Police detained 16 more members of Beijing’s Shouwang House Church and placed others under house arrest: two were held in protective custody while the rest were sent to 10 different police stations; most were released by Sunday morning.
Sudanese Military agents killed one Christian and Islamic militants another last week after attacking churches in Sudan’s embattled South Kordofan state.
Uzbekistan continues to persecute Christians exercising their religious rights. Recently a Christian in eastern Uzbekistan was beaten by police, another was threatened with death by an axe while a Baptist congregation was promised prison for failure to co-operate in a pre-trial investigation of their pastor.
The Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, warned that the vacuum left by failed autocratic regimes was being filled by extremists who have turned the Arab Spring into a “very anxious time” for Christians.
Poland has granted asylum to 16 Christian refugees who accompanied Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski on a flight back from Tunisia.The Foreign Ministry said Friday, June 17, that the six adults and 10 children were “political refugees” from Eritrea and Nigeria, whose lives have been upturned by recent turmoil in North Africa.
An international advocacy group urged the U.S. government Friday, June 17, to condemn Indian authorities for reportedly asking three American Christians to leave India because they allegedly participated in evangelism.
Christians in Pakistan remained fearful Thursday, June 16, after a court in Pakistan acquitted 70 Muslims who were suspected of killing Christians in one of the country’s worst sectarian clashes in recent memory.
Christian rights campaigners on Wednesday, June 15, demanded the immediate release of seven Vietnamese activists, including three Christians, who were convicted of “attempting to overthrow the government” and jailed to between two and eight years.
An Indonesian court sentenced an Islamic cleric to one year in jail for provoking hundreds of people to riot, attacking police and burning churches.
The Christian farmers of Mdandi village in northern Nigeria were preparing for a new harvest when armed Islamists attacked their homes and drove them out.
No country in the Middle East has seen more Christians imprisoned in 2011 than in Iran. A recent report by Christian Solidarity Worldwide revealed that 254 Christians were arrested in more than thirty cities across the country since June 2010.
Nepal’s government has defended a proposed law that Christians say effectively bans evangelism and could lead to a crackdown on devoted believers.
Christians in Sudan expressed concern about their future as South Sudan’s army said northern warplanes bombed its territory on Monday, June 13, following fighting in a tense border area.
Sunday, June 12, marked the second anniversary of the kidnappings of nine Christian foreigners in Yemen by suspected Muslim militants, but German and British investigators “were understood” to have ended “their active search” for those still missing, advocacy group Middle East Concern (MEC) said.
Police in northern Nigeria have detained suspected Islamic militants who allegedly killed a pentecostal pastor, his assistant, and at least 10 other people, Worthy News monitored Saturday, June 11.
Anglicans in Zimbabwe are facing increasing levels of political violence in order to silence them ahead of local elections as the current regime forces their churches into a position of political compliance in order to continue to worship there.
The High Commissioner of police in Bejaia ordered all Christian churches closed, including places of worship still under construction; if not, the commissioner threatened “severe consequences and punishments” would result.
Hundreds of mainly Christian refugees from Eritrea are jailed or or held by kidnappers in Egypt, where they face torture, beatings and sexual assault, according to Christian aid workers who contacted Worthy News.
The fate of an Iranian Christian prisoner remained unclear Friday, June 10, nearly nine months after he was detained by security forces as part of a reported government crackdown on devoted Christians in this strict Islamic nation.
An international Christian rights group has expressed “grave concerns” about increased violence against Christians and other religious minorities in Indonesia and urged the government to tackle Islamic extremism.