the Sudanese capital Khartoum after the missing woman was found, BosNewsLife monitored Wednesday, May 24.
The woman, identified as Shiraz Feteh Rahman Bellula, had reportedly gone into hiding in March to escape physical abuse from her family for becoming a Christian.
Bellula turned herself in to Khartoum police on May 16, prompting the release of priest Elia Komondan and Catholic schoolteacher Anthony Gabriel, as well as four others, several sources said.
Church officials told reporters they were being targeted by the Islamist Khartoum government for religious reasons.
NO CHARGES
"[Rev. Komondan] was released on Thursday [May 18] without any charges," the priest’s lawyer Kulang Jeroboam reportedly said. Gabriel, a religion teacher at St. Peter and Paul Catholic School, also said that no charges had been brought against him.
Police arrested the two Sudanese Christians, along with two Jordanians, a friend of Bellula’s and another Catholic layperson, because Bellula’s mobile telephone records showed she had contacted them before disappearing in late March.
The Christians were taken into custody on May 14 in response to a kidnapping complaint filed by Bellula’s family, although police seemed more concerned that the missing woman had converted to Christianity, news reports said.
"VERY AGGRESSIVE"
"The security officer who was questioning us was very aggressive," Gabriel, 41, said in published remarks. "He said, ‘We know you have made her a Christian. It is all your responsibility, you contributed to her killing!’"
There was no immediate reaction to the allegations. But police officials told reporters that the woman was back with her family and that investigation into her kidnapping had been dropped.
Bellula’s family was reportedly forced to sign a statement that they would not mistreat her, but local Christians fear that document may not guarantee her safety. Priests have denied they put pressure on the woman or any other Muslim, saying converting to Christianity is "an individual responsibility."
CONTROVERSIAL ISSUE
Apostasy is a controversial issue within Islamic Sudan, where some scholars say it is punishable by death, while others believe in freedom of religion. In Sudan, under sharia law since 1983, politician Mahmoud Muhammed Taha was accused of apostasy and executed in 1985.
The church says Muslim converts to Christianity are often harassed by authorities and even tortured. Many are reportedly forced to flee the North African nation as their families threatened to kill them.
Sudan’s new constitution was created last year after a peace deal ended two decades of civil war between the mainly Christian and animist south and the northern Islamist government. Although it enshrines "freedom of religion," investigators remain concerned that the persecution of Christian converts will continue in Sudan as in criminal law converting to another religion remains forbidden.
Christians comprise roughly five percent of Sudan’s mainly Muslim population of over 41 million, according to US Central Intelligence (CIA) estimates. (With BosNewsLife Research and reports from Sudan).
