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Niger: US aid worker Jeff Woodke released

March 20, 2023 Niger Abalak, Burkina Faso, Jeff Woodke, Ken Elliott, Kidnapping, Mali, Niger

Jeff Woodke (Photo: Woodke's Facebook page)

After more than six years in captivity in West Africa, longtime American Christian aid worker Jeff Woodke has been released. His wife, Els Woodke, was told Jeff was “in good condition,” according to a statement on a website campaigning for his release. “She has expressed her profound thanks to the . . . Read More

Egypt: Copt and son killed in IS attack

September 7, 2022 Egypt Copts, Egypt, Islamic State, Ismailia, Sinai

Prayers in Deir El-Garnouse Coptic church, near Al-Minya in Upper Egypt, after Islamic State opened fire on a convoy carrying Copts, killing at least 28 people in May 2017.

A Christian father and son were killed by suspected Islamic State militants in Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula on 30 August. The two Copts, Salama Moussa Waheeb and his son Hany, were shot dead while working in the fields in Gelbana, 20 kilometers east of the city of El Qantara on the . . . Read More

Pakistan: Christians continue to face blasphemy convictions and violent attacks

August 22, 2022 Pakistan Blasphemy, Lahore, Minorities, Pakistan, Quetta

People participate in a motorbike rally ahead of country’s 75th Independence Day celebrations in Lahore on August 12, 2022.

While Pakistan celebrates 75 years of independence, the Christian minority continues to face discrimination, harassment and violence because of their faith. On 8 August, a Catholic man was killed and three teenagers injured when two gunmen on motorbikes opened fire in a Christian colony in the town of Mastung, 45kms . . . Read More

Egypt: Father and son stabbed in latest attack on Copts

August 12, 2022 Egypt Copts, Egypt, Giza

Copts have been targeted in a string of attacks this year. (Getty)

An elderly Coptic Christian and his son who run an off-license shop in Giza, central Egypt, were hospitalized after they were severely injured in an attack. Joseph Israel, 70, was sitting outside his shop in the Omrania district in the early morning of 28 July when a man approached him . . . Read More

ICC Prosecutor visits Nigeria to discuss war crimes and crimes against humanity with government

May 9, 2022 Nigeria Boko Haram, Borno, Chibok girls, Fulani herdsmen, Islamic extremism, Kidnapping, Nigeria

Karim Khan of ICC visits Nigeria, April 2022

The Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, Karim Khan, has made his first visit to Nigeria to discuss the next steps to investigate crimes against humanity and war crimes there, for which there is enough evidence for them to come under the ICC’s jurisdiction. Ten years of ‘preliminary examinations’ (2010-20) . . . Read More

Egypt: Copt stabbed seven times by neighbour who’d lured in his son

March 24, 2022 Egypt Alexandria, Copts, Egypt, Youth

Magdy Fathy Shehata Awad Allah (r) with a local priest.

An Egyptian Christian was stabbed multiple times when he tried to rescue his son who was held against his will by a Muslim neighbour in Alexandria. On the night of 15 February, Magdy Fathy Shehata Awad Allah, deacon at the Coptic Orthodox Church in the northeast of Alexandria and a . . . Read More

Egypt: Coptic Christian imprisoned for 5 years for ‘blasphemy’

February 9, 2022 Egypt Blasphemy, Cairo, Egypt, Human rights, Minorities

An Egyptian police officer enters Tora prison on the outskirts of Egypt's capital Cairo

A Coptic Christian has been sentenced to five years in prison for blasphemy, according to the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, or EIPR, which represented him during his trial. On 29 January the Cairo Economic Court found Marco Gerges guilty of “contempt for Islam”, “exploiting religion in promoting extremist ideas”, . . . Read More

Pakistan: ‘Attack on pastors illustrative of increasing pressure’, say Christians

February 1, 2022 Pakistan Afghanistan, All Saints Church, Pakistan, Peshawar, Quetta, Taliban, Tehreek-e-Labaik

Rev. William Siraj and Rev Patrick Naeem. (Source: Facebook page Church of Pakistan)

A Pakistani pastor was killed and another wounded Sunday in an attack outside their church in northwestern Peshawar. The two pastors were leaving the Shaheedan-e- all Saints’ Church where they had led the Sunday morning service when two men on a motorbike drove up to their car. They shot Rev. . . . Read More

Afghanistan overtakes N Korea as most dangerous place to live as a Christian

January 19, 2022 Afghanistan Boko Haram, Catholics, Churches, Converts, India, Islamic extremism, Minorities, Nigeria, North Korea, Pakistan, Refugees, Religious freedom

Afghan-women-face-highly restricted lives under the Taliban

After the August 2021 takeover by the Taliban of Afghanistan, the country has overtaken North Korea as the most dangerous place in the world to be a Christian, according to the annual World Watch List of the NGO Open Doors International, out today. After 20 years at the top*, North . . . Read More

Pakistan sewage workers’ widows pressured to drop criminal negligence cases

November 22, 2021 Pakistan discrimination, Human rights, legal, Minorities, Pakistan, Sweepers

Mariam, widow of sewer cleaner Nadeem Masih, Oct 4, 2021

“I so wish wish I hadn’t pushed him to go that night”…. Widow Mariam Bibi, mother of six at the age of 32, desperately wishes she could turn the clock back. “It was about 10pm on Sunday night and we were preparing for bed, so [my husband] Nadeem didn’t want . . . Read More

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