In recent months Chinese officials have attempted to build bridges with the Protestant house church movement even as police raided more unregistered congregations, arrested Christian leaders and forced at least 400 college students to swear they would stop attending such worship services.
Hundreds of villagers of Burma’s, predominantly Christian, Karen minority have been displaced and several killed in fresh fighting in the country’s disputed Karen State area, a Christian rights group said Tuesday, November 4.
A land dispute led to two attacks on the headquarters of the Indonesian Christian Students’ Movement (GMKI) and its parent ministry, the Alliance of Indonesian Churches (PGI), last week (August 26 and 28).
Members of a house church in the breakaway Somali republic of Somaliland have fled to neighboring Ethiopia after hearing that the government wants to arrest them as part of a crackdown on evangelical Christians, an influential human rights group said Thursday, January 24.
An advocacy group representing churches and mission organizations says Hindu militants backed by political parties and groups have carried out at least 500 attacks against mainly Christian missionaries in the past 23 months, and urged the central government to halt the violence.
In a highly unusual press conference in Pyongyang in September, the National Security Service of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) announced the arrest of “foreign spies” and “native citizens working for a foreign intelligence service.” The Voice of the Martyrs (VOM), a ministry serving Christians in restricted nations who are persecuted for their faith, announced today that those arrested in North Korea were in fact Christian believers and not spies.
It is Easter 2007, a day when the world is celebrating the resurrection of Jesus. They came from near and far throughout Central and Midwestern Nepal, the throng of masses converging and marching through the center of the crown city of Pokhara, at the foot of the Annapurna mountain range. No, this is not another Communist Maoist rally that we see so often these days, but it is a rally of men and women, boys and girls joyfully lifting up the banner of Jesus Christ, their Lord and King! Jesus said, “If I be lifted up I will draw all men unto me!†Today Jesus is being lifted up in major cities in Nepal.
An influential Christian politician was in hiding in Vietnam Tuesday, April 24, after being harassed by Vietnamese security forces who also attacked other dissidents planning to meet US officials, a leading human rights activist confirmed to BosNewsLife.
One person was killed, a number injured and over 35 arrested in Harare on Sunday, March 11, after hundreds of armed riot police used shotguns and teargas to shut down a prayer meeting about the deteriorating situation in Zimbabwe.
There was mounting concern Tuesday, March 13, about the whereabouts of an evangelical Sri Lankan pastor, his two sons, and another Christian young man who disappeared this month amid intense fighting between Sri Lanka’s government forces and the independence seeking Tamil Tiger rebels, Christians said.
A Christian pro-democracy activist was released by Vietnamese authorities Tuesday, March 13, after spending over 12 hours in police custody, but the whereabouts of a human rights lawyer remained unknown, dissidents told BosNewsLife.
A prominent Mennonite pastor and his wife were recovering Sunday, March 11, from “brutal” beatings by Vietnamese security forces as part of a government crackdown on dissidents, a key activist told BosNewsLife.
A major human rights watchdog accused the Vietnamese government on Friday, March 9 of “flouting” its commitments on human rights by launching “one of the worst crackdowns on peaceful dissidents,” including Christians, “in 20 years.”
Dozens of Christian leaders, including three church officials from South Korea, were detained by Chinese security forces Tuesday, March 6, as part of an apparent government crackdown on independent Christian groups, representatives said.
Zimbabweans planned to hold a prayer vigil Monday, January 29, outside a court-room where eight detained Christian officials were due to appear after Zimbabwe’s largest crackdown on Christian leaders in six years.
Three computer users jailed for comments they made on an Internet forum and website dedicated to religious freedom in Vietnam have been released by Vietnamese authorities after a story by Christian news agency BosNewsLife sparked international protests, fellow activists confirmed, Friday, August 18.
Amid international pressure, Bhutan released two evangelical Christian government workers who were jailed after preaching and showing the internationally acclaimed ‘Jesus’ film to Buddhists, Christian rights investigators confirmed Monday, July 31.
There was mounting concern Wednesday, July 26, over a new crackdown on Christians in Uzbekistan after authorities closed down US-based aid group Central Asia Free Exchange (CAFE) on charges of “illegal religious activities,” including preaching the Gospel.
Dutch Queen Beatrix was weighing her options late Friday, June 30, after the center-right government collapsed over an immigration row that was expected to also impact persecuted Christian converts seeking refuge in the Netherlands.
An avalanche of media coverage of an Afghan man facing the death penalty for converting to Christianity has apparently sparked the arrest and deepening harassment of other Afghan Christians in the ultra-conservative Muslim country.