US Condemns Iran Over Christian Crackdown and 10-Year Sentence for Ghazal Marzban
Updated
Updated · Fox News · Jul 9
US Condemns Iran Over Christian Crackdown and 10-Year Sentence for Ghazal Marzban
2 articles · Updated · Fox News · Jul 9
Summary
The State Department denounced Iran’s intensified persecution of Christians, citing 42-year-old Catholic convert Ghazal Marzban, who is on hunger strike in Tehran’s Evin prison after receiving nearly 10 years for practicing her faith.
US officials said Iran routinely uses arbitrary arrest, torture and detention against religious minorities and called for the immediate release of political prisoners and others jailed for peacefully exercising basic freedoms.
Rights groups say Marzban’s health had deteriorated by late May, her husband has been denied Parkinson’s medicine, and authorities are also moving to seize Tehran’s St. Peter’s Church compound and evict about 20 Armenian and Assyrian families.
Experts say the pressure is widening rather than easing: arrests of Christians rose from 139 in 2024 to 254 in 2025, and at least 11 people received prison terms of more than a decade.
The condemnation comes as the Trump administration is already confronting Tehran over attacks on commercial tankers in the Strait of Hormuz, though it remains unclear whether Washington will add targeted sanctions over religious persecution.
As Iran signs a peace deal, why is its war on religious minorities escalating more than ever?
How does Iran's exploding underground church movement survive the regime's deadliest post-war crackdown?
Sentenced for Conversion: Ghazal Marzban’s Nine Years and the Intensifying Repression of Christians in Iran (2026)
Overview
In May 2026, Ghazal Marzban, an Iranian Christian convert, was sentenced to nine years in prison, a case reported by Open Doors UK. Her journey began with her conversion to Catholicism in 2017, after which she faced ongoing harassment, including being barred from taking her bar exam and pressured to leave Iran. Marzban protested this treatment and was arrested in November 2024, shortly after a violent crackdown on anti-government protests. Her sentencing highlights the severe repression faced by religious minorities in Iran, especially those who convert from Islam, and underscores the broader challenges for Christians in the country.