FLASH NEWS from COMPASS DIRECT

Summary: LOS ANGELES, August 21 (Compass) — More than 60 teenage Eritrean students caught with Bibles at a compulsory military training camp have been arrested and subjected to severe punishment over the past two days. Documented reports obtained by Compass from the tiny East Africa nation confirm that military commanders at the Sawa Military Training Camp ordered a search of students’ personal effects. On August 19, they confiscated Bibles from 35 Protestant students, put them under arrest and subjected them to severe torture. The following day, another 27 teenage believers were incarcerated with them. The youths are reportedly locked in metal shipping containers with no light, high temperatures and a limited oxygen supply. This week’s arrests bring to 213 the known total of evangelical Christians currently jailed for their faith in Eritrea, due to a harsh government crackdown launched last February. The country’s independent Pentecostal and charismatic churches now have some 20,000 adherents, most of them emerging from a mushrooming renewal movement begun five years ago within the Orthodox Church.

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********** TEENAGE CHRISTIANS JAILED AT ERITREAN MILITARY CAMP Evangelical Students Locked in Metal Shipping Containers Special to Compass Direct

Full Story: LOS ANGELES, August 21 (Compass) — More than 60 teenage Eritrean students caught with Bibles at a compulsory military training camp have been arrested and subjected to severe punishment during the past two days.

Documented reports obtained by Compass from the tiny East Africa nation confirm that military commanders at the Sawa Military Training Camp ordered a search this week to find and confiscate any Bibles hidden among the student conscripts’ personal effects.

On August 19, thirty-five Protestant students found with Bibles in their possession were put under arrest and subjected to severe torture. The following day, another 27 teenage believers were incarcerated with them. Locked in metal shipping containers without any light, they are reportedly subjected to high temperatures, miserable close quarters and limited oxygen access.

“Their parents are very frustrated,” observed one source. “They are not being given food properly and are deprived of sunlight and medical treatment.”

In June, hundreds of grade 11 students from across Eritrea were ordered to report for training at the Sawa military base during their summer holidays. When schools resume in late September, it is believed the students will be required to continue their academic training in the Sawa camp, rather than returning to their homes.

The 62 teenagers, 29 of them female, represent most of the country’s 12 independent Protestant congregations. All of these denominations have been refused legal status by the Eritrean government for the past 15 months and ordered to stop meeting for worship.

In a harsh government crackdown launched this past February, more than 300 members of evangelical congregations were arrested, beaten and jailed for extended periods for worshipping without official permission.

This week’s arrests bring to 213 the known total of evangelical Christians in Eritrea currently jailed for their faith.

Among them are 79 Eritrean soldiers, 16 of them women, all jailed under harsh treatment in a military prison in Assab for refusing to deny their Pentecostal beliefs and return to the dominant Orthodox Church. Most were imprisoned in March of last year, when they were warned to expect beatings, threats and ongoing abuse until they recanted. This summer another two Protestants caught raising funds among local believers to feed and clothe

the destitute Assab prisoners were jailed along with the soldiers.

One evangelical pastor and 11 of his church members remain under arrest in Adi-Abytoo, with 10 reported in Keren, five in Mendefera, 13 in Adi-kualla, 25 in Nakfa and seven in Adi-Kihe.

Listed by Freedom House as one of the world’s most repressive regimes, the government of President Isayas Afewerki only recognizes four “official” religions: Orthodox Christian, Muslim, Catholic and Evangelical Lutheran. In a statement issued May 1, the government formally denied that any religious persecution exists in Eritrea.

The country’s independent Pentecostal and charismatic churches now have some 20,000 adherents, most of them emerging from a mushrooming renewal movement begun five years ago within the Orthodox Church. But an apparent alliance between the state and the Orthodox Church has inflamed harsh resistance against the independent Protestants, who have been told it is illegal for as few as three of them to meet together in a private home.

Meanwhile, the Eritrean Embassy in London has been under siege this week by members of an Anglican church located just blocks away. Members of All Saints Church in Islington have patrolled the street outside the embassy every day, praying for a turn-around in the Eritrean government’s repressive stance against evangelical Christians.

In addition to stopping embassy staff and passersby to explain Eritrea’s violations of religious freedom, the church members have gathered signatures for a petition urging Eritrea to honor its signature on a number of international treaty commitments to observe basic human rights.

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