'Another Year Has Gone By': Pastor Abducted Four Years Ago in Malaysia Still Missing

It has been four years since Pastor Raymond Koh was abducted from a street in Malaysia. The kidnapping took place in February 2017 in Kuala Lumpur by a group of masked men.

Video footage captured during the moment of Koh's abduction shows 15 masked men in five unmarked vehicles carry out the heinous act. The attack took 42 seconds and Koh has not been seen or heard from since. 

The Voice of the Martyrs (VOM) launched the petition, ReleaseRaymond.com, in 2019 to press the government of Malaysia and its top police commander for an explanation of what happened to the pastor. 

You can add your voice at ReleaseRaymond.com.

More than 65,000 people from all over the world signed the petition, adding their voices to this call for justice.

"Another year has gone by," said Todd Nettleton, VOM's spokesperson and host of VOM Radio. "Malaysia's Human Rights Commission blamed the Special Branch of Malaysia's police for Pastor Raymond's abduction. Yet no arrests have been made, no one has been held accountable, and there is still no explanation for what happened to him. His family deserves answers."

Malaysia's Human Rights Commission determined that Koh was abducted by members of a special police unit for allegedly trying to persuade Muslims to embrace Christianity.

Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad said after Koh's disappearance that the government would reinvestigate the incident if the Human Rights Commission could produce evidence to support its claims.

Koh pastored an Evangelical Free Church of Malaysia for 20 years before founding Harapan Komuniti in Malaysia in 2004, a community-based charity outreach to single mothers, drug addicts, and HIV/AIDS victims. 

His wife Susanna and their three children grieve over not knowing whether he is alive or dead, suffering or being cared for, healthy or in physical pain. 

The majority of Malaysia's population is Muslim, but the country also has Christian, Buddhist, and Hindu communities. Leaving the Muslim faith is considered both a sin and a crime by Islamic authorities, and evangelizing Muslims is outlawed.  

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