Two Turkish Christians imprisoned near Izmir for a month on concocted charges of insulting Islam were ordered released March 30, after prosecution witnesses admitted that local gendarmarie officials pressured them to sign prepared complaints.
At least 40 people were killed last week in continuing sectarian violence in Indonesia’s Moluccas, also known as the Spice Islands. According to news reports, the fatalities resulted from clashes between Muslims and Christians in the town of Galela on the island of Halmahera in North Malaku province.
An urgent plea for prayer for the Christians of Indonesia has come out of that nation from a recent visitor who has just returned from the Spice Islands.
The last Assembly of God church building in the nation of Vietnam was destroyed last week. Before 1975, the Assemblies of God church had ten church buildings in Vietnam. Nine were destroyed or confiscated by the government prior to the year 2000. The final church, in the coastal city of Vung Tau, was demolished last week.
Prosecutors in northern Vietnam rejected an appeal by a Protestant who was sentenced to prison in December for “interfering with an officer” while she hosted a Christian meeting.
Chinese house church leader Li Dexian was detained by police on Tuesday morning and released the same evening without harm. The Protestant evangelist was arrested by Public Security Bureau officers at his weekly 10 a.m. Bible study in Huadu near Guangzhou for the 11th time since October, a source in Hong Kong told Newsroom.
Two Turkish Christians arrested March 1 while selling and distributing Christian literature near the southern port city of Izmir were refused bail today, pending a court hearing scheduled for March 30.
A Christian Uzbek pastor jailed since February 1999 on contrived fraud charges is being subjected to physical beatings for witnessing to his cellmates, church sources in the Central Asian republic reported in early March.
After a respite of one month, Chinese house church leader Li Dexian was detained by police on Tuesday for the 10th time since October. Public Security Bureau officers arrested the 45-year-old Protestant evangelist as he led his weekly 10 a.m. Bible study in Huadu, west of Guangzhou, a source in Hong Kong told Newsroom.
Pastor Li De Xian preached twice this week in his usual Tuesday meeting in Huadu near Guangzhou, China without interference from Chinese authorities. This marks four consecutive weeks without arrest or interference for Pastor Li’s ministry.
The sentencing of six Protestant house church leaders to hard labor last December and the arrest of six more leaders of the Roman Catholic underground church are but “the tip of the iceberg” of religious oppression, according to five prominent house church leaders inside China, contacted by Compass in January.
Saudi Arabia released four Filipino Christians in Riyadh yesterday, 40 days after their arrest by the country’s strict Islamic police for conducting Christian worship services in a private home.
To observers of China’s Christian church scene the event was as sudden as it was unexpected. Just the day before the Chinese New Year celebrations of February 5, one of China’s most prominent house church leaders, Zhang Rongliang, was released quietly from prison in Fangcheng City, Henan Province, on grounds of poor health. The news was relayed quickly to journalists and China specialists outside of China by friends who had remained in close contact with Zhang for several weeks.
Saudi Arabia has once again taken the dubious distinction of being the country where Christians are more severely persecuted than any other in the world. This was revealed in the January 2001 release of the Open Doors “World Watch List” (WWL), which ranks countries according to their level of Christian persecution.
Baptist pastor Rahim Tashov and a colleague were hauled into police headquarters in their hometown of Turkmenabad (formerly Chardjou) last Thursday, February 3.
For the past ten years earth-worshipping pagans have migrated from Canada, Brazil, Germany, Russia, and 25 other countries, to an isolated corner of Black Rock Desert in Nevada, where a four-day-long New Age techno-fest known as "The Burning Man" has been conducted.
For the past ten years earth-worshipping pagans have migrated from Canada, Brazil, Germany, Russia, and 25 other countries, to an isolated corner of Black Rock Desert in Nevada, where a four-day-long New Age techno-fest known as “The Burning Man” has been conducted.
Four of the 16 Filipino Christians arrested three weeks ago by Saudi religious police remain jailed and under interrogation in the capital Riyadh, a Filipino diplomat confirmed Wednesday. The three wives and five children arrested with them for conducting Christian worship in a private home have been released during the past week. Four adults were released the previous week.