At 6 a.m. on Oct. 3, two clergymen staying at parish premises on Russia’s western edge awoke to find military figures armed with machine guns raiding the site, seizing electronic devices, documents and computer hard drives.
The governor of Kaduna state, Nigeria met with church leaders after the pace of terrorist killings since September increased in a Christian area, including 25 people slain in the first two weeks of January, sources said.
A court in China sentenced a prominent Protestant pastor to 14 years in prison. The pastor’s wife and four church members have also been sentenced to prison terms ranging from three to 10 years. They were all found guilty of purportedly “using superstition to undermine the law.”
Pakistan’s leading human rights and religious freedom advocate, Peter Jacob, is among eight individuals from different countries who were awarded with the US Secretary of State’s International Religious Freedom Award in recognition of their courage and commitment to promoting and defending religious freedom globally.
Authorities in Nicaragua have jailed nine pastors for more than a month on charges that they formed part of a criminal operation along with three U.S. missionaries, according to the mission organization.
A Sudanese Christian 85 miles southeast of Khartoum has succumbed to his injuries af-ter militants from the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) assaulted him, sources said.
Fulani herdsmen and other terrorists kidnapped a pastor and three other Christians on Saturday (Jan. 13) in central Nigeria, sources said.
Large numbers of churches were closed last year, with only four of Algeria’s 47 official Protestant congregations continuing and at least 10,000 churches shut down in China, according to Open Doors’ 2024 World Watch List (WWL) of the 50 countries where it is most difficult to be a Christian.
The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on Religious Liberty warns that attacks on churches constitute the “largest threat to religious liberty in 2024” and could threaten “the very lives of people of faith.” The USCCB’s Committee on Religious Liberty released its annual report, titled “The State of Religious Liberty in the United States” on Tuesday. The document acts as a year in review highlighting developments on issues related to religious liberty such as abortion, human sexuality
A protracted court battle is not over for a Finnish MP and bishop after the country's state prosecutor announced it would appeal a recent 'not guilty' verdict. Charges were brought against Päivi Räsänen, former Minister of the Interior, and Bishop Juhana Pohjola after they shared their Christian beliefs on marriage and sexual ethics in a 2004 pamphlet.
Tens of thousands of Christians from the Kuki-Zo tribal community in India’s northeastern state of Manipur continue to be displaced, more than eight months after the onset of ongoing violence. During this period, at least 80 individuals, including women and children, have died due to inadequate healthcare and substandard living conditions in makeshift shelters in one district alone.
A Muslim teacher at an Islamic school in eastern Uganda who became a Christian on Oct. 4 was killed on Oct. 21, area sources said.
