Jehovah Witnesses – child sex abuse database
01 Jul 2022
The religious organisation, Jehovah’s Witness, has kept details of molestation accusations against members over the last 25 years at its headquarters known as Bethel. Documentation obtained by The Telegraph newspaper shows that senior officials - known as elders - were asked in the late 1990s to log details of child abuse allegations and forward them on to Bethel in Chelmsford. The instruction to record and keep details of abuse has been repeated multiple times since then. The existence of a database of abuse allegations has already been established in America and Australia, but this is the first time it has been shown to be in Britain. In a statement, the Christian Congregation of the Jehovah’s Witnesses said current child protection policies instruct leaders to ‘make a report to the police wherever it appears that a child is in danger of abuse’. They did not, however, respond when asked if the historical database of allegations had been passed to the authorities.
£130m given to housing providers
01 Jul 2022
Over £132m of taxpayers’ money for housing the most vulnerable people has been handed to providers who exploit the system. Huge sums in housing benefit for ‘exempt accommodation’ have been given to organisations since 2018 despite judgments and warnings from the Regulator of Social Housing. The figures cover 95 of over 300 local authorities. The true figure is far higher. Some bosses of non-profit organisations exploit regulation loopholes to steal money. Exempt accommodation is for women fleeing domestic violence, those with substance abuse and people leaving care, for which providers can claim higher rates of housing benefit and can also charge residents service fees on top of this. It is a booming industry that is beset by concerns raised by charities, police and government about the quality of support available to those in exempt accommodation, as well as cases of violence and sex work within properties.
A statutory body set up to monitor and review EU citizens’ rights after Brexit will review Home Office rules impacting 2.5 million European nationals living in the UK. The Independent Monitoring Authority (IMA) is challenging the Home Office decision to remove the rights of people living in the UK for less than five years before Brexit if they do not apply in time for permanent residency status. The rules mean they would be classed as undocumented migrants and lose their rights to reside, work, rent property or access services including the NHS. At worst, they could face deportation. The IMA argued the rules were a breach of the withdrawal agreement between the UK and the EU, which guaranteed the rights of EU citizens who were in the country before Brexit. There is also a real issue as to the potential application of EU law in the interpretation of the withdrawal agreement.
Greta Thunberg at Glastonbury
01 Jul 2022
19-year-old Climate activist, Greta Thunberg, made a surprise appearance and spoke on the Pyramid Stage during the Glastonbury Festival. The 19-year-old warned festival-goers, ‘The earth's biosphere is not just changing, it is destabilising, it is breaking down.’ She criticised world leaders for ‘creating loopholes’ to protect firms whose emissions cause climate change. ‘That is a moral decision that will put the entire living planet at risk’, she added. Gretta spoke against a backdrop of the ‘warming stripes’, a vivid illustration of how the average global temperature has soared in recent decades. But she ended with a message of hope, telling festival-goers they had the power to make a difference. ‘Make no mistake, no one else is going to do this for us.’," she concluded. ‘Right here and now is where we stand our ground.’ She also visited the festival's Park area during her visit and the crowd joined her in a chant of ‘climate justice’.
Ukraine: Pray for refugees’ protection
01 Jul 2022
The International Justice Mission (IJM) reminds us that the Ukraine conflict has displaced millions of women and children across Europe who are now running out of savings and resources, making them vulnerable to false work offers or accommodation from traffickers. The UN warns that Ukraine’s war is turning into a ‘human trafficking crises’. We need to cry out to God for women and children’s protection, that they would find safe housing and a stable income, to avoid accepting offers from traffickers. Please pray that they would know God's peace and comfort at this time of great difficulty. Pray for the expansion of IJM's anti-trafficking work in Europe. Ukraine’s refugee crisis means they urgently need to expand their anti-trafficking work into more European countries to reach and protect more vulnerable people. Pray for more local churches and European communities to accept and help refugees and may God mightily bless those volunteers already welcoming Ukrainians into their communities.
Ukraine: Zelensky urges G7 ‘help us win by year end’
NATO is increasing the troops available to its response force from the current 40,000 and will strengthen forward defences. The military alliance's secretary-general said, ‘We will enhance our battle groups in the eastern part of the alliance, up to brigade levels. We will transform the NATO response force and increase the number of our high readiness forces to well over 300,000.’ He describes Russia as the most significant and direct threat to the alliance's security and values and the NATO response to the invasion of Ukraine as the biggest overhaul of its collective defence and deterrence since the Cold War. Meanwhile, British troops are training Ukrainian soldiers on multiple-launch rocket systems and light guns on Salisbury Plain. A Royal Artillery trainer said it was a privilege to train the Ukrainians, they are professional rocket artillerymen. Their motivation to be quick and to learn is incredible. They don’t take many breaks. They are here to learn and are keen to return to Ukraine ‘as soon as possible’.
Mali: Jihadis kill 132 civilians
01 Jul 2022
Attacks by jihadi rebels in central Mali have killed 132 civilians, showing that Islamic extremist violence is spreading from Mali’s north to more central areas. For several weeks rebels have been blocking the road between Gao in the north and Mopti in central Mali. The United Nations peacekeeping mission in Mali is concerned by the extremist attacks against civilians in the Bandiagara region that have caused casualties and displaced populations. In a separate incident, a U.N. peacekeeper died from injuries sustained from an improvised explosive device. Since the beginning of 2022, several attacks have killed U.N. uniformed peacekeepers. Attacks on peacekeepers constitute war crimes. The U.N. peacekeeping mission began after France went there to remove rebels who were capturing cities and major towns the year before (2014). They currently have 12,000 troops, 2,000 police and other officers in Mali. Over 270 peacekeepers have died in the U.N.’s deadliest peacekeeping mission.
Global: Probes into migrant deaths
01 Jul 2022
Five human rights organisations want Spain and Morocco to investigate the deaths of 18 migrants, the injuries of 76 others, and the actions of 140 Moroccan security officers when migrants attempted to scale a fence separating the two countries. Spain's Commission for Refugees decried ‘indiscriminate use of violence to manage migration and control borders had prevented people who were eligible for international protection from reaching Spanish soil’. Meanwhile, UNHCR is asking both Africa and Europe to enhance legal frameworks and operational capacities at land and sea borders and urban centres plus youth programming and local community-based development as alternatives to dangerous journeys. In America the bodies of 51 dead migrants were discovered inside a lorry in San Antonio. An official said they found ‘stacks of bodies and no water in the truck. Sixteen survivors are in hospital with heat stroke and exhaustion, including four minors. No children were among the dead. See