Evangelicals in Spain have called on its government and the United Nations to step in to prevent the seizure of one of the last Christian churches in Iran. 

St Peter’s, a Presbyterian church in Tehran, has been threatened with seizure and the imprisonment of its congregation. 

A former pastor told Premier Christian News in June that the situation was “awful” with the regime emboldened by the war. 

The AEE, the Spanish Evangelical Alliance, has sent a letter to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, as reported by Evangelical Focus. It warns threats are “part of a wider pattern of confiscation and destruction of Protestant churches properties in Iran.”

The World Council of Churches is supporting the AEE’s statement, calling on Iranian authorities to back down on its threats against the church and Christians in the country. 

The Executive Secretary of the Synod of the Evangelical Church of Iran in Diaspora said the regime had previously confiscated a 10,000 sq m garden that belonged to the church, which is now occupied by four Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) officials.

The IRGC has now claimed church property as its own, by issuing new deeds. It now considers employees and members guilty of trespassing on someone else's property and benefiting from it, despite them living in the church compound and maintaining the property.