ICC Note

In Sudan, after Pastor Hassan Abdulrahim and Darfur activist, Abdulmoneium Abdelmoula each received 12-year sentences for the charges of undermining the constitution, espionage, and spreading false information. However, on May 11th the two were pardoned by Sudan President Omar Al-Bashir after serving 17 months in prison. Although, these two were pardoned, the persecution of Christians in Sudan in still very prevalent and increasing. It is known that “Christians are not welcome in Sudan,” stated by Muhanad Nur, a defense lawyer in Sudan that routinely represents Christians in court. While they were released, these men and Christians in Sudan know they are still not free.

2017-05-31 Africa (All Africa) After spending 17 months in several prisons, the two were released early from a 12-year sentence facing charges of undermining the constitution, espionage and spreading false information, their defense lawyer Muhanad Nur told Nuba Reports.

Abdulrahim came out of Kober prison, a facility in the capital of Khartoum used to lock up opponents and terrorists alike. “It’s hard to remain in prison all that time, especially when we think about our families,” Abdulrahim told Nuba Reports. “But it was also a good experience for us – to help build up the church in prison and encourage parishioners.”

The targeting of churches and Christians up after South Sudan gained independence in 2011. Once the predominantly Christian South Sudanese populace seceded, those Christians remaining within the country had less institutional support and protection against state authorities. In April 2013, the Minister of Guidance and Endowments that no licenses would be granted for building new churches in Sudan, citing a decrease in the South Sudanese population. Two years later, government officials penalties for apostasy and blasphemy.

“Christianity is not welcome in Sudan,” said Nur who routinely defends Christian cases in court, including the Sudan apostasy hearings against , now in the United States. “It seems as if every week I am hearing about another case of Christians being persecuted here.”

In Nur’s latest , the accused’s sentences were largely based on their association with a Christian aid worker from the Czech Republic, Petr Jasek. Authorities arrested Jasek around the same time as Abdulrahim and Abdelmoula along with another Nuba pastor, Kuwa Shamal, who was released in late 2016 for lack of evidence.

In October 2016, state prosecutors video footage and photographs taken from Jasek’s laptop as evidence. The prosecutor’s case included footage Jasek took interviewing Christians in the Nuba Mountains. The state evidence also included evidence of the four suspects assisting a student and Christian convert who suffered skin burns from a teargas bomb during a 2013 university protest.

“They were monitoring me,” Jasek told Nuba Reports upon his . “They [Sudan’s security agents] showed photos of all the meetings I had with church members. There were even night photos -they were monitoring every step.”

But the heavy state surveillance hardly produced any criminal offence.

“Despite being locked up for over a year, the whole legal process was actually six months,” Jasek said. “It took them [state prosecutors] about three months to raise their concerns and then our lawyers were able to destroy their accusations in three hours.”

Despite a weak case against Jasek, Sudan only released him in February after a to Khartoum by the Czech Foreign Minister Lubomir Zaoralek.

All four faced considerable duress, shifting to several different prison facilities during their incarceration.

“I was in five different prisons in total,” Jasek said. “Usually the transfer meant that conditions were going to be even worse.”

At one state, Jasek was placed in a cell with Islamic State fighters who would beat and torture him. One of the fighters from Libya boasted that he had beheaded 20 Coptic Christians in Libya and carried a fishing line that “could kill anyone in seconds,” Jasek during a press conference after his release.

Just days before the president pardoned Abdelrahim and Abdelmoula, Khartoum state authorities destroyed another church 19 kilometers outside the capital in Soba al-Radi. Authorities under the Ministry of Planning and Development the church on a Sunday, May 7, as Christians prepared to worship. The government said in a statement the church was built on land allocated for residential use. The church is among 25 other churches the state has marked for demolition in a June 2016 letter, claiming they were all built on land zoned for other purposes.

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