Free Republic

Capital city of nearby country becomes haven for converts—even though denied refugee status. The New York Times sheds fresh light on the challenges faced by Afghan Christians seeking religious freedom, spotlighting the growth of a refugee church in India's capital city, New Delhi. As the Times observes in a report worth reading, more than 200 Christian converts from Muslim backgrounds have fled to New Delhi, seeking refuge from the Taliban and from political backlash after television coverage resulted in one Afghan politician's urging the government to execute converts in 2010. As CT noted in July 2010, the Afghan government also...

(CNSNews.com) -- There is not a single, public Christian church left in Afghanistan, according to the U.S. State Department. This reflects the state of religious freedom in that country ten years after the United States first invaded it and overthrew its Islamist Taliban regime. In the intervening decade, U.S. taxpayers have spent $440 billion to support Afghanistan's new government and more than 1,700 U.S. military personnel have died serving in that country. The last public Christian church in Afghanistan was razed in March 2010, according to the State Department's latest International Religious Freedom Report. The report, which was released last...

The life of an Afghan Christian By Bill Connor Wednesday, July 16, 2008 During a two-week combat operation in Helmand Province, Afghanistan, I had the honor of befriending an Afghan Christian. As you will discover in his story, being a Christian in Afghanistan is quite dangerous and hard. To protect his identity I will call this man “Paul” to limit what he already faces on account of his faith. Interestingly, when I first arrived in Southern Afghanistan, some Afghan Muslims told me there were no Afghan Christians. That they sincerely believed this was quite telling about the numbers of Afghan...

But is he sane? What difference does it make? Rome, Apr. 03, 2006 (Catholic News Agency) - Abdul Rahman, the Afghan Christian convert who was condemned to death for abandoning the Muslim faith but later released under international pressure, publicly thanked Pope Benedict XVI for his intervention and his support. According to the ANSA news agency, Abdul Rahman, who was granted asylum in Italy, said he never wants to return to his native Afghanistan. “I thank the Pope, the Italian government and all those who came to my aid,” he said during an interview on Italian television. Pope Benedict XVI...

< Afghan Clerics Issuing Threats Afghan spokesmen for the Religion of Peaceâ„¢ are threatening violence unless they get to kill Christian convert Abdul Rahman. (Hat tip: Killian Bundy.) MAZAR-I-SHARIF, Afghanistan (Reuters) - Afghan clerics and their followers threatened violence against the government on Sunday over the release of a Christian convert, saying he had to be brought back from Italy and put on trial. There has been fiery criticism of the government over the release of the convert, who was spirited out of the country last week, but protests have been few and peaceful. The convert, Abdur Rahman, 40, was...

Afghan Christian learns firsthand about tyranny of majority It was Woodrow Wilson who first asserted that the United States must involve herself in overseas wars to "keep the world safe for democracy." The construction remains in style. Following the Sept. 11 terror attacks, the Bush administration, too, has justified military attacks overseas, designed to replace the oppressive governments of Afghanistan and Iraq, on the grounds that the world will be more stable, and America safer, if only we can install democracies in that benighted corner of the world. In Afghanistan we have succeeded. The government of President Hamid Karzai may...

For Afghanistan's tiny Christian community, a community certainly in the hundreds and probably the thousands, the Abdul Rahman case has brought both fear and hope. Mr Rahman is starting a new life in Italy after his trial in Afghanistan for converting from Islam collapsed. He faced the death penalty if he had been found guilty. In a house in Kabul, one of the city's Christian community described the ambivalent position they now find themselves in. The world now knows more of their existence. International pressure for increased religious tolerance, might, they hope, reduce their current vulnerability. 'Civil rights' But the...

KABUL, March 28 2006, (LifeSiteNews.com) – US-based Christian news source, Compass Direct, reports that more Christians have been arrested for their faith in Afghanistan in the wake of the release of Abdul Rahman. Compass, a news service that tracks persecution of Christians mostly in Islamic countries, says harassment of the Christian community has been stepped up. Compass says two more Christian converts have been arrested in other parts of the country, but further information is being withheld in the “sensitive situation” caused by the international media furor over Rahman. Reports of beatings and police raids on the homes of Christians...

You won’t find me criticizing President Bush often; I’m convinced he is God’s man for this time in our country and our world. However, when it comes to the travesty involving Muslim convert to Christianity Abdul Rahman, I have plenty of excoriation to carry Mr. Bush through the rest of his term. This recent and egregious violation of the highest of human rights—the right of religious conscience—nullifies any claim to “freedom” in the “new” Afghanistan. When I addressed this matter in a face-to-face with the European educated secular-minded Afghan ambassador, his response seemed dismissive of religion as something not worth...

An Afghan Christian leader in the U.S. has welcomed reports that criminal charges may be dropped against an Afghan convert who was threatened with execution for refusing to return to Islam. The case has prompted strong international condemnation. Hussain Andaryas said the publicity surrounding the Abdul Rahman case had resulted in a surge of interest in Christianity among Afghans, strong concern for the plight of Afghanistan's underground Christians -- and an antagonistic response from Muslims. On Sunday, Afghan officials were quoted as saying that Rahman would likely be released soon while the case against him was examined further. Reports said...

A monitor of Christian persecution says two more Afghan believers have been jailed in the wake of the case of Abdul Rahman, a convert to Christianity who faced the death penalty under the nation's Shariah law. According to Compass Direct, two other Afghan Christians were jailed in the past few days. "Because of the sensitive situation, local sources requested that the location of the jailed converts be withheld," the organization said. Compass Direct also reports that this past weekend, one young Afghan convert to Christianity was severely beaten outside his home by a group of six men who eventually knocked...

KABUL, Afghanistan, March 27, 2006 — - The case of Abdul Rahman, the Christian convert who faced a potential death penalty in Afghanistan, may have shocked Americans, but for thousands of Afghans, it was a glimpse of what could await them. Rahman is expected to be released and shuttled out of Afghanistan before any trial can resume, which would ease pressures on Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Diplomats and human rights workers say the backdrop to the case is a political struggle between Karzai, a U.S.-backed reformist, and conservative Muslim clerics ideologically close to the Taliban. Getting Rahman out of the...

In May 2003 a federal commission that advises the president and Congress on how best to promote religious liberty expressed grave reservations about how the Afghan judiciary would treat the crime of apostasy. "Afghan jurists have stated that apostasy from Islam would be considered a capital offense, but have intimated that ways would be found to avoid the death penalty," wrote members of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom.