ALGERIA: CHRISTIAN CHARGED WITH EVANGELISM – AGAIN

Already twice convicted, church elder faces another trial tomorrow.

ISTANBUL, June 17 (Compass Direct News) – Convicted of blasphemy and evangelism in two separate cases this year, an Algerian Christian goes on trial in west Algeria for a third time tomorrow, again for evangelism. Rachid Muhammad Essaghir (previously reported as Seghir), 37, will be tried in Tissemsilt, 110 miles southwest of Algiers, for “distributing documents to shake the faith of Muslims.” An evangelist and church elder for a small community of Muslim converts to Christianity in Tiaret, Essaghir believes that local police have targeted him for his religious work. Officers stopped Essaghir and another Christian in the vicinity of Tissemsilt in June 2007 and discovered a box of Christian books in their car. The two men said they were transporting the literature from one church to another. Under Ordinance 06-03 passed in February 2006, Algerians can be fined up to 1 million dinars (US$16,405) and sentenced to five years in prison for printing, storing or distributing materials intended to convert Muslims away from Islam.

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ALGERIA: CHRISTIANS FOUND GUILTY OF PROSELYTIZING MUSLIMS

Four defendants receive fines and suspended sentences, two others acquitted.

ISTANBUL, June 3 (Compass Direct News) – An Algerian court gave four Christians suspended sentences and fines today for seeking to convert Muslims to Christianity, a Protestant church leader said. The case is one of several that have sparked local media and French government claims that Algeria is repressing its Christian minority, which numbers 10,000 according to conservative estimates. A court in Tiaret city, 150 miles southwest of Algiers, gave Rachid Muhammad Seghir a six-month suspended sentence and a 200,000-dinar (US$3,282) fine. He was originally charged with “distributing documents to shake the faith of Muslims.” Chabane Beikel, Abdelhak Rebeih and Djillali Saibi were each given two-month suspended sentences and 100,000-dinar (US$1,640) fines, according to Saibi. He said two other men on trial, Mohamed Khene and Abdelkader Hori, were acquitted. “[We] call on the highest authorities of the state to put an end to the persecution that targets the Christian community and to ensure its right to the free exercise of worship,” Mustapha Krim, president of the Protestant Church of Algeria, said in a statement following today’s ruling.