Pakistan’s preferential trade status could be jeopardized if it does not address human rights concerns, including controversial blasphemy laws, forced marriages/conversions of minority girls and freedom of religion, a European Union (EU) delegation said on Friday (Jan. 31).
The president of Pakistan on Wednesday (Jan. 29) signed into law a digital crimes measure that church and rights leaders fear will be misused to persecute people who share persecution news online or criticize the government for its inability to stop such incidents.
Police in Pakistan this week arrested a mentally challenged Christian on blasphemy charges despite being aware of his condition, sources said.
A court in Pakistan on Saturday (Jan. 25) acquitted Christian twin brothers of a false blasphemy accusation as the prosecution failed to prove charges against them, their attorney said.
Five Muslims on Jan. 9 abducted a 14-year-old Christian girl from outside her home in Pakistan, her father said.
A Christian woman in Pakistan wrongly charged with blasphemy by a mosque leader won bail on Thursday (Jan. 16), her lawyer said.
An Islamist gang trapped more than 450 people in false blasphemy charges in recent years in Pakistan, including five who were tortured death in custody, according to human rights lawyers.
Two church pastors kidnapped on Dec. 29 in northeastern Nigeria were released on Sunday (Jan. 5), Church of the Brethren in Nigeria (EYN) leaders said.
Suspected Fulani herdsmen on Monday (Jan. 6) killed three Christians in an attack on a village in Plateau state, the latest of 11 killings in the area since early December, sources said.
Fulani herdsmen began the new year by attacking a predominantly Christian community at dawn on Wednesday (Jan. 1) in Kaduna state, Nigeria, burning down a Christian church building and six houses, sources said.
Fulani herdsmen on the night of Dec. 22 killed 15 Christians in a village in Plateau state, Nigeria, including a 1-year-old baby and a 13-year-old child, sources said.
Fulani herdsmen attacked a cluster of five predominantly Christian villages in Benue state on Wednesday (Dec. 25), massacring 33 people on Christmas Day, sources said.
