Stan Westrom, a former US Marine who became a missionary in East Africa, has died in a Nairobi hospital where he had been taken after being ambushed by bandits last Sunday (January 4).
Muslim groups are taking advantage of a document issued by the Indonesian government to close several existing churches and prevent the building of new churches in Jakarta. Letter of Decision No. 137, issued in 2002, allows for churches in the Jakarta area to be closed down — even if they have the required government permit — should people in the surrounding community object to their existence or location.
Since the Cambodian government closed the refugee camps in Mondulkiri and Rattanakiri provinces of Cambodia, the Vietnamese government has increased repression in the Central Highlands, arresting, imprisoning and killing the Montagnard Degar people to halt the spread of grass roots Christianity.
After being beaten into a coma three months ago for alleged “missionary propaganda,” Turkish Christian Yakup Cindilli is slowly improving from a nearly helpless state at his home, where his family has given him constant care for the past month.
Leaders of the Christian community in the northern state of Jigawa, Nigeria, report that Muslim extremists burned down 10 churches and over 100 church-owned properties in November during unprovoked attacks against Christians in the town of Kazaure.
A Protestant pastor in Pakistan’s Punjab province was murdered in the early hours of January 5, just minutes after he left his home to catch a train to Lahore.
One employee was killed and about eight others, including a nun, wounded when the Egyptian army attacked a Christian centre for mentally and physically handicapped children and orphans early Monday, January 5, a human rights watch-dogs said.
Following the disaster of December 26, native missionaries of Indonesia have been helping survivors on the northern tip of Sumatra Island, the single region with the most casualties.
Eritrean police arrested and jailed another Protestant evangelical pastor, taking him and seven of his church members to prison, according to a report from Compass Direct.
Police and military units in the northeastern state of Yobe, Nigeria, ended a violent attempt by Muslim militants to carve out an Islamic Republic there.
Iraq’s beleaguered Christian minority has ushered in the New Year amid grief and fears, after several bombs exploded and at least one believer was killed on a marketplace,
Registration is still a hot issue for China’s long-suffering house churches. The government insists on registration as the only means of legal existence for Protestant and Catholic churches. In practice, registration means subjection to the Communist Party’s Religious Affairs Bureau and other party organs, all of which are controlled by atheists.
BAM, IRAN (ANS) — Praying Iranian Christians and believers from around the world continued humanitarian efforts in Bam Saturday, January 3, as relief workers reported “miracle rescues” more than eighth days after an earth quake reduced this city to ruins.
The government of India has rejected a demand that social benefits be extended to Dalit Christians and Muslims, compounding the problems faced by the most downtrodden social class in India.
The Voice of the Martyrs (VOM) urged prayers for a jailed Christian Internet writer Zhang Shengqi and other Christian contacts who were arrested amid a crackdown against house churches across China,
More than 10 Christian churches and a church-run vocational training center in and around the sprawling Wad el Bashier displaced persons camp in West Omdurman, Sudan, have been demolished by authorities in an ongoing urban re-planning exercise affecting thousands of people.
It will be yet another difficult Christmas for the tribal Montagnard Christians of Central Vietnam as disturbing allegations have reached ANS that a Montagnard Christian has been killed, others tortured and Bibles confiscated. (Pictured: Center, A Montagnard (Degar) Christian arrested (and later beaten) by Vietnamese authorities for practicing Christianity).
DUBLIN, December 22 (Compass) — Police in Indonesia pledged today to provide tighter security for churches during Christmas and New Year celebrations, after one of their own was arrested in connection with the murder of a Christian village chief on the island of Sulawesi.
The leader of a persecuted Baptist community in Turkmenistan has been freed after six days of detention at the feared secret police headquarters of the former Soviet republic, a human rights watchdog said Monday, Dec. 22
A leading human rights group urged believers around the world Wednesday Dec. 17 to pray for the safety of two rearrested former Muslims who recently became Christians and “are likely to be subjected to serious beatings.”