Displaying items by tag: Asia

Oscar-winning actor Cate Blanchett described to the UN security council meeting in New York 'gut-wrenching' accounts from Myanmar of Rohingya people being tortured, raped and killed in front of their relatives. 'How can any mother endure seeing her child thrown into a fire?' she said. The UNHCR goodwill ambassador also praised Bangladesh for taking in more than 700,000 refugees, calling it 'one of the most visible and significant gestures of humanity of our time'. UN secretary general António Guterres has called for those behind the Rohingya crisis to be held accountable, urging the council to act on what has become 'one of the world’s worst humanitarian and human rights crises'. However Aung San Suu Kyi probably won't be stripped of her Nobel peace prize, despite revelations around the Rohingya crisis. The UN report said that Myanmar’s military carried out mass killings of Muslim Rohingya. See

Five Saudi activists face possible execution for ‘participating in protests’, ‘chanting slogans hostile to the regime’, and ‘filming protests and publishing on social media’. The five, including women’s rights campaigner Israa al-Ghomgham, have spent over two years in prison. Now their deaths are demanded. Their plight reveals the emptiness of claims that Saudi Arabia is ‘liberalising’ after the death of King Abdullah and that the heir apparent, Prince Muhammad bin Salman, is a driving force behind ‘modernisation’. Over the past year, dozens of activists, clerics, journalists and intellectuals have been detained in a pattern of widespread and systematic arbitrary arrests and detention. Under current ‘reforming’ 146 people were executed in 2017, many for political dissent, which the Saudi authorities rebrand as ‘terrorism’. The regime permits women to drive, but executes them for speaking out of turn. Christians are treated as second-class citizens and persecution is an ongoing and serious problem. Apostasy is punishable by death for Christian converts who refuse to recant. See also

Monsoon flood waters have receded in Kerala after the worst monsoon rains in a century, allowing authorities to retrieve the bodies of victims and enabling residents to start assessing the damage to their homes. But it is feared that thousands of people are still trapped in the worst-hit areas. Pray for regular supplies of clean drinking water and electricity to be distributed quickly and fairly to the state’s 33 million residents. Pray for the thousands of army, navy and air force personnel still searching for survivors and delivering food, medicine and water to those stranded in remote, hilly areas cut off by damaged roads and bridges. Pray for the 1,028,000 people sheltering in 3,274 relief camps. Disinfectants in adequate quantities are needed to prevent water-borne diseases. Pray for more paramedics to be available to advise and give medical aid. The government said it needs hundreds of thousands of electricians, plumbers and carpenters to bring Kerala back to normality. See

Facebook has identified and banned groups and pages engaged in misleading political behaviour and removed 652 pages, groups, and accounts linked to Russia and Iran, for ‘coordinated inauthentic behaviour’ that included the sharing of political material. Facebook significantly stepped up policing its platform after acknowledging that Russian agents successfully ran political influence operations on its platform aimed at influencing the 2016 US presidential election. Other social media networks have done likewise, and continue to turn up fresh evidence of political disinformation campaigns.

The Turkish currency is in freefall after President Trump escalated a feud with Ankara by doubling tariffs on metals imports. The lira has long been falling due to worries about President Erdogan's influence over monetary policy and worsening US relations. Turkey and the USA are at odds over many issues, the most pressing being the detention of pastor Andrew Brunson who was jailed for allegedly supporting a group that Ankara blames for the failed coup. He faces 35 years in prison, and on 15 August a court ruled he must remain under house arrest. Qatar has pledged $15 billion of investments after Erdogan said that the shadowy ‘interest rate lobby’ and Western credit ratings agencies were attempting to bring down the economy. He said, ‘If there is anyone who has dollars or gold under their pillows, they should go and exchange it for liras at our banks. This is a national, domestic battle.’ See also

On 12 August, a Saudi-led airstrike on Yemen killed 51 people (including 40 children) and wounded 79. The next day hundreds of mourners gathered for a mass funeral for the schoolboys. By the caskets stood signs saying, ‘America killed the children of Yemen’. The procession, organised by Houthi rebels, was one of several taking place across Yemen. The US defence secretary is sending a three-star general to help the Saudi-led coalition to investigate the strike and see if there is anything that can be done to prevent this in the future. UNICEF said the strike was the worst attack on children since the war escalated in 2015. It is now the world’s worst humanitarian crisis, with 22 million people in desperate need of aid and protection.

Pakistan plans to seek its largest ever bailout from the IMF as Imran Khan takes office. The loan is to resolve the country’s escalating foreign reserves crisis. However a loan would see IMF impose restrictions on public spending, making it difficult for Khan to fulfil election promises. One government adviser said, ‘We can’t do without the IMF’s support of a $10bn -12bn loan.’ During the election campaign, Mr Khan pledged to spend public money on access to healthcare for all, upgrading schools and expanding the social safety net. Analysts warned these promises would be hard to fulfil, given the reality of Pakistan’s economic situation. 35% live in poverty and Islamabad has kept going with loans from Chinese commercial banks and allowing the rupee to depreciate 20%. Meanwhile, substance abuse is rampant and terrorists have a safe haven there. This is one of the most dangerous countries in the world to be a Christian.

A Sri Lankan brick-maker is living with death threats after his conversion to Christianity, often seen as a ‘foreign’ religion, even though Christianity arrived in the Indian sub-continent almost two thousand years ago. Nimal is illiterate, but attended Bible school. When he talks about his faith, many people mock and challenge him. Rising from poverty to set up a small business, Nimal now shares some of his income with his church. Christian charity Open Doors International recently visited Nimal’s family. To watch the video about him, click the ‘More’ button.

On 23 July a fault in the structure of a dam in Laos was discovered and alerts went out to evacuate villages downstream as repairs were started, but the dam’s walls broke. Residents took to rooftops and treetops to escape the floodwaters, in a region so remote that it is difficult to get supplies and emergency assistance to them. By 26 July at least 26 people had drowned, 3,000 people still needed rescuing, and 6,000+ were displaced. Pray for the local authorities and army rescue teams trying to save the stranded from water that reached a height of 11.5 metres. Entire homes are underwater. Laos is a notoriously secretive Communist state, and information about the extent of the devastation is only trickling out. Pray for the displaced people coming to terms with the realisation that homes and possessions are washed away or destroyed in a man-made disaster.

Pakistan’s election results are in doubt, with the incumbent Pakistan Muslim League (PML) rejecting the result amid widespread allegations of ballot rigging in favour of Imran Khan’s PTI party. With most of the votes counted, Khan’s party is in the lead, but the results have not yet been confirmed. The election was marred by violence, with 31 killed by a bomb at one polling station. The PML leader said his party’s polling agents had been evicted from dozens of stations by security officials before a final tally, so they were unable to monitor potential tampering. In fact almost every party except the PTI said their polling agents had been excluded from polling stations. For the first time ever, no Christian candidates were picked by the mainstream parties for the national assembly, so Christians will be bereft of a voice whoever wins. Khan said he will not change the blasphemy laws, rather he will ensure they are enforced. The blasphemy law is a discrimination tool for persecuting Christians.