Of the 12 men arrested in April 2006 for alleged hyperlinks to a November 2004 grenade incident blamed on Islamic extremists, 4 remained in custody. It was unclear whether their detention was linked to their non secular beliefs or follow. On February 21, 2007, news company Ferghana.ru reported that college directors and lecturers on the Kyzyljar School of the Jalalabad Oblast prohibited two female students from attending class as a result of the scholars refused to take away their hijabs. Parents at both schools protested the prohibition of hijabs but the dispute continued as of the tip of the reporting period. In December 2005 the Jalalabad metropolis training department banned the carrying of hijabs in that city’s schools.
The SCRA turned to numerous religious organizations for his or her ideas on introducing religious education; their reaction usually was unfavorable, as they most popular to retain accountability for the spiritual training of their adherents. SARA indicated that it was still growing a curriculum to teach about non secular groups, in cooperation with the Ministry of Education and several other educational institutions. An August 9, 2006 press report indicated that the Government planned to introduce spiritual education into the secondary faculty curriculum; nonetheless, there had been no implementation of this plan by the tip of the reporting period. Under the auspices of the Muftiate, volunteers referred to as Davatchi visited villages within the south to show conventional Islamic values.
The Muftiate oversees all Islamic entities, together with institutes and madrassahs, mosques, and Islamic organizations. The Mufti is the official head of the Muftiate and is elected by the Council of Ulemas, which consists of 30 Islamic clerics and scholars. A Muftiate-established fee critiques and standardizes Islamic instructional literature printed and distributed in the country and reviews new books on Islamic themes prior to publication.
The mob bodily abused the pastor and burned his Bibles and different non secular materials. Church leaders reported that local police on the scene made no efforts to stop the attack. Soon after the occasion, native police opened a criminal investigation, questioning Sarygulov and others for detailed accounts of the incident.
Missionaries of various spiritual teams function freely, though they are required to register. Since 1996 SARA has registered greater than 1,133 international citizens as non secular missionaries.
Local law enforcement officers reportedly “tormented” the pastor after receiving complaints by family members of Christian converts who belonged to his church. SARA officers showed the pastor a petition with 500 signatures requesting that the church be shut down.
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Although the Government monitored, together with by filming, Protestant and Muslim non secular groups in the past, there were no stories of surveillance through the interval coated by this report. There have been unconfirmed reviews that legislation enforcement officials monitored the activities of missionaries. According to church officials, the local community and authorities officials tried to stress Dzhanybek Zhakipov, the pastor of the Pentecostal Church of Jesus Christ in Jalalabad, to shut down his church in July 2006.
The 1997 Law on Religious Freedom and Religious Organizations forbids the instructing of religion in public schools. In 2001 the Government instructed the SCRA to draw up programs for coaching clergy and to prepare methodologies for teaching about non secular groups in public faculties. These instructions came in response to considerations about the spread of Wahhabism and what the Government thought of unconventional spiritual sects.
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After court docket proceedings, a Jalalabad choose ordered SARA to register the church. The church continued to function, and there were no reports of additional stress. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints , which initially applied for registration with SARA in August 2004, was still not registered at the finish of the reporting interval. Leaders of the Hare Krishna temple in Bishkek, after making an attempt unsuccessfully to register several instances in the final 2 years, deliberate to resubmit the appliance for registration once the location of their new temple was confirmed. In May 2006, a bunch of parliamentary deputies proposed a special draft bill.
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Work on the brand new draft bill continued at the end of the reporting period. The Islamic University oversees all Islamic faculties, together with madrassahs, to develop a standardized curriculum and curb the spread of extremist spiritual instructing.
On February 15, 2007, independently operated Channel 5 TV broadcast a program that portrayed the Church of Jesus Christ as being presumably related to satan worshipers. The pastor offered a rebuttal to this system, but producers never aired it. Channel 5 producers aired opinions in support of the program’s message presented by representatives of the “traditional religious groups” . Several media outlets reported incidents of aggression in opposition to Baptist Pastor Zulumbek Sarygulov in Osh Oblast. According to Forum 18, the first incident occurred on July 28, 2006 when a crowd of 80 local Muslims broke into the Karakulja village Baptist Church within the Osh Oblast.
After the initial inquiries, there were no further reports from the local authorities concerning developments within the investigation. There were several reviews that tensions between Muslims and Muslim converts continued. Both Muslim and Russian Orthodox non secular leaders criticized the proselytizing actions of nontraditional Christian groups. There were no stories of forced non secular conversion, together with of minor U.S. citizens who had been kidnapped or illegally faraway from the United States, or of the refusal to allow such citizens to be returned to the United States.
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All religious entities based by a foreigner should re-register every year with SARA, though the process is much less cumbersome than the preliminary registration. Members of registered spiritual groups could fulfill various navy service; it was reported within the press in 2005 that roughly three thousand individuals apply yearly. According to SARA, there have been 2,113 registered spiritual entities, including mosques, church buildings, foundations, non-governmental organizations of a religious kazak women nature, and religious educational establishments. According to SARA, there are 21 “different spiritual entities” together with 12 Baha’i facilities, 21 non secular facilities of “different foreign confessions,” 13 spiritual faculties, and seven non secular foundations and unions. Established in 1993, the Muftiate (or Spiritual Administration of Muslims of Kyrgyzstan-SAMK) is the highest Islamic managing physique in the country.
Several dad and mom protested the transfer and demanded that the ban be lifted. SARA’s said place was that college students, who for spiritual reasons select to put on clothing that would point out adherence to a selected faith, could attend spiritual colleges. A Baptist pastor reported several instances of their overseas missionaries being denied visas or facing visa delays when trying to go to the country. No missionaries have been expelled, asked to depart the country, or denied registration during the reporting interval.