Algeria: Christian gets maximum prison sentence for "˜blasphemy"

Algeria | 27 August 2016

World Watch Monitor (WWM) reported on 9 August 2016 that an Algerian Christian was fined and sentenced to five years" in prison - currently Algeria"s maximum sentence for blasphemy. The 49 year old Slimane Bouhafs was convicted for a social media post in which he talked about "Jesus overcoming the "˜lie" of Islam and its prophet". Bouhafs converted to Christianity in 1997 and was baptized in 2006. According to WWM the heavy sentence could well be due to his involvement in the political movement seeking autonomy for the Kabylie region in northeastern Algeria, mainly inhabited by ethnic Berbers. Yonas Dembele, persecution analyst at World Watch Research, says: "The Kabylie region is where Christianity in Algeria is growing fastest and this confluence of religion and politics means that the government"s effort to suppress political demands for self-determination could cause Christians to be targeted more often and lead to an intensification of their persecution."