40 Pakistani Christians who were detained over the weekend in Saudi Arabia for holding a joint Catholic-Protestant prayer service have been released, news reports said Monday, April 25.
Currently 16 full-time pastors are among nearly 900 Eritrean Christians known to be jailed in local prisons, military confinement camps and shipping containers for daring to meet secretly for prayer and worship outside government-sanctioned churches.
Unknown killers kidnapped and brutally killed a Protestant pastor and his driver near the capital of Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) last week, apparently in retribution for their evangelizing activities among Muslims.
Two survivors of the North Korean prison camps have spoken at the UN Commission on Human Rights, the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office and at the EU.
Iranian Christian Hamid Pourmand must appear before the Islamic (sharia) court of Iran within nine days. An exact court date has not been released. Arrested last September when security police raided a church conference he was attending, the Assemblies of God lay pastor will be brought up before the Islamic court between April 11 and 14 to face charges of apostasy from Islam and proselytizing Muslims to the Christian belief. Both “crimes” are punishable by death.
The chief minister of India’s western state of Maharashtra, Vilasrao Deshmukh, has rejected a proposed ‘anti-conversion bill’ amid warnings the legislation would increase the persecution of Christians, BosNewsLife monitored Monday, April 4.
The family of the Rev. Jokran Ratu, kidnapped four months ago on a remote Indonesian island, still does not know whether he is dead or alive. No ransom demand has been received and police have not apprehended the kidnappers.
Lawyers acting on behalf of the Rev. Nguyen Hong Quang informed his wife last week that his appeal before the People’s Supreme Court of Vietnam has been rescheduled for April 12.
Sources have confirmed the murder by beheading on March 8 of Dulal Sarkar, a lay pastor and evangelist in Bangladesh.
At least 17 Christian men in Laos, including church leaders, have been detained by Communist authorities and are facing torture and possible death amid an apparent new government crackdown on Christians, missionaries said Monday, April 4.Christian Aid Mission (CAM), an organization supporting indigenous missionaries, said most of those arrested since last week are from Hueyhoy Nua village in Laos’ troubled southern Savannakhet province.
Armed gunmen attacked Christian worshippers as they emerged from Easter Sunday services in a village church near the southern outskirts of Lahore yesterday, killing one young Christian man and injuring seven other congregants.
At least one Christian was seriously injured when Hindu militants “brutally attacked” church members in India’s southern Kerala state for watching the film ‘The Passion of The Christ’, an official confirmed Monday, March 28.
The Sri Lankan government will cast a deciding vote on anti-conversion legislation in April, despite sharp criticism of the “Act for the Protection of Religious Freedom.”
Persecuted Evangelical Christians and missionary workers in Kyrgyzstan were awaiting a new dawn late Thursday, March 24, as lawmakers of this former Soviet republic appointed a new interim president, news reports suggested.
Native missionaries in Liberia are rebuilding damaged churches and evangelizing to help end ethnic and religious strife in the African nation, where two United Nations peacekeepers were injured Wednesday, March 23, UN and Christian officials said.
Native Christian missionaries in rural Colombia are refusing to leave despite attacks from guerilla groups which they claim have “randomly confiscated multiple church buildings” and forced hundreds of villagers to flee to major cities, BosNewsLife learned Tuesday, March 22.
A simmering dispute over the closing of dozens of evangelical churches by the government broke into the open when a leading evangelical member of Costa Ricas Congress staged a protest by climbing the country’s principal monument.
A leading evangelical pastor disappeared off the streets of Asmara four days ago, presumably detained by Eritrean security forces and jailed at some unknown location.
In early March, China adopted the new Regulations on Religious Affairs, first announced by the government in December 2004. The government claims the new regulations are a step towards religious freedom. However, some Christian leaders have expressed serious concerns, particularly with the issue of church registration.
Last Sunday evening, Eritrean security police arrested 16 Protestants for watching a Christian video together in a church member’s home in the town of Adi-Kibe.