News and Prayer Alert from Release International
Sep 02 2008
Postings >> Press Release

NEWS AND PRAYER ALERT FROM RELEASE INTERNATIONAL

News each fortnight on persecuted Christians around the world  

CHINA

The Beijing Olympics may have won international praise but it’s been a tough few weeks for China’s Christians – and things could soon get tougher yet.

Several high-profile Christians have had run-ins with Chinese officials during the games – and they are now bracing themselves for a ‘new crackdown’ planned for October.

Among those harassed during the Olympics were Beijing activist Hua Huiqi and Pastor Zhang ‘Bike’ Mingxuan, president of the China House Church Alliance.

Hua was arrested as he tried to attend a service at the government-approved Kuanjie Protestant church which President George Bush was scheduled to attend. Officers seized him, kicked him and threatened to break his legs.

Amazingly, Hua escaped from custody later that day and went into hiding. Hua has since written to President Bush asking for prayer for religious freedom for China’s people. Hua’s mother Shuang Shuying was jailed last year in a move widely believed to be aimed at punishing Hua for his activities.

Pastor Zhang was detained, along with his wife Xie Fenlang and co-pastor Wu Jiang He, as he was waiting for BBC journalist John Simpson to arrive for an interview. Pastor Zhang and Xie had earlier been evicted from their home and several other addresses in Beijing before the police took them by force to Hebei province.

It has emerged that officials forced several house church leaders in Beijing to sign an agreement that they would not hold services for 17 weeks spanning the Games. China Aid reports that in October the authorities plan to clamp down on ‘troublesome elements’ including house church leaders and dissidents. The crackdown will coincide with a new campaign by the Communist Party for ‘20 more years of political and social stability’.

A video report: The stories China didn’t want the world to hear features in the latest edition of World Update on the Persecuted Church, a ten-minute webcast available on the Release International website www.releaseinternational.org

(Sources: China Aid, Compass Direct, The Voice of the Martyrs Canada)

·        Pray for Hua Huiqi, Pastor Zhang Mingxuan and their families – for peace, joy and freedom to worship their Lord. Pray Shuang Shuying will be freed soon.

·        Pray that China will reflect on the respect it won for the success of the Beijing Olympics and respond to international calls for greater religious freedom.

NIGERIA

Islamist radicals in Kwara state have launched several attacks on Christians, accusing them of praying for the death of one of their spiritual leaders.

At least three Christians have died and several others have been injured in vicious attacks in Ilorin [Ilorin] city since June, church leaders told Compass Direct.

The trigger seems to have been the death in May of Dr Ali Olukade, head of a local group of Islamists called Tibliq. He was critically wounded in a car crash in 2006 and died of his injuries this spring. Dr Olukade’s followers believed Christians had been praying for him to die – in revenge for Muslim protests which cut short a Reinhard Bonnke rally in 2004.

Violent protests by Dr Olukade’s sympathisers followed his accident in 2006: his recent death seems to have sparked a fresh wave of anti-Christian violence.

Rev Cornelius Fawenu, secretary of the Kwara chapter of CAN (the Christian Association of Nigeria) told news agency Compass Direct that the dead included a church pastor and a young Christian girl. Many attacks go unreported, he said.

Rev Fawenu said the Tibliq led Muslim opposition to Bonnke’s rally in 2004, which was first relocated from Ilorin to a village several miles away and then cancelled part-way through.

(Sources: Compass Direct)

·        Pray for the restoration of peace and order in Ilorin city.

·        Pray against the climate of confusion and intolerance which allows false rumours about Christian prayer to provoke such violence.

INDONESIA

Hundreds of Christian theology students have been living in tents since a Muslim mob stormed their college in July armed with bamboo spears, acid and Molotov cocktails.

Weeks of talks since the violence on July 25 have led to the decision by the Arastamar Evangelical School of Theology’s to close its 20-year-old campus in East Jakarta and move to the other side of the capital.

Tensions between the school and its Muslim neighbours in Kampung Pulo district have been building for years, amid locals’ complaints about prayer and worship. On July 25, students were woken around midnight by the crash of stones hitting the roof and a mosque loudspeaker urging locals to rise up against their ‘unwanted neighbour’.

Eighteen students were injured before the school’s 1,400 staff and students could be safely evacuated. RI sources say some students spent at least two nights in the lobby of Indonesia’s parliament. Early reports said the raid was triggered after news spread that a student had broken into a nearby house – but police later dismissed the accusation.

A protest banner now hangs across the entrance to the neighbourhood. It reads: ‘We the community of Kampung Pulo demand the campus be closed and dissolved.’

(Sources: Associated Press, Compass Direct, The Voice of the Martyrs Australia)

·        Ask God to bless and protect staff and students at the college.

·        Pray that Indonesian citizens will reflect now on incidents such as the raid on this Jakarta college and vote for religious tolerance in next April’s elections.

PAKISTAN

A high-ranking inspector has stepped in to investigate the death of a young Christian after a partner of Release International refuted earlier police claims that he had committed suicide.

The body of the 19-year-old ‘Rehmat’ was dragged out of a canal in Hafizabad in Punjab on May 4. His family and lawyers from CLAAS (Centre for Legal Aid Assistance and Settlement) believe Rehmat was murdered by relatives of a 19-year-old Muslim girl with whom he had struck up a friendship in Gujranwala.

Rehmat’s parents’ version of events is that the girl arranged to meet their son outside the city but she arrived at their rendezvous point with relatives who tortured Rehmat for two days and then killed him.

Local police in Gujranwala brought no charges against the girl’s relatives initially. But, when RI partner CLAAS presented the case to the office of the inspector general of Punjab, he reopened the case. The girl’s father and uncle have since been arrested.

(Source: CLAAS, Compass Direct)

·        Ask God to comfort Rehmat’s family and give them hope.

·        Thank God for the intervention of both CLAAS and the inspector general in this case. Pray that justice will be done for Rehmat’s sake.

NEWS UPDATE:
North and South Sudan have reached a deal over the disputed oil-rich border region of Abyei, says the BBC. The two sides have agreed on an ‘interim administration’ led by a southerner from the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, with a member of the northern National Congress Party as his deputy. 7x7 has reported that fighting in May left Abyei in ruins and 50,000 people displaced (7x7, 24 June 2008). 

Through its international network of missions Release International supports Christians imprisoned for their faith and their families in 30 nations. It supports church workers, pastors and their families, and provides training, Bibles, Christian literature and broadcasts. Release International is a member of the UK organisations Global Connections, the Evangelical Alliance and the Micah Network.

ENDS 

NOTES TO THE EDITOR 

In Release International’s new regular news and prayer service on the persecuted Church we are focusing initially on seven principal nations where Christians have faced intense persecution. These are China, North Korea, Indonesia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Vietnam and Sudan – though we may report on others. Our aims are to raise awareness of the persecuted Church and encourage prayer. 

We welcome your feedback on this new service. 

For more information on Release International please go to: www.releaseinternational.org