Laos Christians Pressured To Worship “Local Spirits”
July 16, 2009By BosNewsLife Asia Service
VIENTIANE, LAOS (BosNewsLife)-- Dozens of Christian families in a village in Laos have been warned they will lose their homes and remaining live stock unless they abandon Christianity and start worshiping “local spirits” in accordance with Lao traditions, rights investigators said Thursday, July 16. 
BRUSSELS/BUDAPEST (BosNewsLife)-- The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) on Thursday, July 16, "strongly condemned" the murder of Natalya Estemirova, a prominent journalist and human rights activist who was found dead in Ingushetia, following her kidnapping the previous day at her home in Grozny, the Chechen capital.
JERUSALEM, ISRAEL (BosNewsLife)-- Religious tensions remained in Israel Thursday, July 16, after the Israeli Supreme Court ruled that a Jewish baker's belief in Jesus Christ does not make her baked food unkosher.
MINSK/BUDAPEST (BosNewsLife)-- An evangelical church in the Belarus' capital Minsk faced uncertainty Thursday, July 16, as authorities threatened to close it because a foreign pastor preached at a worship service. 
JAKARTA, INDONESIA (BosNewsLife)-- Muslims have protested the construction of a Protestant church in the capital of Indonesia's South Sumatra Province, the latest in a series of obstacles against church projects in the mainly Muslim nation, news reports said Wednesday July 15.
KHARTOUM, SUDAN (BosNewsLife)-- An international Christian rights group expressed concerns Wednesday over reports that Sudanese officials flogged several Christian women for wearing pants. 
BEIJING, CHINA (BosNewsLife)-- At least five Christians, including two teenagers, were behind bars Wednesday, July 15, in China's Shandong province, where worshipers and rights investigators said security forces raided a Christian youth camp and abolished a house church.
BUDAPEST/WARSAW (BosNewsLife)-- The new president of the European Parliament, former Polish Prime Minister Jerzy Buzek, has pledged to make the European Union more accessible to average citizens following a record-low voter turnout in recent European elections. As the first East European politician to take up the post, Buzek faces a difficult task as the bloc suffers under a global economic crisis and tensions over necessary reforms.
HAVANA, CUBA (BosNewsLife)-- There was international concern Tuesday, July 14, over the detention of a Cuban Evangelical pastor, after news emerged he has been sentenced to six years in prison on charges that include "counter-revolutionary conduct and attitudes" as part of what rights investigators called “mounting state hostility towards religious groups." 
BEIJING, CHINA (BosNewsLife)-- Two Chinese American missionaries were missing and at least four Christians remained detained Monday, July 13, following a police raid on a church in China's volatile Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region where a riot last week left 184 people dead, Christians said.