A Christian rights leader in Pakistan has welcomed a recommendation by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) to keep Pakistan designated as a “Country of Particular Concern” amid reports of widespread violence against Christians and other minorities.
Authorities in Pakistan launched an investigation after a 10-year-old Christian girl was allegedly targeted in an attempted rape by a Muslim man in Punjab province amid a series of violent incidents against Christians in the region, investigators said Sunday.
Pakistani police have arrested two Muslim suspects in connection with the killing of a young Christian agricultural worker whose death sparked protests in the country’s eastern Punjab province, investigators and Christian advocates said Saturday.
Hundreds of Christians, including family members, have protested the killing of a young Christian agricultural worker by one or more Muslims in Pakistan’s eastern Punjab province and the alleged reluctance by authorities to properly investigate the case.
An 11-year-old Christian girl was abducted and killed by her Muslim neighbor in the Pakistani city of Gujranwala, the latest in a series of attacks targeting members of the country’s Christian minority, investigators told Worthy News on Tuesday.
A Christian sanitation worker employed by the legislature of Pakistan’s Punjab province was found shot dead late Friday at a government hostel in Lahore, police and Christian rights advocates confirmed early Saturday.
A young Christian woman alleges she was abducted at gunpoint and forced to convert to Islam and marry a Muslim man four years ago after meeting him through her job at a beauty salon in Pakistan’s eastern Punjab province. Now in her 20s, she fled this month and is in hiding with her young daughter, fearing retaliation.
A Christian sanitation worker in eastern Pakistan has alleged he was brutally beaten while performing municipal cleaning duties in what advocacy groups describe as part of mounting pressure on Christians in the Muslim-majority nation.
Christians in Pakistan’s industrial city of Gujranwala expressed fears of renewed violence after a Christian family’s ancestral home was allegedly taken over by a Muslim lawyer who accused the homeowner of blasphemy, sources told Worthy News.
Christians in Pakistan’s Punjab province were searching Thursday for an abducted minor girl, days after the provincial governor signed legislation raising the legal marriage age to 18 and criminalizing child marriage as a non-bailable offense.
A series of alleged attacks and harassment targeting Christian communities in Pakistan’s eastern Punjab province, including at least one fatal assault, has raised renewed concern about the safety of religious minorities, advocacy group LEAD Ministries said.
Christian rights campaigners have welcomed Friday’s landmark decision by Pakistan’s Punjab province to criminalize child marriage by setting 18 as the minimum legal age for marriage. However, the killing of a Pakistani Christian shopkeeper in the same province cast a shadow over the celebrations.
A court in Pakistan’s eastern Punjab province is due to hear further evidence Wednesday in the rape case of a 14-year-old Christian girl, as separate allegations of violence against two Christian boys have renewed concerns about the safety of minority children in the Muslim-majority country.
Despite what advocates describe as decades of persecution, discrimination, and insecurity, Pakistan’s Christians remain steadfast in their faith and committed to peaceful coexistence, a leading Christian rights advocate said Friday.
Several Christian families in Pakistan’s Punjab province were recovering from injuries Sunday after what they described as “targeted attacks” by suspected Islamic extremists, reflecting broader pressure on Christians and other minorities in the Muslim-majority nation.
In one of its first closely watched cases, Pakistan’s newly established Federal Constitutional Court (FCC) ruled that an underage Christian girl should remain with her “Muslim husband” despite concerns about her age and religious rights, Christians confirmed to Worthy News on Wednesday.
A prominent Pakistani Christian human rights advocate has warned that an increasing number of underage girls are being forced to wear the veil or burqa, calling the practice a form of “child radicalization” and ideological coercion.
A prominent Christian lawyer has urged Pakistan’s government to intervene as a man accused of brutally assaulting a Christian woman and tearing her clothes in a Punjab province market was released within just 30 minutes of police detention, apparently due to his “contacts” with authorities, Christians said.
A Pakistani Christian laborer is recovering from his injuries after he was allegedly nearly burned alive by a suspected Muslim extremist for his faith in Christ in Pakistan’s Punjab province, highlighting ongoing threats faced by Christians and other minorities in the Islamic nation.
Four and a half years of difficult legal proceedings have ended for two Christian nurses in Pakistan’s Punjab province after both were acquitted of blasphemy charges, Christians told Worthy News Tuesday.