Tag: UN

International Youth Day: Young Christians want to build peace

August 11, 2017 Global News -- No Particular Country Aleppo, Arauca, Asia-Pacific, Bangui, Blasphemy, Central African Republic, Colombia, Damascus, ELN, FARC, Indonesia, Iran, Jakarta, Java, Syria, UN, Venezuela, Yogyakarta, Youth

After years of war Colombia's young men and women want peace. (Photo: Open Doors International)

Ahead of the UN’s International Youth Day on 12 August, which this year has “Youth Building Peace” as its theme, World Watch Monitor takes a look at some of the challenges facing young Christians around the world and how they try to contribute to building peaceful societies. Many of the world’s . . . Read More

Central African Republic: ‘early warning signs of genocide’ warns UN aid chief

August 8, 2017 Central African Republic Anti-balaka, Bangassou, Bangui, Bocaranga, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Faustin-Archange Touadéra, Genocide, Seleka, UN, Zemio

The UN has warned of the risk of genocide in the Central African Republic (CAR), saying the situation there has deteriorated in recent months. “Violence is intensifying, risking a repeat of the devastating destructive crisis that gripped the country four years ago… The early warning signs of a genocide are . . . Read More

Displaced by Boko Haram’s violence, Nigerians finally get food to prevent famine

August 4, 2017 Nigeria Adamawa, Boko Haram, Borno, Christian Association of Nigeria, IDPs, Nigeria, UN, Yobe

Food aid has reached 15,000 families in Northeast Nigeria who live in famine-like conditions. (Photo: Open Doors International)

The current crisis in northeast Nigeria has been called the “greatest crisis on the African continent“. More than five million Nigerians live in famine-like conditions in Borno, Adamawa and Yobe states, the epicentre of the eight years-long Boko Haram insurgency. According to the World Food Programme, the ongoing insecurity has . . . Read More

Why Syrian and Iraqi Christians eye different futures

August 3, 2017 Syria Asylum seekers, Iraq, Refugees, Syria, UN, USA

Despite the violence, around 30,000 of Aleppo's 250,000 Christians have remained in Syria's ancient second city

Iraqi Christians who decide to flee the Middle East feel they have no future there, whereas Syrian Christians wish to return home because they believe they have a future there under President Bashar Al-Assad. That is the view of human rights lawyer and genocide expert Ewelina Ochab, who has interviewed . . . Read More

Bishop in C. African Republic wants more effective UN peacekeepers after ‘failure to protect’

July 28, 2017 Central African Republic Anti-balaka, Bangassou, Bangui, Central African Republic, Dieudonné Nzapalainga, IDPs, Morocco, Nicolas Guérékoyamé-Gbangou, Oumar Kobine Layama, Seleka, UN

Bishop of Bangassou, (CAR), Juan José Aguirre Munoz (World Watch Monitor)

A bishop prevented by escalating violence from returning to his Central African Republic diocese has called for UN peacekeepers there to be replaced with a more effective defence force. Bishop Juan José Aguirre Munoz of Bangassou, who was speaking from the CAR capital, Bangui, also said the Moroccan troops are . . . Read More

‘Risk of genocide’ linked with level of religious freedom

July 25, 2017 Global News -- No Particular Country Afghanistan, Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, Genocide, Houthis, Iraq, Libya, Nigeria, Pakistan, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, UN, Yemen

The civil war in Yemen has displaced over 3 million people like this woman who is sitting under a makeshift shelter at a camp for internally displaced persons in the northern district of Abs in Yemen's Hajjah province, on July 23, 2017 (Photo: STRINGER/AFP/Getty Images)

Yemen is the country where the risk of genocide, or mass killing, rose most last year, says Minority Rights Group International (MRG) in its 2017 Peoples Under Threat index, which also includes a large number of countries in which it is most difficult to live as a Christian. Nine of . . . Read More

Maldives told to retract criticism of UN Special Rapporteur

July 25, 2017 Maldives Ahmed Shaheed, Maldives, Progressive Party of Maldives, Religious freedom, UN, USA

UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief, Dr Ahmed Shaheed, has been accused by the Maldives' government of spreading "evil deeds" and of "irreligious activities". (Photo: Getty Images)

The Maldives should retract its accusations against the UN’s Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB) – its former Foreign Minister, Ahmed Shaheed – and condemn the calls for his beheading, says the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF). USCIRF “strongly condemn[ed]” the accusations from the ruling . . . Read More

European Parliament condemns ‘in strongest terms’ Eritrea’s human rights record

July 13, 2017 Eritrea Abune Antonios, Eritrean Orthodox Church, Europe, Human rights, UN

The European Parliament (EP) has passed a resolution condemning in “the strongest terms” the “systematic, widespread and gross human rights violations” in Eritrea, reports CSW. It follows 2016’s report by the UN that the country’s “crimes against humanity” should be investigated by the International Criminal Court. The EP resolution describes . . . Read More

Security not only concern for Syrians returning home

July 4, 2017 Syria Aleppo, Damascus, Homs, IDPs, Islamic State, Maaloula, Migrants, Refugees, Trauma, UN

As Islamic State forces are pushed back and more areas declared “safe”, Syrians are starting to return to their homes. According to the UN’s Refugee Agency (the UNHCR), nearly half a million have gone back since January. Around 440,000 internally displaced people, and more than 31,000 refugees who had fled . . . Read More

Thousands of Nigerian refugees forced back home to looming famine

June 30, 2017 Nigeria Adamawa, Boko Haram, Borno, Cameroon, Chad, IDPs, Niger, Refugees, UN, Yobe

Thousands of Nigerians who fled Boko Haram’s insurgency, and sought refuge in neighbouring Cameroon, have been forced back home, the UN said on 29 June, as Reuters reports. According to the UN refugee agency (UNHCR), some 887 Nigerians, most of them children, were repatriated against their will on 27 June alone. The . . . Read More

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