http://www.assistnews.net/Stories/s04090075.htm
ASSIST News Service (ANS) - PO Box 2126, Garden Grove, CA 92842-2126 USA
E-mail: danjuma1@aol.com, Web Site: www.assistnews.net
Monday, September 13, 2004
MISSION ORGANIZATION URGES PRAYERS AS IRAN DETAINS PENTECOSTAL LEADERS
"Unsure of detainees welfare"
By: Stefan J. Bos
Special Correspondent, ASSIST News Service
SPRINGFIELD / TEHRAN (ANS) -- The mission organization of the world's largest Pentecostal denomination asked its supporters Monday, September 13, to pray for 10 church leaders in Iran who it said were arrested last week by Iranian security forces.
Springfield based U.S. Assemblies of God World Missions (AGWM) said it had been notified that the group was detained last week when a police raid interrupted a meeting of the Iran General Council of the Assemblies of God, reportedly in Karaj 20 miles (32 kilometers) west of the capital Tehran.
"Iranian brethren contacted AGWM to call the Body of Christ to prayer," said Mark Hausfeld, Area Director for AGWM's Central Eurasia Missions in a statement obtained by ASSIST News Service (ANS).
The Compass news agency reported earlier that initially 80 Pentecostal Christians were detained, blindfolded and separately interrogated by Iranian police late Thursday, September 9. While "most were released," the 10 leaders of Iran's Assemblies of God Executive Committee are still being held, added Hausfeld.
DETAINEES WELFARE UNKNOWN
He said his organization is "unsure of the detainees welfare" and that AGWM "is monitoring the situation while awaiting further word from experienced people concerning the best way to proceed."
Six ordained ministers were named among the prisoners, identified by their given names of Vartan, Soren, Harmik, George, Omid and Farhad. Another two men serving as pastors and two church elders were identified as Neshan, Hamid, Henry and Robert, Compass quoted Iranian sources as saying.
"This is the biggest crisis for evangelical believers in the country since three Protestant pastors were murdered 10 years ago," another unidentified Iranian Christian told Compass, which has close contacts with persecuted believers.
IRAN CALLED "THEOCRACY"
Human rights watchers have described Iran "as the world’s only theocracy," which forbids the activities of evangelical Christian citizens, closing down their churches and arresting known converts to Christianity.
Under Islamic law, apostates who leave Islam are subject to the death penalty.
Iran is one of the over 200 countries where AGWM claims to be represented by 4,000 people, including 1,900 appointed missionaries, 600 missionary associates and 1,500 missionary children. The Pentecostal denomination supporting AGWM has roughly 50 million members and adherents with 250,000 churches and preaching points worldwide, according to Assemblies of God estimates.
Read more on these and other news stories on news agency BosNewsLife at website http://www.bosnewslife.com
Award winning Journalist Stefan J. Bos was born on the 19th of September 1967 in a small home in downtown Amsterdam, in the Netherlands not far from the typewriter of his father, who was (and still is) a Reporter and ghostwriter. Already at a very young age Bos decided to become journalist and finally arrived in Hungary, the same country where his parents had smuggled Bibles during Communism.
Bos has traveled extensively to cover wars and revolutions throughout the region and received the Annual Press Award of Merit from the Hungarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs for his coverage about foreign policy affairs including Hungary's relationship with NATO and the European Union. Stefan J. Bos can be reached at: stefan@bosnewslife.com.
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