Iran's President: "I will stop
Christianity in this country"
Compass Direct: Global News from the Frontline
December, 2005
An Iranian convert to Christianity was kidnapped last week from his
home in northeastern Iran and stabbed to death, his bleeding body
thrown in front of his home a few hours later. Ghorban Tori, 50,
was pastoring an independent house church of convert Christians in
Gonbad-e-Kavus, a town just east of the Caspian Sea along the
Turkmenistan border.
Within hours of the November 22 murder, local secret police arrived
at the martyred pastor's home, searching for Bibles and other
banned Christian books in the Farsi language. By the end of the
following day, the secret police had also raided the houses of all
other known Christian believers in the city.
According to one informed Iranian source, during the past eight
days representatives of the Ministry of Intelligence and Security
(MOIS) have arrested and severely tortured 10 other Christians in
several cities, including Tehran. All the detainees have since been
released.
One of the arrested Christians was reportedly interrogated about
his involvement in relief work after Iran's deadly Bam earthquake
in December 2003. Another working with a legal organization
defending human rights was accused of using it as a "cover" for
church activities.
In addition, MOIS officials have visited known Christian leaders
since Tori's murder and have instructed them to warn acquaintances
in the unofficial, Protestant house fellowships that "the
government knows what you are doing, and we will come for you
soon."
A former Muslim of Turkmen descent, Tori had converted to
Christianity more than 10 years ago, while in Turkmenistan.
After he returned to his native Iran in 1998, Tori began to share
his new Christian faith with friends and relatives. Within two
years, a small fellowship of 12 believers was meeting in his
home.
But not all welcomed his message; at least one relative attacked
Tori, scarring his face. In the past year he received several
threats from Islamic extremists vowing to kill him if he did not
stop sharing his Christian faith.
Tori is survived by his wife and four children, ages 3 to 23.
He is the fifth Protestant pastor assassinated in Iran by
unidentified killers in the past 11 years. Three of the five were
former Muslims, under Iranian law subject to the death penalty for
having committed apostasy.
Tori's murder came just days after Iran's new hard-line President
Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called an open meeting with the nation's 30
provincial governors. During the session, an Iranian source told
Compass, Ahmadinejad declared that the government needed to put a
stop to the burgeoning movement of house churches across
Iran.
"I will stop Christianity in this country," Ahmadinejad reportedly
vowed.
"This was apparently a green light from the president of Iran to go
out and start killing Christians," the source said.
Slurring Non-Muslims
Last week a Zoroastrian representative in the Iranian Parliament
protested a slur against non-Muslims on November 20 by a top aide
to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, supreme leader of the Islamic Republic
of Iran.
According to the government-run Entekhaab website, in a public
speech Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati told youthful Basijis (members of a
volunteer militia formed to enforce strict Islamic codes) preparing
to join suicide missions that "non-Muslims are sinful animals who
roam the earth and engage in corruption." Jannati, who is secretary
general of the powerful Guardian Council, is known to be a mentor
and close advisor to Ahmadinejad.
Iranian Member of Parliament Kurosh Niknam declared the comment,
"an unprecedented insult to religious minorities."
Over the past month, Ahmadinejad has conducted a broad shake-up
within the government establishment, replacing hundreds of
governors, ambassadors and senior ministry officials with young and
mostly inexperienced Islamists. Yesterday students at Tehran
University protested noisily when a religious cleric without even a
high school diploma was appointed rector of the nation's oldest
university.
In November, the new director of prisons also transferred a number
of political prisoners of conscience into criminal wards with
convicted murderers and drug dealers. At least one of these
political prisoners has been killed by fellow inmates, sparking the
fears of Iranian Christians for the security of Hamid Pourmand,
serving a three-year sentence at Tehran's Evin Prison for refusing
to renounce his conversion to Christianity.
END
