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AFGHANISTAN: MANY CONVERT TO CHRISTIANITY IN SECRET

Rome, 22 March (AKI) - Abdul Rahman, the man condemned to death for having abandoned Islam, is just one of many Afghanis who decide to convert to Christianity, but most are forced to do so secretly, argues Arab Christian author Camille Eid. In an interview with Adnkronos International (AKI) Eid, author of "The Christians who come from Islam", said during a recent trip to Afghanistan he met many similar cases. "They are Christians who have sprung out of nowhere and it's unclear how they have decided by themselves to convert" he added. The US, Italy, Germany and Canada have all expressed concern over the fate of Rahman who converted to Christianity 16 years ago.

"I also spoke to a priest who had passed through Kabul and he said he was amazed that women sitting on the ground at the local market saw he was a foreigner and a Christian, by the cross he was wearing, and attracted his attention to them by making a sign of the cross with their fingers. He was convinced that they were trying to send him a coded message" said Eid, a Lebanese Maronite who lives in Italy.

According to the author, Abdul Rahman is not the first Afghan citizen to have been sentenced to death for apostasy since the fall of the Taliban regime.

"The Islamic Taliban militias who still control entire areas of the country issued a statement in June 2004 in which they referred to a death sentence handed down to an Afghan converted to Christianity, Moulawi Asad Allah."

Rome, 22 March "Their spokesman declared that a group of militants had dragged the convert from his home and decapitated him after finding Christian preaching material in his wardrobe."

Abdul Rahman has been charged with rejecting Islam a crime under Sharia law in Afghanistan. Rahman's conversion in 1990, when he was an aid worker helping Afghan refugees in Pakistan, alienated him from his family which then denounced him in a custody dispute over his two children.

Another episode of conversion to Christianity in Afghanistan is recounted in Eid's book.

A child discovers that his parents have become Christians because he is being shunned by his classmates, who call him Aissawi, which means Jesuit.

His father chooses not to explain the reason for this ostracism, but the child finds the answer when he comes upon written evidence of his parents' conversion in a cupboard at their home.

"Unfortunately, in terms of religious freedom Afghanistan has not changed much since the fall of the Taliban" Eid noted. "The problem is that president Hamad Karzai wanted a modern constitution but with Islamic dressing, as he knew he was in one of the most traditional countries of the Islamic world."

"Karzai tried to reconcile Islamic Sharia law with universal human values, succeeding in some areas, such as the introduction of a womens' quota in parliament, but failing in others.

"In Afghanistan only freedom of worship if guaranteed - not freedom of religion" Eid said.

An eloquent example of this is that "the only Christian church in Afghanistan to date is inside the compound of the Italian embassy.

"I personally asked Karzai if it was possible in the future to see other churches outside those compound walls and he said yes, under Article 2 of the constitution" Eid continued.

"So there is formally freedom of worship [for Christians or for the Buddhist and Hindu minorities in Afghanistan] but not religious freedom. Conversion to Christianity from Islam remains a taboo." Eid said.

MANY CONVERT TO CHRISTIANITY IN SECRET (http://www.adnki.com/index_2Level_English.php?cat=Religion&loid=8.0.278814590&par=0)