The Rwanda Governance Board continues to close churches it says fail to meet requirements laid down at the beginning of the year. New requirements set in place for those congregations that want to continue ministry are also complicating efforts to comply. Many see the closures as part of an effort by the government to make its aggressive secular stance clear.
Iranian pastor Youcef Nadarkhani has been taken to Evin Prison in the capital, Tehran, after a violent raid on his home in the northern city of Rasht on Sunday (22 July).
After nearly two years in a Turkish prison, hopes for the release of American pastor Andrew Brunson have been deferred. A Turkish court ordered 50-year-old pastor to remain bars until at least his next hearing on October 12.
Church leaders didn’t get an explanation for why the seventh worship building to be closed in Algeria since November was sealed last week, but they suspect lack of registration was the pretext.
Nepali Christians are facing new pressures from their government after authorities deported a Christian couple for evangelizing Hindus.
In further anti-Christian hostilities in eastern Uganda, Muslims knocked a pastor unconscious at a debate and Islamist threats in another village put a halt to worship services.
International Christian Concern (ICC) has documented at least 15 separate anti-Christian incidents across India in the past 14 days. These incidents include physical assaults, a church demolition, forced conversions, false accusations of forced conversions, and social boycotts.
Northwood Church founder Pastor Bob Roberts worries if the US Congress doesn’t act soon, ethnic Kachin Christians in Burma may face the same plight as the Rohingya. He believes prayer and action can make the difference in saving them.
Authorities in India’s eastern state of Jharkhand have accused 25 evangelists of allegedly trying to convert tribal Hindu villagers to Christianity.
An Assemblies of God Nigeria pastor, his wife and son were among at least 218 people killed in Muslim Fulani herdsmen attacks on predominantly Christian areas near Jos on June 23-25, a denominational leader said.
Deadly conflict is raging in central Nigeria as more than 200 people were reportedly killed in a series of recent clashes between Muslim herders and Christian farmers.
One consequence of the ongoing peace initiatives between South Korea and the US with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has been the ban on balloon launches for Christian ministries, who used the tactic to send leaflets and Gospel messages to North Koreans.
More than 10 officials from various government departments, including the local religious affairs committee, raided Gusui Church in China’s central Henan province on May 22. The government agents forcibly removed several congregants and the lecturer for that day’s talk on laws.
Christians coerced into an out-of-court settlement following an Islamist attack on a church building in Egypt recently saw the usual outcome – a closed church – a practice that has long oppressed Christians, according to Middle East observers.
Muslim Fulani herdsmen on Sunday (June 10) killed two Christians and seriously wounded another in central Nigeria as they made their way home from a church service, local sources said.
A North Korean who escaped from the country and now lives in the UK has spoken via persecution charity Open Doors about his life under the regime there.
Three churches recently closed down by authorities in Algeria’s northern province of Oran were permitted to re-open on Sunday, 10 June.
A US missionary kidnapped in Niger in October 2016 is alive, according to the West African nation’s president.
An investigative report has revealed that in isolated regions of Myanmar, which has been accused of carrying out a genocide against Rohingya Muslims, the Burmese military has also been ethnically cleansing the minority Christian Kachin people.
UK-based religious freedom advocacy Christian Solidarity Worldwide has called for the release of four Christians who were arrested in the Indian state of Jharkhand in late May on anti-conversion charges.