{"id":29207,"date":"2020-06-02T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-06-01T23:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/csw-yeo.1wp.site\/press\/four-christians-ordered-to-begin-prison-sentences-4680\/"},"modified":"2026-09-18T21:51:44","modified_gmt":"2026-09-18T20:51:44","slug":"four-christians-ordered-to-begin-prison-sentences-4680","status":"publish","type":"press","link":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/press\/four-christians-ordered-to-begin-prison-sentences-4680\/","title":{"rendered":"Four Christians ordered to begin prison sentences"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/e03729b80efafa72a4f244ea8344b4e9.jpg\" alt=\"\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><b>CSW\u2019s sources have confirmed that four Iranian Christians have been instructed by the authorities to present themselves at Evin prison in Tehran to begin serving five-year sentences.<\/b><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Hossein Kadivar, Khalil Dehghanpour, Kamal Naamanian and Mohammed Vafadar were arrested by members of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard in early 2019 during a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/2019\/03\/04\/presionar\/4237\/article.htm\/\">series of police raids<\/a> on house churches in Rasht. Five other Christians who were arrested at the same time have already begun serving their sentences, including <a href=\"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/2020\/03\/04\/presionar\/4569\/article.htm\/\">Pastor Matthias Haghnejad<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">During a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/2019\/07\/29\/presionar\/4421\/article.htm\/\">court hearing<\/a> on 24 July 2019, Judge Mohammed Moghisheh, who is notorious for miscarriages of justice, called the four men \u201capostates\u201d and argued that the Bible was \u201cfalsified.\u201d During <a href=\"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/2019\/10\/18\/presionar\/4480\/article.htm\/\">another hearing<\/a> on 23 September, the defendants\u2019 lawyer was allowed to speak briefly; however, Judge Mogisheh is reported not to have responded to his statement. The men were subsequently sentenced to five years in prison for \u201cendangering state security\u201d and \u201cpromoting Zionism.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">CSW\u2019s Chief Executive Mervyn Thomas said: <b><i>\u201cCSW condemns the decision to send these innocent men prison. The charges levelled against them are without substance, and their trial lacked transparency. We urge the Iranian authorities to immediately and unconditionally release them, and all others who are currently detained on excessive charges relating to their faith. We also call upon the Iranian administration, as a signatory to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to lift all restrictions imposed on freedom of religion or belief, and end its criminalisation of Christianity.\u201d<\/i><\/b><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>CSWs sources have confirmed that four Iranian Christians have been instructed by the authorities to present themselves at Evin prison in Tehran to begin serving five-year sentences.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":22182,"template":"","categories":[],"regions":[148,145],"class_list":["post-29207","press","type-press","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","regions-iran","regions-middle-east-north-africa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/press\/29207","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/press"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/press"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/press\/29207\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39791,"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/press\/29207\/revisions\/39791"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22182"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29207"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29207"},{"taxonomy":"regions","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.csw.org.uk\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/regions?post=29207"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}