WASHINGTON, DC -- Iran's government should immediately release from prison Iranian Christian pastor Hamid Pourmand, Freedom House's Center for Religious Freedom said today.

On February 17 a Tehran military court convicted Pourmand, a former army colonel, of deceiving the Iranian armed forces by not declaring his conversion from Islam to Christianity before he was promoted to the rank of officer.

"This is a shocking travesty of justice, even by Iran's meager standards," said Center for Religious Freedom Director Nina Shea. "Hamid Pourmand is serving hard prison time for peacefully exercising his right to free conscience under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The fact that he changed his religion before the revolutionary Islamic regime came to power and has documents showing that he openly lived a Christian life the past quarter century did not protect him from the ideology of hatred against other religions, including other Muslim interpretations, that underpins the Iranian judiciary."

The court sentenced Pourmand, 47, to three years in jail, the maximum penalty for his alleged 'crime,' according to a report from Compass Direct, a California-based Christian news service. It unclear whether his sentence will take into account the time he has already served--more than five months in an isolation cell--since his arrest on September 9, 2004. The court ordered his immediate transfer to a group cell in Tehran's Evin Prison. Human rights groups have reported on the prison's deplorable conditions and use of torture there.

Pourmand's conviction also entailed an automatic dishonorable discharge from the military, resulting in the loss of his family housing, salary, and pension accrued over nearly 20 years of service.

Pourmand became a Christian nearly 25 years ago, and is a volunteer lay pastor of a small Assemblies of God church in the southern port city of Bandar-i-Bushehr. The court rejected evidence produced by Pourmand's lawyer that his client's military superiors recognized several years ago that he was a Christian and had even given him exemptions from participating in Muslim fasts.

According to Compass Direct, Pourmand's lawyer will appeal the verdict, and will work to block attempts to try Pourmand before a sharia court of Islamic law, where under charges of apostasy and proselytizing he could face the death penalty.

Iran applies an extremist interpretation of Shiite Islamic law or sharia, which does not tolerate freedom of belief, or the freedom of Muslims to change religion. The U.S. State Department has designated Iran a Country of Particular Concern for "systematic, ongoing, and egregious" violations of religious freedom under the International Religious Freedom Act.

FreedomHouse.org