Iranian Christians deported back to Iran.
Updated: Aug 15
"The Trump administration’s deportation of more than a hundred Iranians held in ICE custody on a flight that touched down in Tehran on Sept. 29 includes Christian converts and other religious minorities who may face harsh penalties for their religious beliefs upon return to the Islamic Republic, advocates warned.... Among those deported were four women and a 72-year-old man who had lived in the United States for nearly 50 years,” said Pastor Ara Torosian in a Facebook post after the flight, in an account attributed to an anonymous witness on the flight. The Iranian-born evangelical Christian pastor has been protesting the detainment of several of his congregants for months. “The group included an estimated 15 Iranian Christian converts, along with political and ethnic asylum seekers,” Torosian wrote" (World & Way; Church Leaders).
"They deported my wife back to Iran even though she is a Christian," Ali says - the BBC has given him a pseudonym to protect the identity of him and his wife....Converts from Islam make up a significant share of Iran's estimated 800,000 Christian population, says Steve Dew-Jones of Article 18, a UK-based advocacy group that monitors violations against Christians in the country (BBC).
"Sitting on a bed in a hotel room surrounded by eight other people, including several children, she explains to the camera that they’re all Iranian Christians who journeyed to the U.S.-Mexico border near Tijuana to seek asylum – then were shackled and flown six hours in a military plane to Panama" (USA Today).
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