The heavily persecuted house church Early Rain Covenant Church (ERCC) in Chengdu, China was raided by government authorities again on August 22, and 28 members were taken away during a worship service, International Christian Concern (ICC) reports.
Iran is set to hold a series of war drills with Russia and China, as the hardline regime celebrates the United States’ bungled evacuation in Afghanistan and boosts its enrichment of nuclear weapons-grade uranium to historically high levels.
The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) demanded Monday a two-month moratorium on COVID-19 “booster shots” to reduce vaccine inequality. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus condemned wealthy nations for stockpiling vaccines as poorer countries struggle to administer coronavirus jabs to their people.
While it has banned former U.S. President Donald J. Trump from its service, the social networking site Twitter continues to host accounts of high-profile officials linked to the Islamist Taliban group.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned the West not to interfere in Afghanistan after the fall of Kabul, amid signs that China and Russia are increasing their footprint there. The authoritarian leader said Western nations “must stop the irresponsible policy of imposing foreign values from abroad.”
Western allies of the United States struggle to respond to the Islamist Taliban group’s return to power in Afghanistan amid reports of killings and thousands fleeing the country. They also expressed concerns about the situation at a just-concluded virtual meeting of foreign ministers of the NATO military alliance.
Although Afghanistan is desperately poor, the Taliban now rule over a nation with nearly $1 trillion worth of mineral deposits that the world needs to manufacture clean technologies, CNN Business reports. Experts have said that Afghanistan has the natural resources to become one of the region’s richest countries within 10 years.
Emboldened by perceived U.S. weakness in the region, China rushed to send warships and fighter planes near U.S.-backed Taiwan which it regards as a renegade province.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents say they have now seized more than 121 shipments containing more than 3,000 counterfeit COVID-19 vaccine cards this year alone.
U.S. President Joe Biden said Monday that the takeover of Afghanistan by the Islamist Taliban group went more quickly than anticipated. Still, he defended his decision to withdraw U.S. forces from the war-torn country. “American troops should not die in a war that Afghans are not willing to fight for themselves,” he told the nation in televised remarks from the White House.
Continuing its policy of “Sinicizing” the church and country, China’s ruling Communist Party (CCP) arrested four house church school teachers in Wuhu, Anhui Province earlier this month, and charged them with conducting “illegal business operations,” International Christian Concern (ICC) reports. China now ranks 17 on the US Open Doors 2021 Watch List of top 50 countries where Christians are persecuted.
China is building a third missile field that will hold more than 100 new DF-41 intercontinental ballistic missiles, The Washington Times has learned.
Russia and China are holding massive military exercises in north-central China involving more than 10,000 troops amid shared concerns over the instability in Afghanistan and tensions with the West, officials confirmed.
Apocalyptic scenes ranging from droughts to massive fires and floods are making life difficult for millions of people worldwide. For example, thousands have fled wildfires in Greece where, after a small break, another heatwave with temperatures of over 40 degrees (104 Fahrenheit) was on its way — with the potential to worsen the situation.
China waged an extended cyberwar against Israeli private businesses and government entities in 2019 and 2020, an online security company announced Monday.
The top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee said in a report Monday that the coronavirus that causes COVID-19 leaked from China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology in August or early September 2019 and that Chinese officials took part in “the greatest coverup of all time.”
As part of its ongoing and systematic suppression of Christianity in China, the ruling Chinese Communist Party last month arrested five Christians from Shanxi Province last because they had attended a Christian conference in Malaysia last year, International Christian Concern (ICC) reports. According to ICC, Beijing is “paranoid” about Chinese Christians being in contact with believers overseas.
The politically charged dispute over the origins of COVID-19 spilled over at the U.N. General Assembly on Wednesday, with the U.S. accusing China trying to “undermine” the investigation and Beijing’s envoy retorting that the U.S. was smearing China in a bid to deflect attention from “its botched response to the pandemic.”
A prominent Chinese billionaire who was outspoken on issues such as human rights has been sentenced to 18 years imprisonment in China.
China on Wednesday told Brussels to stop “politicizing the issue of origins tracing” after a European Union official called for more investigations.