A Pakistani court last week acquitted a Christian “blasphemy†prisoner on grounds that the convict was mentally unstable, while another Christian facing the same accusation was released on bail.
Gospel for Asia (GFA) native missionaries–including a state leader–have been driven away, beaten and even arrested by police at the site of the Ardh Kumbh, a massive festival during which millions of Hindu pilgrims bathe in the confluence of two sacred rivers at the north Indian town of Allahabad.
Groups of Ethiopian Christians were reportedly still hiding in churches Thursday, January 18, after one believer was killed, Christian homes burned and several believers were threatened with execution for converting from Islam.
Sudan’s embattled Christian minority attended church services Sunday, January, 21, as the predominantly Muslim nation plunged further into renewed civil war, despite a peace agreement brokered by US Governor Bill Richardson and others this month.
Tensions remained high in Indonesia’s volatile region of Poso Saturday, January 20, after a key Islamic militant admitted to taking part in the killing of three Christian high school girls there in 2005.
The government of India’s Hindu-ruled Rajasthan state has launched an investigation into the alleged involvement of a major evangelical mission group in the disappearance of children, news reports said Tuesday, January 16.
Tensions remained high in the Sri Lankan city of Jaffna Wednesday, January 17, after a pastor was shot dead by government security forces, triggering fears of more ethnic and religious clashes in the volatile region, local Christians and investigators said.
As soon as Christians in this capital city of Nasarawa state tried to rebuild a Reformed Church building that Muslims burned down two years ago, more than 200 Islamists attacked the workers.
At least nine Christians remained in police custody in China’s Henan province on Monday, January 15, more than a week after Chinese security forces raided a Christian gathering, fellow believers said.
Details emerged Monday, January 15, of long prison sentences given to eight Chinese Christians on charges that included inciting “violent resistance” against the destruction of a church.
Sudanese police have denied attacking 800 Christians at a New Year’s Eve service at Khartoum’s Anglican cathedral and injuring six members of the congregation, the church priest said.
Pastors and other believers were recovering from injuries or struggling to rebuild burnt down churches in several areas of India Wednesday, January 10, after militants reportedly attacked them.
A 200-strong mob prevented a church here from holding a Christmas Eve service in what was an otherwise peaceful holiday season in Indonesia. Some Muslim groups even provided protection for churches alongside police and army personnel.
Seven youths beat Pastor Robert Kennedy of Bangalore in Karnataka state on Sunday (January 7), after asking him to “pray for a sick friend.†The pastor required 16 stitches to his head and back after the assault.
Missionaries and church leaders warned Thursday, August 11, that Russia’s new law on non-governmental organizations (NGOs) could lead to persecution of devoted Christians “reminiscent of the Soviet era.”
A leading Vietnamese human rights lawyer and pro-democracy activist has been forcefully injected with unknown drugs in a mental hospital where she has been confined since last year, fellow dissidents said Tuesday, January 9.
Vietnamese security forces raided several prayer meetings of Montagnard Christians in the Central Highlands injuring dozens of believers, and at least one Montagnard Christian was fighting for his life Friday, January 5, following torture in prison, representatives said.
After launching several anti-Christian attacks during the last week of 2006, Hindu extremists went on to beat more Christians, vandalize vehicles and organize a protest rally against a church, dampening New Year celebrations.
There was concern Wednesday, January 3, about reports that at least nearly a million impoverished men, women and children, most of them Christians, have been “illegally enslaved” on the outskirts of Pakistan’s major cities and towns.
Iraq was named Wednesday, January 3, as the world’s “second-worst persecutor of Christians” after North Korea in an influential report expected to underscore concern about sectarian violence in the war-torn county.