Afrol News - Believers Detained in Eritrea
June 19, 2008 | Filed Under Recommended Reading
Well, Eritrea is certainly one country I wouldn’t want to visit! Many of my brothers there are suffering terribly. Here is a recent news report from afrol News:
A US government report on “International Religious Freedom” reflects that citizens generally were tolerant of one another in the practice of their religion, with the exception of societal attitudes toward Jehovah’s Witnesses and Pentecostal groups. The government requires citizens to perform national service in the military or face incarceration, but it had no programmes for alternative national service that would permit Jehovah’s Witnesses and others whose faith precludes military service to satisfy the requirement. Some individuals who viewed failure to perform military service as a sign of disloyalty encouraged harassment of these religious groups and therefore reported their activities to the government.
Older articles on Afrol news include:
Torture fears for Eritrean Jehovah’s Witnesses
Amnesty says it has information that three Jehovah’s Witnesses “have been detained incommunicado in Sawa military training centre in western Eritrea since 1994, without charge or trial, for refusing to bear arms.”
Eritrea dismisses US report on religious freedom
Some Jehovah’s Witnesses members were said by the US report to have been detained for more than eight years, although the maximum penalty for refusing to perform national service is three years. Further, members had been evicted from government-owned housing and denied passports, identity cards and exit visas, according to the US report.
Comments
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
