Uzbekistan is one of the former Soviet Union republics in the Central Asia.

Population:
23 ml. 14,2 ml. Uzbeks, 1,65 ml. Russians, 0,18 ml. Koreans and many other nationalities.
Capital:
Tashkent 2,5 ml. Only 25% of the population live in cities. The rest 75% reside in rural areas.
Economy:
The country has a great potential due to it's oil stock and the largest in the world gold mining. The third in the world producer of cotton. The lack of water is one of the main hindering factors. Another one is a corrupted centralised command-administrative system, which is still in operation in Uzbekistan. Standard of living is incredibly low. The situation is specially bad for children, pensioners and unemployed population. Many people are starving on regular basis. Unemployment is very high and constitutes about 27%.

Religion:
According to official data Uzbekistan is a secular republic without state religion, but the influence of Islam is constantly growing. Currently Muslims amount to 68,2% of the population. Russian orthodox - 4,4%, Catholics- 0,2%, Protestants - 0,13%, Atheists and other- 26%.
 Tashkent became a centre of Islam for the whole Central Asia. Muslims from Iran and Saudi Arabia are sending their missionaries to the Uzbekistan in order to repair mosques, distribute Koran and make converts. The most dangerous are Muslim's extremists called Wahhabis. Their purpose is a jihad (a sacred war) and creation of a fundamentalist Islamic state on the territory of Uzbekistan. Jihad was intended not only to eliminate physically all infidels but also Muslims who do not hold on to the ideas of Wahhabism. A very strong satanic powers are standing behind their activities.

A new religion law is among the harshest in the former Soviet republics. Being adopted on 1st May, 1998 it prohibits religious activity of any unregistered groups and provides almost impossible registration standards for religious organisations.

Situation is very uneasy for the Evangelical Christians. Any kind of foreign missions, evangelizations, distribution of the Christian literature and religious propaganda is prohibited. That's why Protestant churches have to work and evangelise on the underground basis. Many Christians, especially Russians are departing from the country. More then 800 000 Russians left the country in period between 1985 and 1991. But in spite of all the churches are still growing by the grace of God!

Our need:
Three years ago an evangelist from our Moscow church Igor Ivanchenko visited Uzbekistan for his first mission trip. He spent 2 months there working with the underground church in Numangan city. A year later in 1999 God opened a way for him to become a full-time missiaonary in Uzbekistan.

The Evangelical church in Uzbekistan is persecuted and acts underground. Regular church services are prohibited. That is why the only possible form of meetings is home cell group services. Igor was in charge for a small city where he led several groups and was able to start three new groups and train several leaders.

During that time he was also taking care for a group of homeless children. Igor, jointly with two other Christian teachers decided to teach them some basics in Russian, math, etc. Of course along with that they taught children the Bible which is prohibited in Uzbekistan.
Police traced him down and finally arrested him. He was put into jail with criminals where police mistreated and abused him. Couple of his front teeth were knocked out. Then they put him to the special jail for religious extremists where he spent ten more days. Finally, after intercession of several courageous Christians he was deported from the country.

Igor is very committed to Christ and to his mission. His deep desire was to return back to Uzbekistan and he did it in the year 2000. He was able to establish one underground church with two home groups. Praise God that this time he wasn't arrested and imprisoned as he was during his last mission. He is planning to spend some time with us and than return to Uzbekistan again.

Below is an extract of his testimony:

"The evangelism in Uzbekistan is strictly prohibited. If you got arrested for evangelism you may be convicted to 12 days jail by the authorities and if you are caught again you may be sentenced for 3 or more years of prison. Local Christians are experiencing a hard pressure from the authorities being intimidated, abased, dismissed from the jobs. While I was there two school teachers were fired as they simply were Christians. Special police (SNB) service come to the homes of Christians and search for the information about church leadership. That is why leaders of the church (for example a pastor of the local church in Gulistan city where I stayed for a short time) can't live at the permanent residence. Sometimes he does not even know where he will be spending next night...

Central Asia today is a frontier line between Christianity and Islam. Christians are being arrested, abused, intimidated. Several times I was arrested by SNB officers who frightened me with physical violations, jail and prison. I am sure that only God has protected me. I also want to witness that it's impossible to survive there without lot of prayers. Demonic attacks are very strong. I'd say that without 2 hours of prayer in the morning it's very dangerous to do any kind of street ministry. I've learned that in practice.

Christian literature is normally gets arrested by customs service at the border yet it is possible to buy New Testaments at the flea-markets sometimes. There is a need for Bibles, New Testaments, Christian literature and audio tapes. There is not enough church leaders, very few missionaries, no finances - poverty and unemployment...

In spite of all this the God's army is moving forward bringing the Gospel to many souls! People are very open. They desire to find a real God. As I said it's impossible to have some kind of open evangelism, but we spoke to people on the streets and it is very often they invited us to there homes serving us some tea (it's a part of there culture). Many invited Jesus to their heart after 30 minutes of conversation just as if they were awaiting for it. We have prayed for many sick people and God performed miracles of healing. Uzbek ladies brought their sick children secretly from Muslim husbands and God healed many of them! Praise the Lord! God helped us to lead to the Lord 20 people just for 3 weeks. Two families opened the doors of their homes for us so that new converts could meet and be taught the basics of the Bible...

In December 2001 brother Igor came back to Moscow.

Below is one of brother Igor's testimonies:

"While on mission in Uzbekistan I've seen many manifestations of God's power. God wants to work through those who trust Him and put all their faith in Him.

Zhanna is a new convert. She came to the Lord only a few months ago. She is very young and unattractive Uzbek girl. In addition she has cerebral palsy.

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