Wife of Saeed Abedini to Address United Nations Council

By MidEast Christian News, Monday, June 03, 2013

The wife of Saeed Abedini, an Iranian-American pastor imprisoned in Iran since last September, is scheduled to speak before the United Nation's Human Rights Council today, Monday, Christian News Network (CNN) reports.

Abedini is currently held in Iran's notorious Evin Prison for allegations of threatening national security and attempting to "turn youth in the nation away from Islam and toward Christianity." Abedini is currently suffering from severe health problems and has been denied medical treatment for months.

He was sentenced to eight years in prison for his crimes.

Naghmeh Abedini and the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) have spent the past week meeting with various countries and non-governmental Organizations to raise awareness of the plight of Pastor Abedini.

Abedini had previously been urging the U.S. government to help her husband.

"I am encouraged by our meetings and efforts here at the United Nations," Naghmeh said. "The international community plays an important role in holding Iran responsible for its human rights violations. I pray many new voices will be added to the efforts to bring my husband home."

For its part, the ACLJ said that the reception has been positive.

"The responses have been encouraging as the world begins to respond to the pleas of a wife and mother desperately seeking to have her husband brought home," the organization said in a statement.

Jordan Sekulow, the executive director for the ACLJ, spoke to the council on Friday, in which he read a segment of a report written by the European Center for Law and Justice (ECLJ) on the Abedini case.

"Saeed's peaceful assembly violated no promulgated law nor has Iran demonstrated how the peaceful assembly of its religious minorities threatens it national security," he said. "The European Center for Law and Justice recommends that the Human Rights Council condemn every unlawful restriction on peaceful religious assembly and requests that Saeed be released immediately."