Amid international pressure well-known house church leader Zhao Wenquan has been released from custody, two weeks after his May 9 arrest in Hegou Town, Meng Cheng County, Anhui Province, a human rights groups said Friday May 28.
Gu Xianggao was beaten to death on April 27 while in the custody of Chinese Public Security Bureau (PSB) officers. He was 28 years old.
For the first time in history, Chinese Christians gave evidence of persecution in April at a special meeting called by the United Nations Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) in Geneva. Several speakers testified to beatings, imprisonment, torture and damage to church buildings in recent years.
Three house churches in Sarpang district of southern Bhutan were visited by police on the night of April 11 following their Easter Sunday services. According to a respected Christian leader in Bhutan, the church members were warned to discontinue meeting together for worship. The raids seem to confirm a growing crackdown against Christian activity in Bhutan.
A 100-year-old building that housed an unregistered Chinese house church was badly damaged on March 11, then completely destroyed March 31. The church was located in Dong Gang Xi village, Beilun District, Ningbo City, Zhejiang Province. This congregation included about 300 members, and had existed for the past 20 years. Liu Fuen, 50, pastored the church throughout its history.
Persecuted Chinese House Church leaders, including tortured and sexually abused women, have for the first time testified at the United Nations Commission on Human Rights amid claims that the Beijing government is increasing pressure on unregistered churches and active believers, ASSIST News Service (ANS) learned Monday April 5.
Human rights watchdog The Voice of the Martyrs (VOM) urged Christians Saturday, March 13, to pray for three representatives of China?s rapidly growing house church movement who it said were due to appear in a Chinese court on charges of “providing intelligence to overseas organizations.”
In January 2004, top cadres of China’s Religious Affairs Bureau and the policy-making United Front Work Department met for the annual National Religious Working Conference.
Two Egyptian Coptic Christians jailed by Saudi authorities have been released 17 days after their arrest for establishing an expatriate house church in the capital of Riyadh.
Two Egyptian Christians jailed in the Saudi capital of Riyadh 10 days ago for leading a house church were ordered released this morning by Prince Sultan bin Abdul Aziz Al-Saud.
Mr. Xiao Bi-guang and Mr. Zhang Yi-nan were arrested last Friday morning in Ping Ding Shan city, Henan Province, China. Sources in China reported that more than 20 Public Security Bureau (PSB) officers made the arrest. The location where the two men are being held is unknown at this time. Their families have received no official notification, in violation of Chinese law which says the family of arrested persons will be notified of their location within 24 hours after arrest.
HO CHI MINH CITY, March 19 (Compass) — In what may be a small breakthrough for religious liberty, Vietnam’s religion authorities invited five leaders of Protestant house church organizations and non-denominational missions to Hanoi for “informal talks†in early March.
At about 8:00 p.m. on Sunday, January 5, 2003, approximately 10 unidentified men burst into the home of Brother Hua Huiqi and his wife, Ju Mei in Beijing. Forcing all of the members of the household, including Hua’s elderly parents, to lay on the floor, the attackers savagely beat the family, breaking one of the legs of Hua’s 80-year-old father. They then confiscated all of the home’s portable heaters, leaving the family to suffer from the cold of winter. It is believed that the intruders were either sent by the police or could even have been plain-clothes policemen.
Four female leaders of the South China Church, an unregistered house church network, were declared innocent by the Hubei Provincial Court on October 11. However, only hours after their release they were re-arrested by the Public Security Bureau and sent to three years of “re-education through labor.”
NASHVILLE, Tenn. (BP)–The revelation by North Korea that it had engaged in a clandestine operation to develop nuclear weapons, contrary to promises made to the Clinton administration in 1994, thrust the Asian nation again into the news. However, many in the United States have had the communist nation on their minds and in their prayers for years for its shoddy record in human rights.
SANTA ANA, CA (ANS) — Terry Madison, U.S. president and CEO of Open Doors with Brother Andrew has said that Saudi Arabia’s treatment of two expatriate Christians is further proof of why this desert Kingdom is among the world’s worst persecutor of Christians.
ISTANBUL, April 1 (Compass) — An Ethiopian and Filipino Christian jailed since last summer in the Saudi Arabian port city of Jeddah were released and deported to their home countries over Easter weekend.
by Alex Buchan LONDON, January 31 (Compass)– In an attempt to ensure fair treatment of house church leader Gong Shengliang, six jailed female co-workers from the embattled South China Church authorized the release on January 29 of three letters detailing how they were tortured by police into providing false testimony against him. In a secret December trial, Gong was sentenced to death on charges of rape and arson, and of leading a cult. Although due to be executed on January 5, fifty-year-old Gong was granted permission to appeal his death sentence while on death row after international pressure was applied … Read more
A crucial paradox lies at the heart of China’s persecution dynamics. Over the past 30 years, conditions have improved for Christians in China. But during the past five years, they have deteriorated markedly.
LONDON, January 7 (Compass) — The forty-six-year-old founder of the “South China” house church movement, Gong Shengliang, was granted a reprieve from his death sentence, which was due to be carried out on Saturday, January 5. Gong was given a stay of execution, relatives said.