Multiple Violent Attacks Against Believers Reveal Just How Dangerous it is For Pakistani Christians

Two recent attacks against Christians in Pakistan emphasize the worsening conditions for believers in the predominately Muslim country.

One of those incidents occurred on August 2, when Vicky Masih, 35, was murdered on his wedding anniversary.

"It was the wedding anniversary of Vicky and his wife," an advocate Tariq Zia told International Christian Concern (ICC). "Vicky was asked by his Muslim friends to meet them at Muhammad Abbas' house and celebrate with them."

"Muhammad Ilyas, another one of Vicky's Muslim friends, had to pay back a handsome loan to Vicky," Zia continued. "When Vicky asked for his money back, Muhammad Ilyas abused Vicky and said that he will teach a lesson to the choora."

"Choora" is a derogatory term used against Christians.

"Within no time, the party turned into an exchanging of harsh words, a physical clash, and ended with Vicky's murder," Zia reported.

According to Asia News, Abbas opened fire on Vicky and left him to die. Local residents eventually took him to a hospital where he was pronounced dead. He left behind a wife and three young children.

Iftikhar Saleem, the victim's younger brother, told Asia News that the police arrested the killer only after public protest.

"The police are conniving with the perpetrators, who are part of rich criminal families," he said. "We want justice...We are poor and we do not have the strength to fight these thugs. We call upon all the people of God to help us and pray for the wife of Vicky and her three little children: now they are the most vulnerable and defenseless."

Just 16 days later, Alvin John and his family were brutally attacked in the Mehmoodabad neighborhood of Karach.

He told ICC that some of his Muslim neighbors repeatedly harassed his family because of their Christian faith.

"I shifted my family to this rented house about 10 months ago," John told ICC. "At first, we were asked to leave by some Muslim neighbors because of our Christian faith. But since Easter, we have been pressurized, threatened, and teased."

"My 19-year-old daughter Aresha then became the target," John explained. "They would follow my daughter in the streets and markets, offering her a bright and secure future if she converted, and often abused her for her Christian faith."

John did his best to protect his family and find another place stay, but he says they were attacked on August 18.

"A mob of Muslims, led by Muhammad Samad Zaheer, attacked me and my family," John said. "They damaged the left eye of my son, Vickram John. Initially, the doctors have no hope for his eyesight."

"The attackers also broke most of the house stuff, furniture, doors, and windows," he continued. "We cannot go back to the house as there is unrest in the neighborhood. We are now taking shelter with relatives."

Pakistan is one of the most dangerous places in the world for Christians. It is especially dangerous for Christians who convert from Islam.

In May, the United States Commission for International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) cited Pakistan for its deteriorating human rights record.

"In 2017, religious minorities in Pakistan, including Hindus, Christians, Sikhs, Ahmadis, and Shi'a Muslims, continued to face attacks and discrimination from extremist groups and society at large," the commission stated in a report. "The government of Pakistan failed to protect these groups adequately, and it perpetrated systematic, ongoing, egregious religious freedom violations."

U.S. Soldier Pleaded Guilty to Trying to Help ISIS

United States Sgt. 1st Class Ikaika Kang pleaded guilty on Wednesday to trying to help the Islamic State. Kang, 35, who is based in Hawaii, told the judge that he provided secret military information and a drone that would track US troops to undercover federal agents who he believed to be ISIS members.

Kang said, "Your honor, I provided unclassified, classified documents to the Islamic State.”

Kang is expected to receive up to 25 years in prison as a part of his plea deal.

Assistant Attorney General Demers said at the hearing, "Kang swore to defend the United States as a member of our military but betrayed his country by swearing allegiance to ISIS and attempting to provide material support to the foreign terrorist organization.”

Demers continued, “With today's plea, he will be held accountable for his crimes.  I want to thank all of the agents, analysts and prosecutors who are responsible for this case." 

According to Fox News, Assistant U.S. Attorney Ken Sorenson said, Kang provided large quantities of digital documents including sensitive information on a U.S. military weapons file and various military manuals.

Sorenson stated that at a meeting with undercover agents, Kang swore allegiance to ISIS in Arabic and English and kissed an Islamic State flag.
Fox News reports that Kang began researching Islam in 2014 and according to an affidavit signed by an informant, Kang
 “couldn’t wait to move to the Middle East to ‘join the cause.’”

Reportedly, the document also said that Kang admitted to the informant the if he became an ISIS member, he would be a suicide bomber and attack Schofield Barracks, a sprawling Army base outside Honolulu.

The informant also signed that Kang told him in September of 2016 “that if he were to do something like shoot up a large gathering, it would be out of his hatred for white people, the wicked and non-Muslims.”

Reportedly, Kang obsessively watched videos of beheadings, suicide bombings and other violence for hours in his bedroom each day. The government had been building a case against Kang since 2016 when they placed a tracking device on his car.

Kang was arrested without bail in July 2017 and has been held ever since.

He will be sentenced on Dec. 10.

Kidnapped Schoolgirl Leah Sharibu Appeals for Rescue in Audio Recording, Reports Say

In an audio recording revealed yesterday, kidnapped Christian schoolgirl Leah Sharibu appeals to the government of Nigeria to win her release from Islamic extremist group Boko Haram, according to several published sources.

Boko Haram released more than 100 schoolgirls about four weeks after kidnapping them on Feb. 19 but held Leah, 15, because she refused to convert to Islam, Morning Star News revealed on March 26.

In the audio recording obtained by a journalist for Nigerian online news outlet The Cable, Leah says in her native Hausa that she wants the government and “people of goodwill” to rescue her.

“I am begging you to treat me with compassion, I am calling on the government, particularly, the president, to pity me and get me out of this serious situation,” she says on the audio.

CNN today reported that her father, Sharibu Nathan, confirmed that the voice is that of his daughter.
 
Boko Haram, which seeks to impose Islamic law (sharia) throughout Nigeria, kidnapped the girls from a boarding school in Dapchi, the Government Girls Science Technical College, in nothereastern Nigeria’s Yobe state.

President Muhammadu Buhari’s spokesman, Garba Shehu, told CNN that intelligence personnel were analyzing the voice recording, and that officials would issue a statement after studying it.

Boko Haram has kidnapped more than 1,000 children in Nigeria since 2013, according to CNN.

About 100 of 276 girls kidnapped by Boko Haram from the town of Chibok, in Borno state, in 2014 are still missing.

Boko Haram, whose name is loosely translated as, “Western education is a sin,” has fought for nine years to impose sharia (Islamic law) on all of Nigeria, killing tens of thousands of people and displacing more than 2 million. Boko Haram militants reportedly warned parents of the returned Dapchi girls not to send their daughters back to school.

In 2015 the Nigerian military began taking back most of the territory Boko Haram had controlled, but many areas remain, and the terrorists are still mounting isolated attacks.

Christians make up 51.3 percent of Nigeria’s population, while Muslims living primarily in the north and middle belt account for 45 percent.

Nigeria ranked 14^th on Open Doors’ 2018 World Watch List of countries where Christians suffer the most persecution.

Australia’s New Prime Minister Is an Evangelical Christian

Australia’s newest prime minister is a church-going evangelical Christian who isn’t afraid to stand up for his faith in a country largely viewed as secular.

Scott Morrison became prime minister Friday when the Liberal Party voted him in as its leader after ousting Malcolm Turnbull, the former prime minister and party leader. The Liberals are a center-right party in Australia, while the Labor Party is more center-left.

Morrison is a member of Horizon Church, a Pentecostal congregation in Sydney where he and his family are involved in ministries. 

Hugh White, a professor at the Australian National University, told The New York Times that Morrison is a social conservative, although it remains to be seen how he will governor.

“The question is whether Morrison will choose to make his faith part of his political persona or to what extent he will,” White said. “At this point, he doesn’t seem to have shoved it in people’s faces.”
Morrison opposes same-sex marriage but abstained during a vote on its legalization. The Liberals had promised a vote on the issue if the public supported it in a public survey through the mail. The bill passed after the survey of 12.7 million people showed 61.6 percent supported it.
When Morrison was first elected to the Australian House of Representatives in 2008, he referenced his Christian faith.

“My personal faith in Jesus Christ is not a political agenda,” he said. “As Lincoln said, our task is not to claim whether God is on our side but to pray earnestly that we are on His. For me, faith is personal, but the implications are social -- as personal and social responsibility are at the heart of the Christian message.”

Morrison then asserted that it had become “fashionable” to stereotype Christians as “extreme” and to “suggest that such faith has no place in the political debate of this country.” He suggested that his Christian faith impacts his political beliefs.

“This presents a significant challenge for those of us … who seek to follow the example of William Wilberforce or Desmond Tutu, to name just two,” he said.

“These leaders stood for the immutable truths and principles of the Christian faith. They transformed their nations and, indeed, the world in the process. More importantly, by following the convictions of their faith, they established and reinforced the principles of our liberal democracy upon which our own nation is built.”

Australia, he said at the time, is not a secular country but rather a “free country.”
“This is a nation where you have the freedom to follow any belief system you choose. Secularism is just one. It has no greater claim than any other on our society. As U.S. Senator Joe Lieberman said, the Constitution guarantees freedom of religion, not from religion. I believe the same is true in this country.”

Group Petitions White House for Release of Pastor in China

ChinaAid the watchdog organization, launched a petition this week calling on the White House to support the release of John Cao. Cao has been in a Chinese jail for more than a year, according to The Christian Post.

"While working to build schools for impoverished children in Myanmar, John was detained at the Chinese border on March 5, 2017,” the petition says. “Twenty days later, he was charged with 'organizing illegal border crossing,' despite the fact that he had used the same route between China and Myanmar for this humanitarian work for years.”

The organization says Cao helped build 16 schools in the areas before he was sentenced to seven years in prison. Chinese officials arrested Cao in 2017 while he was on a raft returning from the Yunnan province, where he had been helping build schools. He also tossed his cell phone in the water to protect other Christian teachers, according to The Christian Post.

Earlier this year, Cao’s son, Ben Cao, told the Associated Press that he hopes China will release his father.

Cao’s wife, Jamie Powell, told the U.S. State Department at the inaugural Ministerial to Advance Religious Freedom event that Cao was “set up” for arrest because of his faith.
"Since his detainment, my husband has suffered a rapid decline in his health. He has lost 50 pounds. He has not been able to communicate with me and my children. My sons and I traveled there — 10,000 miles — and we were not allowed to see him," she said.