelum, Punjab Province, said a mob led by Muslim religious leader Maulana Mahfooz Khan killed his family on June 21 after Khan called him to the local mosque and told him to leave the predominantly Muslim colony. Masih’s Muslim neighbor, Ali Murtaza, said that after a shopkeeper refused to sell laundry detergent to Masih’s oldest son, 11, Khan led a Muslim mob to Masih’s home and confronted his wife. The mob accused the boy of blaspheming Muhammad, the prophet of Islam, and when she protested, they killed her and her children. When Masih tried to file a complaint against Khan for the murder, Station House Officer (SHO) Ramzan Mumtaz refused to do so, according to Murtaza and Presbyterian clergyman Saleem Mall. Murtaza said, “The SHO just said, ‘I am a poor man, I have a family, and I was pressured by higher authorities not to register the FIR as Khan is a very influential man. I am sorry; I don’t have anything in my hands.’” Contacted by Compass, SHO Mumtaz confirmed that he responded to the request to file the complaint against Khan in these exact words. Masih has filed a complaint with the chief minister of Punjab Province begging him for justice, Mall told Compass.
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