A Presbyterian church in Tehran is set to be seized, after residents in the church compound were ordered to leave their homes and worshippers told to find a different church.

The confiscation of St Peter's Evangelical Church in Tehran and eviction of its residents, who belong to Iran's recognised Armenian and Assyrian Christian communities, comes after a state organisation moved to enforce a court order issued nearly 30 years ago.

The court order, passed by a Revolutionary Court in 1998, ruled that the entire church compound, which is around 10 acres in size and includes two schools as well as dozens of homes, should be handed over to the Execution of Imam Khomeini's Order (EIKO).

EIKO has also been responsible for the confiscations of Assyrian Presbyterian churches in Tabriz and Mashhad, as well as an Assemblies of God church in Gorgan and retreat centre in Karaj.

The Council of Evangelical Churches of Iran, responsible for St Peter's, was not even aware of the ruling until 2008, and protested against it. However, the Islamic Republic has repeatedly refused to allow the council to renew its registration since 1980, and closed the case at the direction of the Office of the Supreme Leader.

Now, according to the former pastor of the church, Rev Sargez Benyamin, the 20 Armenian and Assyrian families living in the church compound, which is in central Tehran and therefore worth a significant amount of money, have been ordered to leave within two weeks and to find new churches to worship in.

Most of the families have lived in the compound for years, are on low incomes, and "have no chance to survive without church support", Rev Benyamin told The Free Press.

He added that the church's leaders have been threatened with arrest, should the families refuse to comply.

According to Article18's sources, six Ministry of Intelligence agents visited the site on Sunday and stayed for several hours, even bringing food with them and telling residents: "We have come so that you can become accustomed to our presence".

The World Council of Churches (WCC) released a statement, expressing its "profound sorrow and deep concern" following the recent demolition of the church in Mashhad and reports that "church personnel [in Tehran] have been threatened with imprisonment, that residents of the compound have been pressured to leave, and that demands have reportedly been made for the transfer of church-owned property".

The WCC called on the Islamic Republic to "immediately halt any actions that could lead to the confiscation, transfer, demolition or repurposing of church properties" and to "cease without delay ... all threats intimidation and legal or administrative pressures directed against church leaders, staff, residents and members of the Evangelical community".

It also called on the international community to "engage constructively and urgently in support of the protection of these church properties and the preservation of the religious freedoms and communal life of Christian communities in Iran".

Background

The pressure on St Peter's is the latest example of how Protestant Christianity has been slowly crushed since the establishment of the Islamic Republic in 1979, and comes more than a decade after the church was forced to stop its Persian-language services, in order to prevent Christian converts from attending.

There were once around 50 Protestant churches in Iran -- the majority of them from the Presbyterian, Assemblies of God and Anglican denominations -- but today only a dozen Protestant churches are still permitted to operate, and they must preach in the ethnic minority languages of Assyrian or Armenian, and not Persian.

Renowned Iranian lawyer Shirin Ebadi wrote on her Telegram channel that the attack on St Peter's was a "continuation of the same policy that has been pursued for years against Iranian Christians, especially Christian converts: closing Persian-language churches, threatening church leaders, arresting converts, prosecuting them under false security-related charges, and gradually eliminating the presence of Christians from the country's public space".

She added: "The Islamic Republic first considered worship in Persian a threat. Then it closed Persian-speaking churches. Then it prosecuted Christian converts for their faith and worship. Now the scope of the pressure has gone beyond converts and has reached historical properties, old churches, and even the places where Armenian and Assyrian citizens live. This is the same logic of confiscation: first, citizens are deprived of their obvious rights, then their worship is prohibited, then their homes and churches are taken away, and finally they are evicted from their homes and ancient properties."