Representing the Union of Evangelical Christians-Baptists of RussiaAudio Interviews with Pastor Balaev and Pastor Zenchenko
SGA's Joel Griffith conducts an exclusive interview with Zaur Balaev, the Azerbaijan Baptist pastor imprisoned last May and recently released from as part of an amnesty by the country’s president. Pastor Balaev updates us on his health, future ministry prospects, and the prospects of his appeal to the Azerbaijan Supreme Court.
Also interviewed is Azeri UECB president Ilya Zenchenko regarding the case of Zaur Balaev and the state of persecution in Azerbaijan.
Zaur Balaev Interview Text Transcript
Q: How is your health?
A: I don’t feel well. I need to undergo some medical treatment.
Q: We heard your heart and kidneys had problems.
A: My big concern is my heart. I was born with this problem. Definitely I need to get treatment and try to cure my heart. I don’t know.
Q: Are you hopeful that your April 1 appeal at the Azerbaijan Supreme Court will have a positive outcome?
A: I cannot believe that they will clear my name, because I don’t believe that they will act against one another. I don’t know. Sometimes we say the dog will not bark at another dog, or better to say the wolf will not bite another wolf. I hope you understand what I mean. I am sorry for this comparison, but I don’t believe they will clear me.
Q: Do you believe that pressure from the outside world helped?
A: Yes, no doubt. This pressure caused the authorities to release me. I think it played a deCISive role in my deliverance. They did not clear my name, though. It is obvious to me that they do not want to clear my name of these charges. They released me because of pressure from around the world. Everybody could relax, but they are not going to clear my name.
Q: Were there other believers in the prison?
A: There were some Orthodox believers from Georgia.
Q: What are your plans now for future ministry?
A: I am going to serve the people of my motherland in Azerbaijan. I am going to the end. Openly, freely as I did before my prison term.
Q: Are there other pastors in this region facing the same kind of problems?
A: Yes. Very many. I don’t want to talk about this on the phone, because there are so many names we won’t have enough time to name them all.
Q: Do you think that the pressure will be relaxed in the country.
God allowed this to happen in our church. It’s very positive. Because they wanted to destroy Christianity in our region and in our church. God allowed them to arrest me because He wanted to show the authorities that He is sovereign and wanted to help me. He did it through international pressure on the government, and I think that the government will lift the pressure.
Q: How can we best pray for you and for your churches?
A: A very big need is that God would open the doors in our country for evangelism. Second, so that our church will withstand all the hardships, and, of course, I would like you to pray for my family so that they will grow closer to God, so that they will be willing to serve Him, and I pray for their health, and also I would like you to pray for jobs for my family, so we can feed ourselves.
Q: How many Christians are there in your church?
A: Altogether, we have about 50 in attendance. But we have very many of those who believe in God, but they are afraid to come to services. Many of them cannot openly confess Christ, so we have many, many such people. They are just afraid.
Ilya Zenchenko Interview Text Transcript
Q: What is Zaur’s status legally at the moment?
A: Zaur’s sentence was officially commuted by the president, meaning that he is a free man. But he was convicted of crime in the view of society, so he will be viewed with suspicion. Now he enjoys all kinds of freedoms and can continue his ministry. Authorities recognize his right to continue his ministry. If the government was against him continuing, probably they would not have set him free. I would like to say thanks to the world community and the pressure they applied to Azerbaijan. Because of this and religious movements around the world who applied pressure, this is why we had this result. So the government chose to free Balaev instead of receiving angry letters from around the world asking why a Christian pastor is jailed.
Q: Did world pressure matter?
A: I was not allowed to be in the high level of authorities, but I can feel that the world pressure was the last bucket of water for the government to make this deCISion. Yes, of course, it had its own positive effect.
Q: Other pastors have been threatened. Do you think this will still happen, or will some of the restrictions be lifted?
A: For the last year, we had many pastors who were oppressed by the police in different regions of Azerbaijan. What we see today is authorities do not understand their duty, not only in remote regions, but also in our capital city. The government increased pressure on Christians. So we know that in one region, the deputy pastor was put under house arrest for 24 hours. Authorities wanted him to stop visiting the church, but he refused. But within 24 hours he was allowed to go free. It seems to me that our authorities do not have a common policy of behavior or actions toward Christians. Every official does what they want to do.
Q: What is Balaev’s health?
A: He did not feel well even before his imprisonment, because he has a heart valve condition from his birth. With this condition he was in prison for ten months. These ten months caused his health to deteriorate. He was in a small cell with 15 inmates, where many of them were smoking, some were sick, a couple had TB. He was in a prison cell during the winter and, of course, there was not enough oxygen in the cell. It was wet and dark. Tomorrow I will send you his pictures from when he was released. You can see his smiling face and happy eyes, but it may be misleading from how he really is. In reality, he is a very ill man. I am looking into the possibility of sending him to western Ukraine in the Carpathians, to the city of Truskevets.
Q: How can we pray for the churches of Azerbaijan?
A: Our churches are experiencing spiritual revival because we see the triumph of truth. We want this victory to be complete, so we have appealed to the Supreme Court of Azerbaijan. We would like everybody to praise God with us for the deliverance of our beloved brother who became a real victim. When Zaur was in jail, it helped us to attract attention to Azerbaijan from many countries, and maybe our authorities will ease their policy toward Christians after that. I hope the authorities will be afraid to commit such provocations in the future. This is the first thing. Secondly, April 1 the Supreme Court will hear the appeal. We would like the court to reverse the conviction and clear Zaur Balaev of all charges. In the event that Zaur is cleared, then the people who accused him falsely will be punished. Now we do not know what to expect since he was not totally pardoned. At the moment, Zaur doesn’t know if it’s safe for him to continue his ministry or not. That’s why it’s so important for us for the Supreme Court to clear him. If the Supreme Court does not, we will go to the International Court of Human Rights to fight for his good name. It will be better for our country if it doesn’t get that far, but would be best if it was decided here in Azerbaijan.
There is another pastor in Nefchela. Last November, some of our ministers were summoned to the police station and they were threatened with the same treatment as Zaur Balaev received. This pastor’s deputy was arrested by police in his house in front of his mother, who was very scared because nothing was explained. They kept him in detention for three hours. So you can see that they put pressure on him. But it was under such terrible emotional pressure, so the mother was very scared and the young pastor was also very scared. He did not visit the church for a couple of weeks.
Related Articles About Pastor Balaev
4/16/08: Prayer Alert: Police Cheif from Balaev Case Injured in Accident
4/14/08: Appeal Fails in Azerbaijani Pastor Conviction Case from Mission Network News
4/10/08: Pastor Balaev Update and Prayer from SGA president Robert Provost.
04/01/08 — Press release: Azerbaijan Supreme Court Hears Pastor Zaur Balaev’s Appeal
04/01/08 — Prayer Alert: Pastor Balaev’s Azerbaijan Supreme Court appeal
04/01/08 — SGA exclusive audio interviews with Pastor Balaev and Azeri UECB president Ilya Zenchenko
03/19/08 — Prayer Alert: Pastor Balaev Released from Prison!
01/18/08 — Press Release: An Interview with Imprisoned Pastor Zaur Balaev
11/22/07 — Prayer Alert: Imprisoned Pastor Disturbing News
09/11/07 — Azerbaijan pastor imprisoned
