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********** UAE COURT GIVES FILIPINO PASTOR SUSPENDED SENTENCE Dubai Judge Dismisses One-Year Jail Term for Rev. Alconga by Barbara G. Baker

Summary: ISTANBUL, April 30 (Compass) — A criminal court in the United Arab Emirates has declared a Filipino pastor, Rev. Fernando Alconga, guilty of “abusing Islam” and conducting Christian missionary activity. Arrested five months ago for giving a Bible and Christian literature to an Arab Muslim at a Dubai shopping center, Alconga was held in jail for five weeks and charged with a felony for “preaching other than the Islamic religion,” as forbidden in the Federal Criminal Code. A total of eight court hearings were conducted in his trial, which opened on January 19. In the April 27 verdict, Chief Judge Mahmood Fahmi Sultan of the Dubai Criminal Court of First Instance suspended Alconga’s punishment because the court was of the opinion that the 54-year-old pastor would not repeat his crime. “In the long run, we are seeing God’s hand in this,” said Alconga, an ordained Conservative Baptist minister who has pastored congregations in the UAE for the past nine years. He had been scheduled to return to the Philippines in January with his family, where he was due to take up pastoral ministry in a Manila church.

Full Story: ISTANBUL, April 30 (Compass) — Five months after the Rev. Fernando Alconga was arrested for giving a Bible and Christian literature to an Arab Muslim at a Dubai shopping center, a criminal court in the United Arab Emirates has declared the Filipino pastor guilty of “abusing Islam” and conducting Christian missionary activity.

But in the verdict handed down on April 27, Chief Judge Mahmood Fahmi Sultan of the Dubai Criminal Court of First Instance suspended Alconga’s punishment, including a one-year prison sentence followed by mandatory deportation.

According to an article in today’s Gulf News, “The leniency was shown because the court was of the opinion that the 54-year-old would not repeat his crime.”

At the close of Sunday’s hearing, Alconga was advised by the court clerk that his case was closed. However, under Emirati law, the court’s verdict only becomes final after 15 days, during which period the chief prosecutor is allowed to appeal the decision.

The pastor said he expected his clearance formalities to be processed by mid-May, when the court would return his passport to him. “We have been waiting patiently and praying for the dismissal of the case,” Alconga told Compass from Dubai today. “In the long run, we are seeing God’s hand in this.”

Alconga had been scheduled to return with his family in January to the Philippines, where he was due to take up pastoral ministry in a Manila church. But after his arrest last November and subsequent release on bail December 17, his passport and that of another expatriate colleague were held on bond by the courts, requiring him to remain in the UAE until a judicial ruling was concluded on his case.

An ordained Conservative Baptist minister, Alconga has pastored congregations in the UAE for the past nine years. He was arrested at the car park of Dubai’s Al Bustan shopping center by plainclothes police on November 12, one day after he had given a packet of Christian materials to a passerby in the same car park.

After initial police interrogations, Alconga was held in jail custody for five weeks and then released on bail December 17. In formal charges filed against him a week later, the prosecution declared that Alconga had committed a felony by “preaching other than the Islamic religion,” as forbidden in Articles 121, 319 and 325 of the Federal Criminal Code.

A total of eight court hearings were conducted in his trial, which opened on January 19.

The sole prosecution witness was an Egyptian Muslim who had accepted a Bible and packet of Christian materials from Alconga the day before his arrest. Although the witness had filed a complaint against Alconga to the local police, he testified at a February 16 hearing that he had known the materials were Christian in content and had accepted them willingly when Alconga offered them to him.

On March 2, the court submitted the confiscated materials for evaluation to a panel of Islamic scholars to determine whether they “vilified the fundamental principles or teachings of the Islamic religion.”

According to a report from the Christian advocacy group Middle East Concern (MEC), the religious experts informed the court on April 6 that the materials were “acceptable for private use, but not for distributing to non-Christians.”

The Philippines Consulate in Dubai has monitored the case since Alconga’s arrest, appealing for his release and dismissal of the charges in order to prevent the UAE from being “viewed as intolerant,” a diplomat confirmed to Compass.

“The United Arab Emirates are signatories to the conventions on human rights and religious freedom,” Alconga remarked today, “so I think the authorities here would like to be consistent with that.” He confirmed that he and his wife Naomi planned to return to the Philippines within a month, as soon as their 13-year-old son Timothy completes his school exams.

The UAE’s penal code strictly prohibits non-Muslim missionary activities, including possession of any materials which oppose the “fundamental principles” of Islam among its citizens. But resident expatriates, who comprise 80 percent of the population, have been granted land and de facto recognition by the government to establish numerous Christian churches throughout the seven wealthy sheikhdoms.

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