Persecution Unveiled Cause

Persecution Unveiled Cause
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Persecution Unveiled has established this cause to educate people about the persecution of Christians and religious minorities in the US & worldwide. Mission Raising awareness to the growing tide of bigotry and hatred toward Christians around the world has become a burden on those trying to wake up those who cherish religious freedom as a God given right. Persecution Unveiled has been called by God to prick the consciences of this nation and all free people to speak up and act on behalf of those who have no voice. Email
persecutionunveiled@gmail.com

Sunday, June 28, 2020

China: 200 Communist Officials Demolish Church, Beat Christians


Reports have also indicated that authorities have required that some churches remove pictures of Jesus and the Virgin Mary inside of their buildings and replace them with images of President Xi Jinping.


A Chinese Catholic woman prays at the government-sanctioned Xishiku Catholic
 Church on August 14, 2014, in Beijing, China|Getty Images/Kevin Frayer

By Anugrah Kumar
Christian Post


A Christian man was arrested and at least two women were injured in China’s Henan province after 200 communist officials stormed into Sunzhuang Church, which is part of a network of government-run churches, and brought it down using cranes and heavy-duty machinery.

The officials from the Zhengzhou High-Tech District’s Ethnic and Religious Affairs Bureau did not show any legal documents when they demolished the church on June 12, the U.S.-based group China Aid said in a statement this week.

They threw the church’s furniture and other belongings out of the building before razing it, reported China Aid, which helps those who are persecuted by the Communist Party in China.

A Christian woman who tried to resist the officials lost consciousness after being pushed to the ground. She and another female member of the church who was beaten had to be hospitalized, the group said, and a male church attendee was taken into custody.

Sunzhuang Church joined the Three-Self Patriotic Movement in June 2012, when the communist government allowed it to build a new church building. After the building had been constructed in June 2013, the church received eviction and demolition notices from the Sunzhuang village authorities.

China Aid said the 2013 decision to demolish the church was made without the villagers' consent and authorities were barred from carrying out the demolition at the time. Instead, vehicles owned by Henan province threw tons of dirt and rocks at the church’s doorway. Officials also cut off electricity and water to the church.

The Italian-based magazine Bitter Winter, a publication produced by the Center for Studies on New Religion which covers human rights issues in China, reported earlier this month that authorities removed crosses from more than 250 state-sanctioned churches in Anhui province between January and April.


“All Christian symbols are ordered to be removed as part of the government’s crackdown campaign,” a provincial employee from Ma’anshan city was quoted as saying.

China’s crackdown on religion and religious minorities has drawn scrutiny from international actors such as the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, rights groups, and the U.S. State Department.

In its 2020 annual report, USCIRF noted that not only have authorities removed crosses from churches across the nation, but they have also banned youth age 18 and younger from participating in religious services.

Reports have also indicated that authorities have required that some churches remove pictures of Jesus and the Virgin Mary inside of their buildings and replace them with images of President Xi Jinping.

On Open Doors USA’s World Watch List, China is ranked as one of the worst countries in the world when it comes to the persecution of Christians. The organization notes that all churches are perceived as a threat if they become too large, too political, or invite foreign guests.



Persecution Unveiled has been called to prick the consciences of our nation and all free people to pray for, speak up and act on behalf of those who are persecuted for their faith. Follow us on Pinterest.

Saturday, June 13, 2020

Trump Signs International Religious Freedom Executive Order, Approving $50 Million for Programs

The order comes as religious persecution, including against Christians worldwide, continues to rise




By Amanda Casanova
Christian Headlines

President Donald Trump signed an executive order this week that earmarks $50 million for religious freedom programs around the world.

CBN News reports that under the order, named Advancing International Religious Freedom, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo will create action plans for countries to help eliminate religious persecution. The money will go to the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development.

"Religious freedom, America's first freedom, is a moral and national security imperative," the order states. "Religious freedom for all people worldwide is a foreign policy priority of the United States, and the United States will respect and vigorously promote this freedom.”

The order comes as religious persecution, including against Christians worldwide, continues to rise. According to Open Doors USA’s 2020 World Watch List, North Korea, Afghanistan and Somalia are the most dangerous countries for Christians.

USAID Acting Administrator John Barsa praised the executive order, saying the organization was “grateful for the President's leadership in advancing religious freedom around the world."

"Americans have always believed our first freedom is the freedom of religion, and it is a key component of our national security strategy," Barsa wrote. "Whether in response to genocide committed against Christians and Yazidis in Northern Iraq, or the ethnic cleansing of the Muslim Rohingya in Burma, the institutional culture regarding international religious freedom has become a top priority at USAID."

Vice President Mike Pence tweeted that he was “proud to stand with [Trump] today as he continued to take decisive action to promote Religious Freedom around the world.”

The order follows the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom’s annual report, which was release in April. The report named 14 countries around the world as “countries of particular concern,” where those countries encourage or tolerate “systematic, ongoing, egregious violations.”

"USCIRF has long called on the U.S. government to develop an overall strategy for promoting religious freedom abroad, as well as country-specific action plans, and we welcome the fact that this Executive Order requires the State Department and USAID to do exactly that," USCIRF Vice Chair Gayle Manchin said in a statement.

Website: Christian Headlines

Persecution Unveiled has been called to prick the consciences of our nation and all free people to pray for, speak up and act on behalf of those who are persecuted for their faith. Follow us on Pinterest.

Chinese Police Secretly Install Surveillance Cameras in Churches

"They can see every move in the church. If we didn’t follow their demands, the church would have to be shut down.”



By Michael Foust
Christian Headlines


The pastor of a Chinese church says police last month secretly installed security cameras to monitor the congregation’s activities and to try and force him to stop preaching, according to a new report.

Pastor Ma Chao of the Guangfu house church in Guangdong province told China Aid he was heading to a prayer meeting in May when he noticed three cameras outside the church building, pointing toward the main entrance.

He was told police had installed them to watch Ma and the church’s members.

The cameras were installed several days after police investigated three church members at the building.

“Four police officers came, saying that they were investigating the church’s gathering. Two of them said we were not allowed to meet,” Ma said. “I was not present at the time, but pastor Wu, along with another pastor and elder were there.”

The church members asked the police for their identification and for the reason behind their visit, but were refused.

“A police said that his uniform is the ID,” Ma told China Aid. “They also took pictures of the church’s Bibles, hymnbooks, and said that this is where Ma Chao has his illegal gathering, so they came specifically for it.”

Police also investigated Ma in April. He believes the visits are “meant to threaten him and push him out of Guangzhou,” International Christian Concern reported.

Although Ma’s church is an illegal, unregistered house church, China has used cameras to monitor legal Three-Self Patriotic Movement congregations, too.

Last year, Bitter Winter reported that 155 of the 170 Three-Self churches in one section of Huai’an city (Jiangsu province) had government-mandated cameras. They are connected to a network, allowing Chinese officials to monitor Christians.



Persecution Unveiled has been called to prick the consciences of our nation and all free people to pray for, speak up and act on behalf of those who are persecuted for their faith. Follow us on Pinterest.


Wednesday, June 10, 2020

Archbishop Viganò’s Powerful Letter to President Trump: Eternal Struggle Between Good and Evil Playing Out Right Now

Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò warns the president that the current crises over the coronavirus pandemic and the George Floyd riots are a part of the eternal spiritual struggle between the forces of good and evil. 



By Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò
Life Site News

Life Site Editor’s note: Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò has released this powerful letter today to President Trump warning him that the current crises over the coronavirus pandemic and the George Floyd riots are a part of the eternal spiritual struggle between the forces of good and evil. You are not alone in your beliefs on life, faith, family and freedom.


June 7, 2020
Holy Trinity Sunday

Mr. President,


       In recent months we have been witnessing the formation of two opposing sides that I would call Biblical: the children of light and the children of darkness. The children of light constitute the most conspicuous part of humanity, while the children of darkness represent an absolute minority. And yet the former are the object of a sort of discrimination which places them in a situation of moral inferiority with respect to their adversaries, who often hold strategic positions in government, in politics, in the economy and in the media. In an apparently inexplicable way, the good are held hostage by the wicked and by those who help them either out of self-interest or fearfulness.

       These two sides, which have a Biblical nature, follow the clear separation between the offspring of the Woman and the offspring of the Serpent. On the one hand there are those who, although they have a thousand defects and weaknesses, are motivated by the desire to do good, to be honest, to raise a family, to engage in work, to give prosperity to their homeland, to help the needy, and, in obedience to the Law of God, to merit the Kingdom of Heaven. On the other hand, there are those who serve themselves, who do not hold any moral principles, who want to demolish the family and the nation, exploit workers to make themselves unduly wealthy, foment internal divisions and wars, and accumulate power and money: for them the fallacious illusion of temporal well-being will one day – if they do not repent – yield to the terrible fate that awaits them, far from God, in eternal damnation.

       In society, Mr. President, these two opposing realities co-exist as eternal enemies, just as God and Satan are eternal enemies. And it appears that the children of darkness – whom we may easily identify with the deep state which you wisely oppose and which is fiercely waging war against you in these days – have decided to show their cards, so to speak, by now revealing their plans. They seem to be so certain of already having everything under control that they have laid aside that circumspection that until now had at least partially concealed their true intentions. The investigations already under way will reveal the true responsibility of those who managed the Covid emergency not only in the area of health care but also in politics, the economy, and the media. We will probably find that in this colossal operation of social engineering there are people who have decided the fate of humanity, arrogating to themselves the right to act against the will of citizens and their representatives in the governments of nations.

       We will also discover that the riots in these days were provoked by those who, seeing that the virus is inevitably fading and that the social alarm of the pandemic is waning, necessarily have had to provoke civil disturbances, because they would be followed by repression which, although legitimate, could be condemned as an unjustified aggression against the population. The same thing is also happening in Europe, in perfect synchrony. It is quite clear that the use of street protests is instrumental to the purposes of those who would like to see someone elected in the upcoming presidential elections who embodies the goals of the deep state and who expresses those goals faithfully and with conviction. It will not be surprising if, in a few months, we learn once again that hidden behind these acts of vandalism and violence there are those who hope to profit from the dissolution of the social order so as to build a world without freedom: Solve et Coagula, as the Masonic adage teaches.

       Although it may seem disconcerting, the opposing alignments I have described are also found in religious circles. There are faithful Shepherds who care for the flock of Christ, but there are also mercenary infidels who seek to scatter the flock and hand the sheep over to be devoured by ravenous wolves. It is not surprising that these mercenaries are allies of the children of darkness and hate the children of light: just as there is a deep state, there is also a deep church that betrays its duties and forswears its proper commitments before God. Thus the Invisible Enemy, whom good rulers fight against in public affairs, is also fought against by good shepherds in the ecclesiastical sphere. It is a spiritual battle, which I spoke about in my recent Appeal which was published on May 8.

       For the first time, the United States has in you a President who courageously defends the right to life, who is not ashamed to denounce the persecution of Christians throughout the world, who speaks of Jesus Christ and the right of citizens to freedom of worship. Your participation in the March for Life, and more recently your proclamation of the month of April as National Child Abuse Prevention Month, are actions that confirm which side you wish to fight on. And I dare to believe that both of us are on the same side in this battle, albeit with different weapons.

       For this reason, I believe that the attack to which you were subjected after your visit to the National Shrine of Saint John Paul II is part of the orchestrated media narrative which seeks not to fight racism and bring social order, but to aggravate dispositions; not to bring justice, but to legitimize violence and crime; not to serve the truth, but to favor one political faction. And it is disconcerting that there are Bishops – such as those whom I recently denounced – who, by their words, prove that they are aligned on the opposing side. They are subservient to the deep state, to globalism, to aligned thought, to the New World Order which they invoke ever more frequently in the name of a universal brotherhood which has nothing Christian about it, but which evokes the Masonic ideals of those want to dominate the world by driving God out of the courts, out of schools, out of families, and perhaps even out of churches.

       The American people are mature and have now understood how much the mainstream media does not want to spread the truth but seeks to silence and distort it, spreading the lie that is useful for the purposes of their masters. However, it is important that the good – who are the majority – wake up from their sluggishness and do not accept being deceived by a minority of dishonest people with unavowable purposes. It is necessary that the good, the children of light, come together and make their voices heard. What more effective way is there to do this, Mr. President, than by prayer, asking the Lord to protect you, the United States, and all of humanity from this enormous attack of the Enemy? Before the power of prayer, the deceptions of the children of darkness will collapse, their plots will be revealed, their betrayal will be shown, their frightening power will end in nothing, brought to light and exposed for what it is: an infernal deception.

       Mr. President, my prayer is constantly turned to the beloved American nation, where I had the privilege and honor of being sent by Pope Benedict XVI as Apostolic Nuncio. In this dramatic and decisive hour for all of humanity, I am praying for you and also for all those who are at your side in the government of the United States. I trust that the American people are united with me and you in prayer to Almighty God.

       United against the Invisible Enemy of all humanity, I bless you and the First Lady, the beloved American nation, and all men and women of good will.

+ Carlo Maria Viganò

Titular Archbishop of Ulpiana
Former Apostolic Nuncio to the United States of America


Persecution Unveiled has been called to prick the consciences of our nation and all free people to pray for, speak up and act on behalf of those who are persecuted for their faith. Follow us on Pinterest.

Monday, June 8, 2020

Five Ways Iran Violates Christians’ Rights to Religious Freedom

Iran ranks as the ninth worst country in the world when it comes to Christian persecution on Open Doors USA’s 2020 World Watch List. 


Iranian flag in Abyaneh mountain village; Wikimedia Commons/Nick Taylor

By Anugrah Kumar
Christian Post


Five Christian groups have submitted a collaborative report to the United Nations Human Rights Committee, listing five ways in which Iranian Christians face violations to their right to freedom of religion or belief that go against the Islamic country’s international commitments.

The nonprofit watchdog group Article 18, which promotes religious freedom and tolerance for Christians in Iran, has released the report in collaboration with its partner organizations Open Doors, Christian Solidarity Worldwide, Middle East Concern and The World Evangelical Alliance.

Here are the five ways Iran persecutes Christians, according to the report:

1. Iran prohibits Persian-language church services and religious materials, and forces closure of those that fail to comply, the report points out.

Last May, an Assyrian church in northwestern Iran was closed down and the cross was removed from its tower because it reportedly attracted Muslim-born Iranians as its services were held in the Persian language, according to World Watch Monitor.

Church members who were found to have evangelized to Muslims, such as the Assyrian pastor Victor Bet-Tamraz, had been charged with “actions against national security” and handed long prison sentences.

2. The Iranian government uses Articles 489, 499 and 500 of the country’s Penal Code to prosecute Christians for their peaceful religious activities.

Last month, four Iranian Christian converts — Hossein Kadivar, Khalil Dehghanpour, Kamal Naamanian and Mohammed Vafadar — were summoned to begin their five-year jail sentences for leading house churches in the northern city of Rasht, for which they were convicted of “acting against national security.”

3. Iranian authorities prosecute — and in one case executed — Iranians who leave Islam on charges of “apostasy,” and justifies it through the use of Article 220 of the Iranian Penal Code and Article 167 of the Constitution, which allows judges to rely on non-codified Islamic law.

Iranian Christian prisoner Yousef Nadarkhani was first arrested on charges of apostasy and was given a death sentence in 2010. That conviction was quashed in 2012, following international outcry. He is, however, still serving a 10-year sentence for his Christian activities.

4. Iran confiscates or forces closure of church properties, just as it did with the Assyrian Presbyterian Church in Tabriz last May.

“Intelligence agents stormed the 100-year-old church, officially recognized as a national heritage site in Iran, on Thursday, May 9, changed all the locks, tore down the cross from the church tower, and ordered the churchwarden to leave,” Article 18 reported at the time.

5. Iran discriminates against non-Muslims in marriage and inheritance laws, and in giving access to employment and education.

According to the country’s Civil Code, a Muslim woman is not allowed to marry a non-Muslim man, as per Article 1059, and a non-Muslim cannot inherit from a Muslim, according to Article 881, the report points out.

Access to higher education and employment is also restricted for minority faith adherents, especially concerning jobs in the public sector. In May 2019, for example, the State Welfare Organization issued a directive prohibiting minority faith adherents from working in nursery schools.

The Christian groups have also urged the UNHRC to ask some specific questions to the Iranian government, including how Article 13 of the Iranian Constitution, which recognizes only Zoroastrians, Jews and Christians as religious minorities, is in line with the provisions of the covenant, and whether Iran plans to amend its Civil Code to allow non-Muslims to inherit from Muslims or Muslim women to marry non-Muslims.”

Christian Post report continues

Persecution Unveiled has been called to prick the consciences of our nation and all free people to pray for, speak up and act on behalf of those who are persecuted for their faith. Follow us on Pinterest.

Nigerian Pastor and Calvin Seminary Grad Gunned Down with His Wife on their Farm

“Their martyrdom was the result of an ongoing ethnic war in their home country of Nigeria.”


Emmanuel and Juliana Bileya Facebook/Hausa Christians Foundation

By Samuel Smith
Christian Post


A Nigerian Christian pastor who graduated from Calvin Theological Seminary in Michigan was gunned down along with his wife Monday while working on their farm in the Taraba State of Nigeria. The couple leaves behind eight children ages 1 to 19.

The Rev. Emmanuel Saba Bileya and his wife, Juliana, who is said to be pregnant, were killed by gunmen who have yet to be identified, according to a statement released by the Hausa Christians Foundation.

“It was an attack on the pastor and his wife on their farm. While they were working on the farm, suddenly armed men came and opened fire on them, leading to the death of the pastor and his wife,” a spokesperson for the state police said in a statement shared by the foundation.

Bileya served as a pastor at a Christian Reformed Church in the Donga local government area. Bileya received a Master of Theology from Calvin in 2014 and served for the last five years at Veenstra Theological Seminary in Donga, according to his LinkedIn profile.

“In what is being noted as systematic direct war against Christianity in Nigeria, pastors, Christian leaders and seminarians are either being kidnapped or killed every week,” the Hausa Christians Foundation statement reads. “Christians in Nigeria have been the target of many attacks by the vicious Boko Haram jihadist Islamist terrorists, herdsmen attacks and many other kidnappings in recent times.”

In a statement released through a spokesperson, Taraba Gov. Darius Ishaku condemned the murder of the pastor and his wife. Ishaku said he sympathizes with the surviving members of Bileya's family and members of the Christian Reformed Church in Nigeria.

“The killing of the pastor and his wife is wicked and inhuman,” the governor’s statement reads, according to Nigeria’s This Day newspaper. "Killings of this nature have happened too often recently in Southern Taraba communities and this is unhelpful to the ongoing efforts of the government to achieve lasting peace among communities in the area.”

Biyela was a doctoral student at the Robert E. Webber Institute of Worship Studies, a nondenominational graduate school in Jacksonville, Florida.

He enrolled at IWS in 2014 and was in the final stage of his doctoral program. He took a thesis course in 2019.

“It is with a broken heart that IWS announces the deaths of D.W.S. student Emmanuel Bileya, his wife Juliana, and their child in utero, whose name is known only to God,” an IWS statement reads. “Their martyrdom was the result of an ongoing ethnic war in their home country of Nigeria.”

According to IWS, Emmanuel and Juliana will receive Christian burials on Friday.

According to IWS, Biyela wrote an explanation of the escalating tribal conflicts ongoing in his local area as recently as two weeks ago. 



Persecution Unveiled has been called to prick the consciences of our nation and all free people to pray for, speak up and act on behalf of those who are persecuted for their faith. Follow us on Pinterest.

Friday, June 5, 2020

UK Education Office Argues Christians Should Limit Their Beliefs to Church

"This is a hypothetical dispute in which there are no actual victims...."



By Thomas D. Williams, Ph.D.
Breitbart


The United Kingdom’s Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted) argued before the High Court that Christian groups should not allow their religious beliefs to influence their professional activities.

After an inspection and review in March 2019, Ofsted, a non-ministerial department of the British government, downgraded the Christian-run Cornerstone Adoption and Fostering Service from “good” to “requires improvement” because it only places children with married Evangelical Christian couples.

Challenged by Cornerstone before the High Court, Ofsted lawyer Sir James Eadie said that Ofsted “does not prevent Cornerstone and their carers manifesting their religious beliefs as they wish – outside the professional sphere,” adding that fostering “is essentially a secular act.”

An unpublished brief by Ofsted allegedly demanded that Cornerstone abandon its religious ethos.

In response, Cornerstone lawyer Mr Aidan O’Neill asked whether the regulator was claiming that “religious acts only happen in your place of worship and as soon as you come into the public square it cannot be categorised as a religious act.”

“They are failing in their duty of neutrality,” Mr O’Neill continued, “not appreciating that evangelical Christianity in particular, which founds itself on scripture passages, includes the injunction to feed the hungry, and carry out in practice what you believe.”

“So don’t say to me fostering is a secular act,” O’Neill said. “When carried out by Cornerstone it is the fulfilment of a religious duty.”

In failing in its duty as a state body to be neutral as regards the expression of religious belief, in relation to Cornerstone “Ofsted has acted unlawfully,” he argued.



O’Neill also told the Court that Ofsted had misapplied equality law and abused its regulatory function in issuing its report, suggesting that the regulator had “invented” discrimination by Cornerstone in order to fabricate a case against it.

Breitbart report continues

Persecution Unveiled has been called to prick the consciences of our nation and all free people to pray for, speak up and act on behalf of those who are persecuted for their faith. Follow us on Pinterest.


Wednesday, June 3, 2020

Israeli Research Facility Working Toward Coronavirus Vaccine Is Allegedly Targeted in Cyber Attack

Some of the websites targeted in the attacks were replaced with a video stream of Israeli cities being bombed and a message that threatened Israel


Photo courtesy: ©Getty Images/Motortion

By Amanda Casanova
Christian Headlines

A cyber attack last week shut down hundreds of Israeli websites and impacted an Israeli research institute developing a coronavirus vaccine.

According to CBN News, the attacks were not meant to steal information but to hamper vaccine development.

Israeli officials said the attacks caused no damage.

Some of the websites targeted in the attacks were replaced with a video stream of Israeli cities being bombed and a message that threatened Israel.

The Israel National Cyber Directorate (INCD) said Thursday it was a “superficial defacing of websites of private bodies in Israel done via a single storage firm hosting those websites.”

It’s unclear who is responsible for the cyber attacks, but an Israeli news station suggested Iranian hackers may have been involved.

Israel and Iran have been engaged in cyber warfare after Israel allegedly knocked out Iran’s port computers, shutting down traffic at Iran’s Shahid Rajee port terminal. That attack is presumed to come in retaliation for an Iranian hacking attempt on Israeli water distribution networks, but Iran has denied involvement in that hacking attempt.

Hackers had tried to cripple computers that control water flow and wastewater treatment in Israel. Israeli Water Authority officials detected the cyber attack before there was any damage.

Israel isn’t the only country being targeted in cyber attacks on vaccine research organizations. The U.S. reported earlier this month that state-sponsored Chinese hackers were targeting U.S. labs and the United Kingdom reported that Russia was trying to hack some of its research labs.

"There is nothing more valuable today than biomedical research relating to vaccines for treatments for the coronavirus," said Jon Demers, the head of the Justice Department’s National Security Division. "It's of great importance not just from a commercial value but whatever countries, company or research lab develops that vaccine first and is able to produce it is going to have a significant geopolitical success story."



Persecution Unveiled has been called to prick the consciences of our nation and all free people to pray for, speak up and act on behalf of those who are persecuted for their faith. Follow us on Pinterest.


Two Senators Ask President Trump to Offer Aid to Persecuted Christian in Nigeria

Since 2009, over 32,000 Christians have been killed in Nigeria by Islamic extremist groups...



By Milton Quintanilla
Christian Headlines


As Christians in Nigeria continue to face harsh persecution by Islamic extremist groups, 2 Republican senators want President Trump to take action.

According to CBN News, Iowa Senators Joni Ernst and Chuck Grassley are urging the President in a letter to send out a special envoy to aid persecuted Christians in Nigeria.

Both Senators noted in the letter that 40,000 Nigerians have died at the hands of Boko Haram, an Islamic terrorist organization.

Boko Haram, along with other terrorist groups such as the Fulani herdsmen, have reportedly made it difficult for Christians living in West Africa throughout the years.

President Trump had previously asked Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari to ensure the safety of "innocent civilians of all faiths,” about two years ago.

Both senators, however, assert that Christians are in need of more protection.

Earlier in May, CBN News reported that an estimated 620 Christians in Nigeria were killed by Boko Haram within the first five months of 2020, according to a report published by a Nigerian organization.

The International Society for Civil Liberties & Rule of Law (LSCLRL), a nongovernmental organization, had advised in a report concerning increased violence against Christians by Boko Haram and the Fulani Herdsmen.

The report noted that Christian centers of worship and learning have been burned down or destroyed in a region referred to as the old Middle Belt as well as other Northeastern regions of the country.

In addition to the attacks on places of worship, hundreds of homes were demolished.

Despite the attacks, the report noted that there was no act of retaliation taken by the Nigerian government nor its military forces against Boko Haram or the Fulani herdsmen.


"The atrocities against Christians have gone unchecked and risen to alarming apogee with the country's security forces and concerned political actors looking the other way or colluding with the Jihadists," the report said.

Christian Headlines continues her
e

Persecution Unveiled has been called to prick the consciences of our nation and all free people to pray for, speak up and act on behalf of those who are persecuted for their faith. Follow us on Pinterest


Pakistani Christian Couple's Death Row Appeal Delayed After 6 Years in Prison for Blasphemy

Allegations of blasphemy are frequently lodged to settle personal disputes and to discriminate against religious minorities.

Christians attend a Good Friday prayer at the Saint Anthony
 Church in Lahore, Pakistan, April 3, 2015.
 Reuters/Mohsin Raza

By Melissa Barnhart
Christian Post


A Pakistani Christian couple who've been imprisoned for six years and sentenced to death on false blasphemy charges of sending a text message insulting the Islamic prophet Muhammad continue to have their conviction appeal delayed.

Shagufta Kausar and her husband, Shafqat Emmanuel, who is partially paralyzed, were accused by a local imam of committing blasphemy by sending him an offensive text message in 2013.

Maulvi Mohammed Hussain, a leader at a mosque in the town of Gojra in Punjab province, claimed that Emmanuel used his wife's cellphone to send an anti-Islamic text message. He later claimed other messages followed.

Hussain said he was praying when he received the offensive text message from an unknown number.

The Muslim cleric reportedly showed the text message to two other imams before approaching his counsel for legal proceedings. He and his lawyer later claimed they both received subsequent blasphemous messages.

Police registered the blasphemy case following the imam's complaint, and the couple were arrested on July 21, 2013. They were charged with "insulting the Quran" and "insulting the prophet."

They were sentenced to separate prisons in 2014.

According to some reports, "[Kauser] is being held in the same prison cell Asia Bibi was held in before her release," Will Stark, regional manager for South Asia at International Christian Concern, told The Christian Post on Wednesday.

"In regards to Shafqat, his medical condition has deteriorated significantly during his imprisonment," Stark added. "This is because the jail does not provide facilities for him, as someone partially paralyzed. Bedsores and lack of nutrition are definitely issues I have seen reported specifically in regards to Shafqat’s case."

According to the BBC, a final hearing before the Lahore High Court was scheduled for Wednesday. However, the hearing was delayed and a new hearing date will be announced.

Kausar's brother, Joseph, told the BBC that his sister and her husband are not only innocent, but he believes they aren't even literate enough to have written the text messages.

Joseph also said his brother-in-law had been tortured and forced to make a false confession.

"He told me the policeman hit [him] so hard that his leg was broken," Joseph was quoted as saying.

The text messages were also alleged to have been written in English. Aside from being illiterate, Shafqat and Shagufta are not familiar with the English language — written or spoken.

The couple's lawyer, Saif ul Malook, who also assisted in the appeal of Asia Bibi's blasphemy case, said the charges against Kausar and Emmanuel are "deeply flawed" and "weaker" than those levied against Bibi.


Persecution Unveiled has been called to prick the consciences of our nation and all free people to pray for, speak up and act on behalf of those who are persecuted for their faith. Follow us on Pinterest.

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