Mission Network News reports the following persecution incidents:

Philippines

New Tribes Missions is facing another hostage situation. Missionaries Martin and Gracia Burnhamwere abducted early Sunday morning along with 18 other people in what's believed to be a random act of violence. New Tribes Scott Ross says they were taken from Dos Palmas Island. "They were spirited away in a couple of boats and headed south into the area of the Philippines that this extremist group works. And so, there was a bit of a military chase which ended when dark ensued. So, we've been now working at trying to determine exactly where they are." The Islamic group Abu Sayyaf is claiming responsibility. Ross says people need to pray. "Be praying for Martin and Gracia and their safety. Their travelling in open ocean in boats. Who knows how they're being treated." Rebel leaders say they will conduct mass killings if the government sends in the military.

   

Angola

Sixteen Christian aid workers in Angola are safe. President of World Vision[3] Rich Sterns says the missing staff members are now accounted for and the one-million dollar aid program continues. World Vision helps the needy physically in an effort to lead people to Christ. According to Sterns the government is now back in control of the Golungo Alto region after an attack by rebel leaders there. Two World Vision staffers were injured, including a young engineer who was captured and interrogated for nine hours before being released.

   

Sudan

Christians are being encouraged to help free slaves in Sudan. According to Norm Nelson, founder and president of Life At Its Best, they've started a program called Project Freedom. Nelson says in Sudan's war against Christians, radical Sudanese Islamic officials are raiding villages, capturing women and children and selling them into slavery. Nelson says they're asking people to send in $35 to help buy them out of slavery. Nelson believes this is a great project for families, churches and schools.

   

Turkey

Turkey Christian workers who distribute Scripture in Turkey are facing an investigation by police in Istanbul. According to Assist News, offices of this organization were raided recently by police after a newspaper article criticized this groups newspaper ad for Prayerphone and their offer of free Bibles. Police accuse the workers of using illegal money to buy the Bibles, however none of the workers have been arrested. The investigation comes in the wake of increasing missionary activity taking place in this predominately Muslim nation. ontent Beginning... End.

   

From Voice Of The Martyrs comes the following reports.

Mexico

Evangelicals continue to face danger at the hands of local officials who insist that they change their religion to traditional Catholicism or face severe consequences. In a report released on May 29, 2001 by Assist News Service (ANS), Open Doors has documented how evangelical Christians in three separate Mexican villages have recently been threatened with imprisonment, expulsion from their homes, denial of access to public services such as water and electricity and even death.

In San Nicolas, Ixmiquilpan, in the central Mexican state of Hidalgo, believers face a June deadline when they must either have renounced their faith or they will be forced to leave their homes and community.

In Arroyo-Arena San Lorenzo La Lana, Choapa, in the southern state of Oaxaca, two recent evangelical converts were briefly imprisoned on two separate occasions since the beginning of March and asked to deny their newfound faith in Jesus. Local authorities have ordered that the six Christian families in the community (numbering 40 individuals) have their water and electricity cut off and that their homes and animals be burned. The evangelicals have also received death threats from those who insist that they must change their religion if they wish to remain in the community.

In Los Llanitos, Teopisca, in Mexico's southernmost state of Chiapas, town authorities met on May 19 and formally declared that the town's evangelicals would be expelled unless they agreed to participate in all Catholic festivals. Evangelicals typically refuse to participate in these festivals on religious grounds, which angers local authorities since the festivals are an important source of income for them. On May 3, two Pentecostals were jailed for 2 days for refusing to participate in the Santa Cruz festival.

Please remember to pray for the evangelicals of Mexico. Pray that they would remain faithful to Christ in the face of pressure and danger and respond in love to those who persecuted them. Pray, especially, for those who have recently accepted Jesus and who learn early that the path of following Christ is the path of the cross. Mexico is one of four countries highlighted in this year's International Day of Prayer for the Persecuted Church in Canada on November 4, 2001.

   

India

Love in Action, VOM^Òs sister mission in India, reports that the family of Dondabhai Lazarus Solanki was prevented from burying their loved one in a Christian cemetery in Kapadwanj, Kheda in central Gujarat by a mob of militant Hindus on May 28, 2001. Members of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) stalled the funeral procession and burial of the 74-year-old Christian, claiming that the cemetery had originally belonged to the Hindus. When the Christians attempted to go ahead with the funeral, the VHP activists went berserk. The police used over 10 tear gas shells and finally had to charge the crowd in order to disperse the VHP activists and other Hindus who squatted on the road to prevent the Christians from moving ahead with the funeral procession. The Christians had to call off the funeral procession and, for safety purposes, had to leave the body at the police station. After several hours, when it became obvious that the militants would not allow Solanki^Òs body to be buried in his native place, the family was compelled to have it flown to Ahmedabad for burial. China ontent.

   

China

According to Hong Kong-based Information Centre for Human Right and Democracy, 35 Christians were arrested on Saturday, May 26 when Chinese police raided the clandestine worship service they were attending in Dongsheng, a city in Inner Mongolia. The following day, all but 15 were released after they each paid a 200 yuan ($37 CDN) fine. The remaining 15, including church leaders Wang Yulan and Li Haihe, remain in detention on charges of illegal religious activity. Wang^Òs husband is currently serving three years of ^Óre-education though labour^Ô because of his religious activities and it is expected that his wife will now be similarly sentenced. Her imprisonment will leave no one to care for their 12-year-old son. While China's constitution enshrines freedom of religion, the government only allows the existence of religious groups that submit to strict government control over their actions and teachings. The majority of China's Christians meet in unregistered "house" churches, so-named because they typically meet in the private homes of worshippers.

   

Egypt

Egypt According to a report released in the Copt's Digest of May 30, 2001, the Municipalities Council of Sohag Governorate has decided to change the name of the predominantly Christian village of El Kosheh to the more politically expedient name of al-Salam, which is Arabic for "peace." The site of Egypt's worst slaughter of Christians in a century as 21 Copts were killed in the first few days of January 2000, El Kosheh has become a village known around the world and a rallying point for those concerned with the plight of Egypt^Òs Christians. The town is in the heart of Upper Egypt, 450 kilometres south of Cairo in the Sohag Governorate. While the region has one of the largest Christian populations in Egypt, it is also the area where politically militant Islam on a populist level is strongest. Changing the name of El Kosheh to al-Salam forwards the government's attempt to gloss over the massacre of January 2000 (saying there is peace where there is no peace) with the added advantage of erasing a name from the map that has become synonymous with religious intolerance and injustice.

   

For more information about these stories, check http://www.persecution.net

Keston News Service has provided the following bulletins.

Russia

Catholics in the southern Russian city of Belgorod may soon succeed in registering their parish, after trying for over two years. At a May 15th meeting at the local department of justice, attended by Keston News Service, the department head promised that the parish "will definitely be registered', despite "problems' with the application. Without registration, it cannot make a legal claim to the small former Catholic church in the centre of the city. The region's department of culture has meanwhile transferred the building, currently empty, to the local Orthodox diocese for use as a museum-cum-library. In Fr Kempa's absence, head of the Kursk parish council Nadezhda Roshinskaya told Keston that there was "nothing wrong' with the Belgorod Catholics' registration application, which followed that of other Catholic parishes in Russia. "There is no basis to refuse us. When the department of justice says something is wrong, we ask what we should do, but they constantly change their reasons for refusal.' Roshinskaya stressed that Belgorod's parish of some 40 members was very keen to register: "They understand that they can't claim the former Catholic church until they are registered".

The regional duma (parliament) of Belgorod region, approximately 450 miles south of Moscow, has passed a local law sharply restricting missionary activity. The new law is supported by the local Orthodox bishop and the governor, but opposed by Belgorod's Protestants, some of whom have already had it applied against them. Keston News Service has learnt that a Pentecostal church was denied permission for public events in the city centre in April as an official claimed the possible presence of children without written permission of their parents meant the events would violate the law, although the Orthodox had no problems holding public Easter celebrations with children present. Following their 16 February letter protesting at the unconstitutionality of Belgorod's new missionary law, local Protestant representatives have been able to express their views in individual discussions at the region's Federal Security Service, the FSB (former KGB) and at an open meeting held by Belgorod's department of justice on 15 May to discuss the law, attended by Keston News Service. Keston News Service has learnt that a Pentecostal church was denied permission for public events in the city centre in April as an official claimed the possible presence of children without written permission of their parents meant the events would violate the law, although the Orthodox had no problems holding public Easter celebrations with children present. Those violating the law face a fine of between 50 and 100 times the minimum wage.

In late April the regional parliament of Russia's northern Caucasian republic of Kabardino-Balkaria (1200 miles - 1900 kilometres ^Ö south of Moscow) passed a local law banning extremist religious activity, Keston News Service has learned. The law - which is awaiting approval by the republic^Òs president - appears intended to prevent a conflict similar to that in nearby Chechnya by curbing radical Islam, but contains harsh provisions which could be used against almost any religious organization. Concerns about security along Russia's Caucasian border seem to override the fact that the law directly contradicts Russia's federal law on religion. CHINA:

   

China

China: Keston News Service has obtained important documentary evidence, showing the extent of the destruction to unregistered religious buildings in Wenzhou in the province of Zhejiang in south-eastern China at the end of last year. The evidence from the official Communist-controlled press in Wenzhou is overwhelming: a carefully planned campaign against "feudal superstition," lasting from the end of October to December last year, was unleashed throughout the municipality, destroying hundreds of Buddhist, Daoist and Christian temples, shrines and churches, carried out with the explicit approval of the municipal Communist Party and state authorities. All the legally-registered "patriotic religious organisations in Wenzhou (Catholic, Protestant, Buddhist and Daoist) dutifully expressed their approval of the campaign. Several Christian house-church leaders Keston spoke to in the region in May claimed the catalyst for the campaign was a visit by President Jiang Zemin in early 2000. He was reportedly horrified by the sight of hundreds of Christian churches and Buddhist shrines, many of them unregistered with the authorities. The brother of one Wenzhou house-church leader told Keston that the original decree for the destruction of illegal shrines and churches had been issued in July of last year, ordering Christians, Buddhists and Daoists to personally demolish their "illegal" structures. Although Keston has been unable to corroborate the report of Jiang Zemin's instigation, there seems little doubt that an anti- religious campaign of this virulence could not have been unleashed without at least the acquiescence of the central government. The same house-church leader added that Wenzhou authorities held a party conference early in 2001. Some leaders were reportedly shocked by the strength of the international protests against the demolitions, with some arguing the "rectification" campaign had gone too far. ontent.

   

For more details on these and other stories, check http://www.keston.org.

email: ve6xtc@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca