COMPASS DIRECT
Global News from the Frontlines
August 9, 2005
Compass Direct is distributed monthly to raise awareness of Christians worldwide who are persecuted for their faith. Articles may be reprinted or edited by active subscribers for use in other media, provided Compass Direct is acknowledged as the source of the material.
Copyright 2005 Compass Direct
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IN THIS ISSUE
BANGLADESH
Two Christian Health Workers Murdered
Police suspect Islamic extremists of stabbings.
CHINA
Wave of Arrests Submerges Hope in New Regulations
Legal reforms fail to improve religious freedom.
Citizens Increasingly Stand Up for Human Rights
Prominent lawyers defend house-church pastor; peasants protest against corruption. Lawyers
Lawyers d
INDIA
Staines’ Killer Inspires Double Murder
Hindu extremist admits murdering two Christian pastors in Hyderabad.
BigScreen Infomercial Discourages Conversions
High Court rejects petition from Christian and Buddhist communities.
State to Tighten Control on Conversions
Report blames missionaries for violence in Madhya Pradesh.
Hindu Fundamentalists Allege ‘Forced Conversion’
Orissa High Court orders strict enforcement of state anti-conversion law.
Government Proposes Stiffer Law to Regulate Foreign Donations
Christians fear new law will be misused against the church.
INDONESIA
Mob Attacks Boarding House atTheological School
No injuries reported, but damage is extensive; 300 students affected.
Sunday School Teachers’ Case Goes to High Court ***
Judge scolds the accused; courtroom spectators heckle them.
IRAQ
Beneath the Bombings, Churches are Growing
A hunger for peace brings openness to the gospel.
NIGERIA
Muslim Extremists Threaten to Kill Christian Family
Vigilantes assault father of daughter who allegedly sold pork.
Northern Leaders Implore President to End Sharia
Church and state officials grow restless over violence from Islamic law.
SRI LANKA
The Politics of Conversion
Second anti-conversion bill ‘Gazetted’ as parliament splits over tsunami-aid deal.
VIETNAM
Government Razes Portion of Mennonite Church ***
Destroyed section includes apartment of pastor’s family.
Authorities Twice Raid Mennonite Center
Disruptions come just five days after half of complex was demolished.
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Two Christian Health Workers Murdered in Bangladesh
Police suspect Islamic extremists of stabbings.
by Sarah Page
DUBLIN, August 3 (Compass) --Two Christian men working with a non-governmental organization in Bangladesh were hacked to death on July 29. Police and local officials said Islamic extremists were likely responsible for the murders.
The incident took place in Dhopapara village in Boalmari, Faridpur district, about 150 kilometers away from the capital, Dhaka.
Tapan Kumar Roy, 27, and Liplial Marandi, 21, worked for Christian Life Bangladesh (CLB). Along with educational films on arsenic poisoning, mother-and-child health care and AIDS prevention, they often showed the “Jesus Film” at the invitation of local villagers.
Swapon Bose, a well-known Christian leader who was familiar with the two evangelists, said an official at a local madrassa (Islamic school) had threatened the men verbally prior to the murders.
According to Peter Bose, supervisor of CLB in Faridpur, some villagers had also threatened to kill Roy and Marandi if they continued to show the “Jesus Film.”
A report in the Daily Star, an English newspaper, said the victims were asleep in their home when assailants knocked on the door. When the victims answered the knock, they were attacked and stabbed with sharp weapons.
The killers had also chained the doors of nearby houses to prevent neighbors from rushing to the scene. Hearing the victims’ cries, however, neighbors managed to enter the house. The two severely wounded men were rushed to the nearby Boalmari Health complex in a van. Roydied in transit, and Marandi died immediately after reaching the hospital.
Police sent the two bodies to FaridpurSadarHospital for an autopsy. They also arrested a man named Monir Hossain in connection with the murders.
Roy and Marandi lived in a house rented from Bipul Kumar Bagchi, who filed a First Information Report on their behalf. The landlord said Muslim extremists were angered by the showing of the “Jesus Film” in their district.
Nanok Kumar Biswas, general secretary of the Hindu-Buddhist-Christian Welfare Front of Boalmari, said he believed followers of an Islamic fundamentalist group were responsible for the murders.
Police are still investigating the double murder.
Bangladesh is facing an overall deterioration in human rights, both for the Muslims who form 863 percent of the population and for religious minorities.
The House of Lords in the U.K. Parliament held a special debate on June 29 to discuss the harassment and oppression of religious minorities.
In response to testimony from Lord Navnit Dholakia, the deputy leader of the Upper House, Minister Douglas Alexander said, “We have serious concerns about the security and law and order situation in Bangladesh. The Bangladeshi government needs to take effective action to bring those responsible for violence to justice.”
Alexander had earlier discussed these concerns with Bangladeshi Prime Minister Khaleda Zia during a visit to Dhaka in February.
A report in Lebanon’s Daily Star on July 21 indicated growing Islamic militancy in Bangladesh. The writer, Charles Tannock, is vicepresident of the human rights subcommittee of the European Parliament.
In the report, Tannock said religious extremists seemed to operate with impunity -- and with “the apparent support of local police, the ruling Bangladeshi National Party (BNP), and local authorities.”
Tannock pointed out that Bangladesh had enjoyed a reputation for secularism and democracy until 2001, when Khaleda Zia replaced secularism in the constitution with the “sovereignty of Allah.”
Encouraged by this change, the BNP’s junior coalition partner, Jamaat-e-Islami, began calling for the imposition of sharia, or Islamic law. Jamaat-e-Islami has been linked to Islamic militias in both Bangladesh and Pakistan. It has also encouraged the development of some 64,000 madrassas, or Islamic schools, across the country.
Indian intelligence officials say the leader of another BNP coalition partner, Mufti Fazlul Haq Amini, maintains ties with Harkat-ul-Jihad-al-Islami, or HuJI, a banned Islamic militia which in turn is linked with Al-Qaeda.
Taskforce against Torture, another non-governmental organization, has documented more than 500 cases of torture and intimidation by Islamic extremists. This is regarded as key evidence that Hindus, Christians and Buddhists are regular targets of Islamic extremists, along with members of the minority Ahmadiyya Muslim sect.
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Wave of Arrests in China Submerges Hope in New Regulations
Legal reforms fail to improve religious freedom.
by Xu Mei
NANJING, July 20 (Compass) -- Wide-ranging persecution of Chinese Christians in recent months has dashed hopes of greater religious freedom from a new law on religion that took effect in March.
China adopted the new Regulations on Religious Affairs on March 1. They encouraged Protestant and Catholic house churches to register with the relevant government body. Younger house church leaders were optimistic about the law, while an older generation of leaders -- those who survived the Cultural Revolution -- were suspicious of the government’s motives. (See Compass Direct, “Chinese Christians React to New Religious Regulations,” March 9, 2005.)
A wave of arrests in May, June and July has cast further doubt on the government’s intent to improve religious liberty.
Police surrounded an entire village in Qi county, Henan province, on June 24, during a leadership training program for house church pastors. About 100 pastors from major cities in Henan were arrested, according to the China Aid Association (CAA). Most were released the same day after questioning, but nine of them, including the leading pastor, Chen Dongming, were detained.
A month earlier, on May 24, police arrested three Christian women in Yiyang county, Henan province. Liu Lianying, Xue Haimiao and Zhang Xiulan were arrested while visiting a Christian leader, CAA reported. Police held them for two days and brutally beat them to the point where Liu, 52, suffered a heart attack.
CAA also reported the arrest of 20 house church leaders in Pinglu county, Shanxi province, northern China. Pastor Zhang Guangmin and Elder Li, who were leading the Bible training class, were held for two weeks and one month respectively in the local county detention center.
More than 1,000 miles to the west, in Xinjiang province, Chinese border guards detained 12 Christians from the mainland who were traveling to Pakistan. According to Compass sources, police detained them for several days after one member of the group admitted they were going as missionaries.
On May 22, police raided approximately 100 house churches in Changchun, Jilin province, northeast China. In one of the largest mass arrests in recent years, around 600 house church Christians were detained. Most were released after interrogation, but CAA reported that around 100 leaders were held in custody.
The May raid was unique as the majority of Christians arrested were not peasants but university students and even professors from ChangchunUniversity. This arrest was in line with recent internal Communist Party guidelines to stop Christian groups from meeting on campus.
The spread of Christianity among educated Chinese was highlighted in an article in The Economist on April 23, entitled, “Christianity is becoming popular with China’s urban elite.” The trend clearly worries the Chinese government.
In Beijing, officials postponed the trial of prominent house church pastor Cai Zhuohua in July. Cai was arrested in September 2004 for illegally printing Christian literature. Cai, along with his wife and two other church members, were charged with “illegal business practices,” although Cai insists that the 200,000 Bibles seized were for free distribution to their church network and therefore did not qualify as a business enterprise.
Cai’s lawyer claims Chinese authorities frequently charge people with economic crimes as a cover when dealing with religious or political issues, according to a BBC report on July 6.
Police have also focused their attention on the unofficial Chinese Roman Catholic Church in recent months.
According to Asia News, members of an unregistered Catholic church in Hebei province wrote a letter on June 8 exposing a wave of arrests ordered by their local Religious Affairs department.
The letter claimed that Bishop Jia Zhiguo, 70, was held in solitary confinement between the death of John Paul II on April 2 and the election of the new pope, Benedict XVI, on April 19. The bishop has since been arrested and taken to an unknown location.
The Chinese government refuses to accept the authority of the pope over the Chinese Catholic Church. In turn, Bishop Jia Zhiguo, along with the majority of Hebei’s 1.5 million Catholics, refuses to accept the state-controlled Catholic Patriotic Association.
The letter from Hebei Catholics also alleged that Wang Zhenguo, director of the local Religious Affairs department, threatened to blow up a planned new church, even though local villagers had a permit to build it.
Church members said provincial authorities had established a special “Catholic Church Unit,” under the leadership of Deputy Provincial Governor Chen Xiyun, for the sole purpose of crushing the Catholic Church.
On July 5, Asia News received word that officials had arrested the bishop and taken him to an unknown destination.
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Chinese Citizens Increasingly Stand Up for Human Rights
Prominent lawyers defend house-church pastor; peasants protest against corruption. Lawyers
Lawyers d
by Xu Mei
NANJING, China, July 28 (Compass) -- China is witnessing a rising anger against official corruption and a growing determination to stand up for basic rights.
Signs are emerging that unregistered Protestant and Catholic believers, Tibetan Buddhists, Uygur and Hui Muslims, peasants, factory workers, academics and journalists all share a growing sense of the injustices perpetrated against them by the ruling Communist Party.
In regard to unregistered Christians, the idea of standing up for persecuted believers is gaining momentum. For example, five prominent Chinese lawyers have offered to defend house-church Pastor Cai Zhuohua, arrested in September 2004 for printing 200,000 Bibles. One of these lawyers, Professor Fan Yafeng, is an associate researcher at the Institute of Legal Studies at China’s prestigious Academy of Social Sciences.
Officials charged Cai with illegal business practices; Cai claims the Bibles were printed for free distribution and thus did not constitute a business offense.
The government has unsuccessfully pressured all five lawyers to drop their defense of Cai. Government officials may fear the case will attract unfavorable international attention.
China’s peasant millions are also becoming more restless and impatient with official corruption. Their concerns were exposed in early 2004 with the publication of “A Survey of China’s Peasants.” The survey was written by two Chinese investigative journalists who uncovered evidence of brutal repression and blatant corruption by local officials against poor farmers.
In recent months, these farmers have engaged in a wave of violent protests over land rights and environmental pollution.
In April, thousands of peasants protested against an unpopular chemical plant at Dongyang in Zhejiang province, resulting in a bloody battle with police and local officials.
In June, the South China Morning Post reported that at least six people were killed in Hebei province, when several hundred armed thugs attacked villagers who refused to hand their land over to an electronics factory.
A large number of peasants and manual laborers converged on the American and French embassies in Beijing between June 18 and 23, hoping to express their anger over illegal land seizures, bureaucracy and corruption. However, the protestors were arrested and removed from the area by Beijing police.
According to a recent survey by the National Bureau of statistics, China’s income gap widened in the first quarter of 2005, with 10 percent of the population enjoying 45 percent of the country’s wealth. China’s poorest 10 percent, mainly peasants, owned only 1.5 percent of the total wealth, Xinhua News Agency reported on June 19. The income gap between rich and poor in China is now the largest of any country in the world.
“The thing everyone hates most is corruption,” a leading economist at the National Economic Research Institute told Xinhua.
In an unprecedented move, more than 2,000 Chinese journalists recently signed an open letter appealing to the Guangdong Supreme People’s Court for the release of two fellow journalists. Yu Huafeng and Li Minying were imprisoned in January 2004, sentenced to 12 and 11 years respectively on charges of corruption.
Their colleagues say the pair published a story in 2003 exposing the beating-to-death of a young graphic designer in police custody. The couple also reported a suspected SARS case in December of that year, when the Chinese government was still trying to quell reports of an epidemic.
In 2004,China jailed more journalists than any other country -- for the sixth consecutive year.
Meanwhile in Australia, Chinese diplomat Chen Yonglin, 37, made headlines when he requested political asylum. Chen chose June 4, the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square massacre, to announce his resignation from the Communist Party and accuse the Chinese government of political and religious repression.
Chen claimed that one of his responsibilities in Australia was to monitor the Falun Gong -- a religious sect that is severely repressed in China. He also created shock waves by claiming that China operates a spy network of about 1,000 people in Australia.
With press freedom stifled in mainland China, few dare to report on the injustices committed against religious minorities, farmers, migrants and other marginalized groups.While the Chinese Communist Party has long survived by using strong-arm tactics, this method may lose its effectiveness in a country where people are fast catching up with the modern notion of human rights.
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Staines’ Killer Inspires Double Murder in India
Hindu extremist admits murdering two Christian pastors in Hyderabad.
by Satya Kumar
NEW DELHI, July 11 (Compass) -- A 25-year-old man recently confessed to the murder of two Christian pastors in Hyderabad city, Andhra Pradesh, southern India.
The accused said he was inspired by Dara Singh, a Hindu activist convicted for the murder of Australian missionary Graham Staines and his two sons, ages 11 and 7, in January 1998.
Police said on June 30 they had arrested five other suspects and claimed the men had drawn up plans to kill other Christian ministers, according to a report by the Indo Asian News Service.