Iran: Christian Man Sentenced to 10 Years in Prison for Alleged Proselytization
by Karen Faulkner, Worthy News Correspondent
(Worthy News) – A court of appeals in Iran has sentenced a Christian Armenian man to 10 years imprisonment for alleged “proselytizing,” Barnabas Aid reports.
Iranian intelligence officials arrested Armenian citizen Hakop Gochumyan and his wife in the summer of 2023 after finding them in possession of seven Farsi (Persian)-language New Testaments while on a visit to Iran. “During their vacation in Iran in August 2023, Hakop and Elisa were arrested while they and their children were having dinner at a friend’s house,” Barnabas Aid said in its report. “The house was raided by intelligence agents, who confiscated Christian books and arrested all the adults present in the house.”
The couple were charged with “engaging in deviant proselytizing activity that contradicts the sacred law of Islam” through “a network of evangelical Christianity,” Barnabas said. They were taken to the notoriously harsh Evin prison in Tehran to await trial: Elisa was granted bail two months later, but Hakop remained in custody.
Following the failure of his appeal, and despite a lack of evidence proving criminality, Hakop was sentenced to 10 years in prison under Iran’s Islamic Penal Code which allows judges to give sentences based on their “personal
intuition,” Barnabas Aid said.
“Please pray for Hakop and his family in this trying time, asking that God gives them strength and comfort,” Barnabas Aid requested in its report. “Pray that Hakop will remain strong in his faith and remember that God is always with him during his time in prison. Ask that more freedoms will be granted to Christians in Iran and that all further trials will be just and evidence-based.”
Ruled by a paranoid dictatorial Islamic extremist regime, Iran ranks nine on the Open Doors World Watch List 2024 of the top 50 countries where Christians are persecuted.
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