Displaying items by tag: Asia

For the last six years, Prayer Alert readers have often been asked to pray for Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, held in an Iranian jail on charges of plotting to overthrow the government. She was freed on 16 March, as was retired civil engineer Anoosheh Ashoori, and they have both been reunited with their families in the UK. Mr Ashoori had been detained in 2017 on spying charges and sentenced to ten years in prison. Another prisoner, Morad Tahbaz, has been released but must stay in Iran. As Nazanin walked down the plane's stairs seven-year-old Gabriella Radcliffe asked, ‘Is that Mummy?’ Mr Ashoori's daughter Elika spoke of her happiness at seeing her father, sharing a video of the pair's arrival. Their release came after the UK settled a debt to Iran of almost £400m dating from the 1970s. This news follows last week’s positive report of a landmark decision that nine Christians jailed for their faith should be freed from prison.

The Horn of Africa is in crisis with drought and food insecurity. 20 million are impacted or in need of aid; pray for the survival needs of both livestock and humans to be met after three failed rainy seasons back to back. In Somalia 4.3 million people are hungry, and people fear a repeat of the 2012 famine. In Ethiopia, the drought is compounding the humanitarian disaster of the war in the country’s north, while in neighbouring Kenya’s pastoralist zone, the loss of cattle is triggering raids and clashes between communities. In Myanmar farmers say the 2021 coup worsened food insecurity and is nothing short of a disaster. Humanitarian needs multiply and continue to spiral. One million people needed aid before the coup; now it’s 14 million. 500,000 people have been displaced since the coup, a quarter of the population is food insecure and violent new conflicts spread in a new wave of anti-coup militias. ‘There is fear everywhere’, one aid worker said.

Saudi Arabia executed 81 people convicted of crimes ranging from killings to belonging to militant groups, the largest known mass execution carried out in the kingdom in its modern history. The number of executed surpassed even the toll of a 1980 mass execution of 63 militants convicted of seizing the Grand Mosque in Mecca in 1979, the worst-ever militant attack to target the kingdom and Islam's holiest site. The executions came as much of the world's attention remains focused on Russia's war on Ukraine. Death penalty cases in Saudi Arabia had dropped during the pandemic, though the kingdom continued to behead convicts under King Salman and his assertive son, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. The state-run Saudi press agency announced the executions included those convicted of murdering innocent men, women and children. The kingdom also said some belonged to al-Qaeda, IS and backers of Yemen's Houthi rebels.

Foreign minister Wang Yi says that China is not a party to the Russia-Ukraine crisis, as pressure grows on it to withdraw support for Moscow. He said China rejects sanctions in principle and ‘has the right to safeguard its legitimate rights and interests’, calling the three-week conflict in Ukraine ‘the product of the accumulation and intensification of European security contradictions over the years’. There was no mention of recent reports that Russia had asked China for military and economic help after the start of the war. On 13 March US national security adviser Jake Sullivan told Beijing that there will be consequences for large-scale sanctions evasion efforts or support to Russia to backfill them. China’s foreign ministry spokesman said the US had been spreading disinformation targeting China on the Ukraine issue. Asked if he could clarify whether China had received a request for military help from Russia, Mr Zhao said this was ‘fake news’ but did not deny it.

A court has acquitted nine men who were sentenced to five years in prison for attending a house church in a ‘landmark decision’ for Iranian Christians. They were imprisoned in 2019 for ‘acting against national security’ and ‘promoting Zionist Christianity’. In November 2021 the supreme court ordered a review of their case, arguing that ‘going to church does not mean Christians are enemies of the state’. On 7 March all nine were released when the appeal court judges found there was ‘insufficient evidence’ of them acting against national security as they had only ‘worshipped in the house-church, and Christians are taught to live in obedience, submission and support of the authorities’. Earlier this year Christian agencies which have been supporting their case called on the UN to help Persian speakers in Iran to have the right for a place of worship.

China is engaged in a massive nuclear weapons buildup that includes hundreds of new strategic missiles, and Chinese President Xi Jinping is preparing the military to retake Taiwan, USA’s most senior intelligence official told Congress on 8 March. Avril Haines, director of national intelligence, disclosed new information on threats from China and dangers posed by Russia, North Korea and Iran at the annual briefing on threats to US security around the globe. China’s military buildup includes the largest ever nuclear force expansion and arsenal diversification in its history, and there were 39 incursions Into Taiwan's airspace by fighter planes in one day. The Pentagon is warning that China is preparing for a military campaign, so it is sending new sales of advanced-grade military drones to Taiwan.

Extreme hunger is causing parents to sell their kidneys to feed their children. Illegal organ trading existed before the Taliban takeover, but the black market exploded when millions more were plunged into poverty after international sanctions. Currently the UN estimates that 24 million people, 59% of the population, are in need of lifesaving humanitarian aid. ‘I had to do it (sell a kidney) for the sake of my children,’ said 32-year-old Nooruddin, ‘I didn’t have any other option. I regret it now.’ He was speaking outside his home, where clothes hang from a tree and a plastic sheet is a window pane. ‘I can no longer work. I’m in pain and I cannot lift anything heavy.’ The practice is so widespread where Nooruddin lives, that it is nicknamed ‘one kidney village’. Children desperately search through litter for food waste, and shops are closed. People have no money to buy things. Mother-of-three Aziza said, ‘If I don’t sell my kidney, I will be forced to sell my one-year-old daughter.’

The hospital authority says the number of patients dying from Covid-19 or serious complications triggered by the cold weather has sharply increased over the past two weeks, putting immense pressure on the mortuary service in public hospitals where storage space has reached capacity. Dozens of bodies are waiting in hospital accident and emergency rooms to be transported to mortuaries, and the health-care system is under enormous stress as workers battle to control a surge in cases. Empty grocery shelves were seen across several supermarkets as residents stocked up on essentials after health secretary Sophia Chan said the government has not ruled out a city-wide lockdown during the mass testing period. Hong Kong has a large proportion of unvaccinated elderly. The government announced that ‘the deaths are mostly among unvaccinated people’. Previously that information would not have been readily given.

Abdullah al-Howaiti was 14 years old when he was arrested in 2017 on charges of murder and armed robbery. The Supreme Court had overturned his original conviction last year. He was first sentenced to death in 2019, after he was convicted by a court in Tabuk province of shooting dead a policeman while robbing a jewellery shop. Five other defendants were handed 15-year prison terms for allegedly aiding and abetting the crimes. All six had pleaded not guilty, telling the judge that interrogators coerced their ‘confessions’ through torture or the threat of it. The judge also ignored CCTV footage showing that Howaiti was not near the jewellers’ shop at the time of the crime. The court of appeal in Tabuk upheld the conviction in January 2021, but the Supreme Court threw it out in November and ordered a retrial.

A 20-foot statue of Jesus that stood next to Gokunte village's St Francis Xavier's Church in Karnataka state for 18 years was demolished after local officials claimed it was built on land reserved for animal pasture. ‘We have prayed at the statue since 2004’, said a villager. ‘Despite asking the authorities to safely remove the statue and hand it over to us, it was destroyed and removed in a tractor.’ Father Lobo of the Catholic bishops' council said, ‘The video of the demolition was widely circulated, and Christians are alarmed and pained at such repeated acts by the pro-Hindu government machinery’. The bishops say dishonouring the Jesus statue is an example of growing attacks against Karnataka state Christians by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata party. Open Doors warned, ‘The persecution of Christians in India is intensifying as Hindu extremists aim to cleanse the country of their presence and influence’.