As 250-300 guests gathered last Saturday, May 28 to celebrate the union of two members of the Meserete Kirstos Church in Asmara, security forces also gathered to detain all those present. According to Release-Eritrea, the wedding reception was being held in a hall known in central Asmara when the celebration was raided. Another wedding reception in Asmara was cancelled for fear that the incident would be repeated. A similar raid took place in Barentu in January. Most of those detained from that wedding have since been released.
Dr. Berhane Asmelash, director of Release-Eritrea said, "With the release of most of those who were detained in Barentu over the last few weeks, I was hoping that this trend of raiding weddings and detaining people indiscriminately may perhaps be coming to an end. I have been proven wrong. I once again call on all Eritreans, Friends of Eritrea and members of the international community to join me in raising objections to this. Abuse of Eritrean Christians must stop."
Pray for the release of those detained. Pray that the Eritrean government will ease their oppression of its evangelical citizens. The Voice of the Martyrs Canada has released two video news features on Eritrea. They are available in the Video section of our multimedia website, https://www.vomcanada.com/. The feature article of the July edition of The Voice of the Martyrs Newsletter is entitled "Eritrea's 'Dangerous' Christians" and will focus on recent persecution in the country and what you can do to help. To begin your free subscription today, click here.
For more information on the persecution facing Christians in Eritrea, click here.
Population
