Nairobi, Kenya: Two evangelists are still receiving hospital treatment two weeks after hardline Muslims in eastern Uganda beat them unconscious for proclaiming Christ, sources said.

In the last six years, Samuel Mukiibi, 27, and 25-year-old Ephraim Duula have led several Muslims to Christ. They were attacked on May 16th near Naigombwa swamp near Bukwanga village, Iganga Sub-County in Iganga District, in eastern Uganda.

After an evangelistic outreach in the Nambale area on May 13–16, they left at about 4 p.m. after open-air preaching and were approaching the swamp when three Muslims blocked the road, said Mukiibi.

“They stopped us and asked us to renounce Jesus Christ, whom we were preaching at Naigombwa Trading Center for four days,” Mukiibi told Morning Star News. “They wanted us to undergo circumcision aggressively by Islamic teaching for our survival.”

The assailants took their Bibles and gospel tracts, he said.

“I identified one attacker named Murshidi, who was calling the other attackers by Islamic names,” Mukiibi said. “My colleague, Duula, suffered serious bleeding coming out of his ears, a bruised face, and a deep cut in his left hand, while I had a twisted neck, a swollen face, and a twisted neck.”

When they awoke in an Iganga hospital, they found that a group of motorcycle riders under the leadership of an unnamed man named Dauson had come to their aid.

Dauson said he knew their pastor.

“We found the two evangelists bleeding seriously, picked up Mukiibi’s phone, and rang the pastor, who came to the hospital immediately,” Dawson said.

Iganga District is a heavily Muslim area of Uganda. The attack was the latest of many instances of persecution of Christians in Uganda that Morning Star News has documented.

Uganda’s constitution and other laws provide for religious freedom, including the right to propagate one’s faith and convert from one faith to another. Muslims make up only 12 percent of Uganda’s population, with high concentrations in eastern areas of the country.