International Christian Concern | Oct. 9, 2018
International Christian Concern (ICC) has learned that the National Intelligence and Security Service (NISS) of Sudan admitted that they seized the property of Rev. Noah Ibrahim due to religious intolerance. In 2012, NISS approached Rev. Ibrahim and confiscated his car without providing a legal reason for doing so. Again, in 2013, they arrested Rev. Ibrahim and seized a second car that he was using. He was released from custody shortly after, but his car was not returned.
Last year, Rev. Ibrahim was able to find a lawyer willing to help him take NISS to court over the illegal seizures of the vehicles. During the long process of this case, NISS maintained the stance that they were allowed to seize his car, but never gave a legal reason. On September 14, 2018, NISS responded to the court in a letter. In the letter, they said that they confiscated the car “because it was owned by a foreign organization to evangelize and bring people to Christianity.” This is not illegal in Sudan. Anyone is free to evangelize to anyone else, including foreigners. Also, this is a false claim as at least one of the cars was owned by Rev. Ibrahim himself.
Unfortunately, this is not the only ongoing case of discrimination. When ICC spoke with one of the lawyers involved in Rev. Ibrahim’s case, he said that he “currently has four cases open against NISS.”