Tuesday, 12 August 2008

An Iranian asylum seeker has taken refuge in Hamilton while he waits to hear the outcome of his final appeal against deportation.

Ali Panah, who last year went on a 53-day hunger strike while being held at Auckland Remand Prison at Mt Eden, is staying at the Friary of Divine Compassion, part of the Anglican Church complex in Hillcrest.

His protest, started in July last year, was over his 20-month detention, enforced because of his refusal to sign travel documents for deportation to Iran, where he said he would be persecuted because he had converted to Christianity.

A man was reportedly lashed 34 times in Iran last August after being caught with a copy of the Bible in his car.

Mr Panah arrived at the Te Ara Hou Village Friary in Hillcrest on Saturday afternoon straight from Wellington, where he lodged his final appeal for asylum with Immigration New Zealand.

He had being staying at the Orakei Parish in Auckland with Rev Clive Sperring since the Government granted him bail last September.

However, Rev Sperring retired on Sunday and the parish could no longer support him.

So the Te Ara Hou Friary put up their hand to help.

"Our ethos is hospitality to anybody...so we take in the stranger," said the Friary's Brother Damian.

"We are willing to have him here as long as it takes, which is likely to be months, rather than weeks."

Mr Panah will remain at the Friary until a decision on his appeal is made.

Mr Panah was not a difficult person and was settling in well, Brother Damian said.

"He is certainly very grateful for all this and can't stop saying thank you. He prays a lot and spends a lot of time reading the Bible in both Persian and English."

He said Mr Panah could do voluntary work during his stay in the village.

He did not consider Mr Panah a dangerous man: "would we bring a dangerous man into this house?"

The Anglican Church, which has sponsored Mr Panah's bail, was concerned that any publicity could jeopardise his case and declined to allow the Times to speak directly with Mr Panah or photograph him.

Last year some people, most notably New Zealand First deputy leader Peter Brown, cast doubt on the genuineness of Mr Panah's conversion to Christianity.

The case is beginning to echo that of the highly-publicised plight of Algerian Ahmed Zaoui, who came to New Zealand in December 2002 and was immediately imprisoned for two years as a suspected terrorist.

Last December, after the Security Intelligence Service dropped their five-year objection to Zaoui claiming refugee status in New Zealand, he and his wife and four children moved out of the spotlight and into their first home in 14 years, in Auckland.

(Source Nicola Brennan - Waikato Times)