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Freedom House
Wednesday, April 19, 2000
Contact:  Nina Shea
For Immediate Release                                   202-296-5101

EASTER WORSHIP BARRED FOR THOUSANDS OF CHRISTIANS

Washington, DC. As Christians gather to reflect on Jesus' passion this 

Easter, many of their fellow believers around the world are suffering for their 
Christian beliefs and no longer have churches in which to worship.

•  In Sudan, where southern Christians are facing genocide, the extremist 
  Islamic government is carrying out a bombing campaign against churches, 
  and church-run hospitals and schools.  It is conducting a military offensive 
  to terrorize the population from oil fields located in the Christian south – oil 
  fields in whose development Americans are currently investing.

•  In the village of Al Kosheh in Upper Egypt, the Coptic villagers mourn the loss
   of 22 of their brethren who were killed by rampaging Muslim mobs in January. 
  Their church, St. George's Orthodox Church, and all its contents were destroyed 
  at the same time.

•  In Ashgabad, Turkmenistan Seventh Day Adventists say their church was destroyed
   by the government in November. It was bulldozed while the congregation were still inside praying.

•  In Nigeria four churches were burned on March 27 in Demboa in the state of Borno.
   Christian resistance to the state governments' attempts to impose Islamic shari'a law
   in Kaduna have left several thousand dead since lastfall.

•  On the island of Lompok in Indonesia, every Christian home and church has been destroyed,
   and all Christians have fled.

•  In other places, there may be buildings but no clergy. On April 12 in the town of Kosikalan
   in Uttar Pradesh state in India, a Roman Catholic priest and three nuns were brutally beaten 
  in the latest in a series of attacks by radical Hindus.

•  In China, six Roman Catholic bishops, and scores of priests and Protestant pastors are 
  incarcerated for religious reasons. Catholics in Fujian saw several of their churches bulldozed
   by the government in the past year.

•  Protestant evangelist Marat Kojash of the Bayan-Olgey district of western Mongolia was 
  sentenced this month to thirteen years of labor camp for his Christian faith. The police declared
   he was guilty of "distribution of the wrong religious propaganda."

 These are but a few of the thousands of cases in dozens of countries this Easter where
 Christians are suffering for the peaceful expression of their religious beliefs.
 The Center for Religious Freedom of Freedom House calls on American churches to keep
 these persecuted Christians in their prayers this Easter, and urges the U.S. government
 to work to end such oppression.

 

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