In the town of El Gadarif, on Sudan’s eastern border with Ethiopia, another Christian woman has been incarcerated in April under suspicion of having left Islam.
Immigration/Citizenship police questioned Faiza Abdalla, 37, as she was going to obtain her national identification number at an official building in El Gadarif on April 2. When she responded to officers’ questions about her religion that she was a Christian, they immediately arrested her based on her Muslim name, he said.
Her family had converted to Christianity from Islam before she was born but kept their former name, the source said. ‘They arrested me because I am a Christian’, said Abdalla, originally from an area in Sudan’s Nuba Mountains, where her parents raised her in an evangelical church.
A court terminated Abdalla’s marriage to her husband, a lifelong Catholic from South Sudan, on grounds that she had committed ‘adultery’ by allegedly having left Islam and married a Christian. Abdalla’s husband fled the country two years ago because of persecution.
Looking to human rights groups
Immigration/Citizenship officials, who are responsible for issuing national IDs, routinely search for those who have left Islam to arrest and force them to return to the religion, the source said. ‘Faiza Abdalla is a Christian, and her husband is a catechist’, said a Christian in Al Gaderif who grew up with her in the same community.
Church leaders and Christian activists in Al Gaderif went to police to ask for the release of Abdalla, without success, the source said. Church leaders in the town say they are upset by a new wave of persecution against Christians.
‘We are asking all human rights groups and humanitarian groups to intervene against such acts’, said one church leader, who asked to remain anonymous.
