Pastor in South Sudan Jailed, Lashed after Radical Muslims Threaten Him

Pastor in South Sudan Jailed, Lashed after Radical Muslims Threaten Him
By Dan Wooding, Founder of ASSIST and the ASSIST News Service
JUBA, SOUTH SUDAN (ANS – March 28, 2015) -- A Sudanese pastor in South Sudan was jailed and tortured for more than three months after Islamists who tried to kill him accused him of being a spy, sources said.
According to the Sudan correspondent for Morning Star News (http://morningstarnews.org), Adam Haron, a 37-year-old convert from Islam and a native of West Darfur, Sudan, said Muslim extremists called him on Nov. 9 and 10 threatening to kill him if he continued to proclaim Christ among Muslims in Aweil, near the
Sudanese border.
“This pastor of a church in an undisclosed area of South Sudan, Haron had gone to Aweil, about 800 kilometers (500 miles) northwest of the capital city of Juba, to plant a church,” said the story.
“Evangelism is not illegal in South Sudan, where Christians outnumber Muslims, and the Transitional Constitution following the country’s secession from Sudan in 2011 guarantees religious freedom, including the right to propagate one’s faith.”
Haron said he knew the Muslims who threatened him as they were from his home region of West Dafur. The following day they tried to kill him when a Land Cruiser with no license plate nearly ran him over, he said.
Morning Star news went on to say that Haron, who came to South Sudan in 2010 after converting to Christianity in 2005, said that three days later six armed men, including three in military uniform, entered his hotel room in Aweil and started to search his personal bag and laptop and scattered his clothes around. They also took his cell phone.
As the armed men ordered him to get into their car, they began kicking his legs and groin, he said.
“Thank God, who protected me from serious injury from them,” he said.
One of the assailants took out a pistol, pointed it at Haron’s head, and asked him if he was a Christian pastor. He answered, “Yes, I am a pastor,” and they took him to a detention center in Aweil, he said.
The story then stated that Haran said the three men in uniform were military intelligence personnel. Based on a military officer’s interrogation of him, he concluded that the radical Muslims had the military personnel arrest him after falsely accusing him of being a spy for Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir’s National Congress Party.
On Nov. 15, two soldiers gave him 364 lashes using a tree branch as a whip, he said.
“We will beat you every Saturday in this way,” one of them told him during the lashing.
Haron told Morning Star News that he was encouraged because he was considered worthy to suffer for his faith and replied, “I am ready to die for the sake of the gospel.”
They threw him into a narrow cell, his legs bound with chains, he said. On Jan. 3 he was transferred to another jail cell. He was released on Feb. 18.
In the course of his incarceration, those who arrested Haron stole 2,600 South Sudanese Pounds (US$820) from him, he said.
Morning Star News then continued, saying Haron, who pastors an underground church made up primarily of converts from Islam, said he was gratified that the mistreatment tested his faith.
“This detention has been a great encouragement to my spiritual life,” he said.
Pastors Held in Sudan
In the Sudanese capital of Khartoum, two pastors of South Sudanese descent continue to languish in prison following their arrests in December and January.
Officials from Sudan’s National Intelligence and Security Services (NISS) are demanding that the Rev. Peter Yein Reith and the Rev. Yat Michael pay $12,000, but even that may not guarantee their release, sources said.
Morning Star News said that Reith, from Khartoum but of South Sudanese descent, was arrested on Jan. 9 and is being held without charges. NISS officials arrested Michael, a visiting South Sudanese pastor from Juba, after Sunday worship at Khartoum Bahri Evangelical Church on Dec. 21. He also has been held without
charges.
Juba Mountain Bombing
“Bashir’s regime, meantime, continues to bomb civilian targets in its war with rebels in the Nuba Mountains of South Kordofan state,” said the Sudan correspondent.
“On March 11 at 2 p.m., Russian-made Sukhoi jets bombed Tanase village, Bram County, wounding a 15-year-old girl, an area source told Morning Star News.
Saloom Habil Tiya of the Sudanese Church of Christ was walking near her home when the bomb landed a short distance away.
The source said the girl was seriously injured, adding that there is no military installation near the area.
“We hope the international community will pay attention to the crimes committed,” the source concluded.
Photo captions: 1) Christians going to church in South Sudan. 3) Homes ablaze in Kordofan (Photo courtesy of Operation Broken Silence), 3) Inmates in a South Sudan prison. 4) Sudan's President Omar Hassan al-Bashir.
Note: You are welcome to republish this or any of our stories with attribution to the ASSIST News Service (www.assistnews.net)
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