by Andrew Halloway
GLOBAL: World EA hears call for Church to defend the persecuted
An Open Doors representative made a powerful appeal for the Church to speak up for persecuted Christians at the World Evangelical Alliance General Assembly in Seoul on 28 October. Joshua Williams, Director of Africa Services for Open Doors International, called on Christians around the world to stand up for their suffering brothers and sisters.
Photo – Joshua Williams, Director of Africa Services for Open Doors International, “The blood of hundreds of thousands is crying to God globally”
Christian Daily International reports that Williams shared heart-breaking accounts of the dreadful experiences of thousands of believers. Deploring the violence against women, he said: “It is horror and hell. When a village or a family attacks these girls and women and keeps them, rapes them again and again and again, what these women and ladies go through cannot even be imagined.” Even if they survive and manage to return home, the pregnant women then face ostracism when they have their children born from rape.
Williams added that the crises in Gaza and Ukraine gain the world’s attention, but “there are more than 121 global crises”, many of which involve Christian victims. In 2024, there were “almost 122 million displaced people”. In Africa alone, 16 million of the 45 million displaced people are Christians. Calling on Christians globally to pray for the suffering Church, he said: “The blood of hundreds of thousands is crying to God globally. And one wonders, where is the Church? Where are the people of God?”
SUDAN: Militia tells Christians: “Convert or be killed”
Horrifying reports from Sudan claim that Sudanese Christians are being burned alive by the Rapid Support Forces if they do not convert to Islam. The civil war in Sudan involves the RSF, a paramilitary group that evolved from the Janjaweed militias and are led by Mohamed Hamdan “Hemedti” Dagalo, fighting the Sudanese army.
Once the RSF had conquered El Fasher, capital of Northern Darfur, killings of non-Arabs began. Satellite images analysed and released by the Yale Humanitarian Research Lab show clusters of objects consistent with the size of human bodies, surrounded by reddish colouration that could be pools of blood. The Sudan Doctors Network has also reported that RSF soldiers were executing anyone found inside the city’s hospitals, turning them into what it called “human slaughterhouses”.
Christians were being told to convert to Islam or be burnt alive
The World Health Organisation reported that 460 people were massacred at the Saudi Maternity Hospital. Images verified by the Associated Press appeared to show dozens of people massacred by the RSF inside the hospital.
Other satellite vision released in early November showed what experts suspect are mass graves, with Yale releasing another report which documented “evidence of mass killing”. Meanwhile CBN reported that Christians were being told to convert to Islam or be burnt alive in large pits filled with old tyres and petrol. Up to 500 Christians at a time, it said, were being murdered.
SUDAN: Police try to force church to give up its property
Rev Daud Fudul Kachu of the Sudan Presbyterian Evangelical Church (SPEC) in Atbara was arrested and imprisoned overnight, because a Muslim businessman claimed the church building should be his. Police officers detained the pastor at his home on 28 October. According to Morning Star News (MSN), Rev Kachu was forced into a vehicle, imprisoned in the Atbara police station and interrogated the following morning.
(Photo – The Rev Daud Fudul Kachu of Sudan Presbyterian Evangelical Church in Atbara, River Nile state, Sudan. Credit Morning Star News)
The police supported the Muslim businessman’s demand that the church hand over their premises and tried to intimidate the elderly pastor into signing a document to agree to that. The pastor refused, but was released after intervention by the church’s legal representative. A church member told MSN that the police officers had said to them, “The law is above your religion”. Other churches have faced similar attempts to seize their property for several years, as the government sides with Muslim businesses.
MOZAMBIQUE: Jihadists behead Christians and burn churches and homes
At least 11 Christians were killed by militants of the Islamic State Mozambique Province (ISMP) in northern Mozambique. Some were shot, some beheaded. Many homes and several churches were also burned to the ground, reports Christian Daily International.
Photo – Burning church in Mozambique Credit: Middle East Media Research
ISMP’s own public statements admit to at least one beheading of a Christian in the Macomia District of Cabo Delgado Province in their attack on 28 September, when they killed four Christians. Earlier, on 26 September, they raided Nacocha village in Cabo Delgado’s Chiure District, where they killed one Christian and burned two church buildings as well as homes. On the same day, they set fire to two churches in Nacussa village in the same district.
It is claimed that ISMP reported killing 30 Christians in northern Mozambique in late September. The Terrorism Research & Analysis Consortium confirms ISMP killed at least 11 Christians. ISMP’s own statements claim many attacks in September, including burning 134 Christian homes and several churches, and kidnapping people.
Caption: The Rev Pavel Shreider in prison in Kyrgyzstan Credit: US Commission on International Religious Freedom
KYRGYZSTAN: Pastor tortured and left with brain damage
A True and Free Reform Adventist pastor’s torture in prison has resulted in a permanent brain injury.
UN Special Rapporteurs allege that prison staff attacked Rev Pavel Shreider, 65. A letter by prison chief Major Azat Kudaybergenov admits that doctors had diagnosed “traumatic brain injury” resulting in “cognitive impairment”.
According to Christian Daily International, the pastor was serving three years on false charges of “incitement of racial, ethnic, national, religious or regional enmity” after being arrested by the National Security Committee (NSC) secret police in November 2024. Forum 18 reported that the NSC officers tortured Shreider and three other church members while being interrogated.
(Photo – The Rev Pavel Shreider in prison in Kyrgyzstan Credit: US Commission on International Religious Freedom)
Shreider wrote in a November 2024 complaint: “Five officers gave me blows on my head, chest and gave me kicks in my spine from behind” and “hit me with an iron pipe to force me to confess that I committed crimes”. The True and Free Reform Seventh-day Adventist Church in Kyrgyzstan refuses to become state registered, so joining it is illegal and punishable.
Andrew Halloway is a British freelance editor, writer and publishing consultant. He is also editor of Good News—a national monthly evangelistic newspaper (www.goodnews-paper.org.uk). Andrew has 18 years’ experience as an editor and publishing manager in the Christian publishing world, and holds a first class honours degree in Humanities. He has long had an interest in the creation/evolution debate, and is the contributing editor of ‘The Delusion of Evolution’, a magazine-style evangelistic booklet that has sold over 23,000 copies in the UK (available from www.newlife.co.uk).