*HCJB World Radio společně s In Touch Ministries, SIM a Evangelical Church of West Africa začali v roce 2000 vysílat jednou týdně půlhodinový program v jazyce Ibogo. Programy pro 15 milionů obyvatel Nigérie mluvících tímto jazykem se vysílají na krátkých vlnách.

*Nejnovější zprávy v originální anglické verzi jsou vždy ZDE (klikněte).

Church-backed human rights organizations are urging the international community to investigate a mass grave in Sudan they say includes "fields littered with human remains, many of them from young children." Voice of the Martyrs, Servant's Heart and Freedom Quest International made their appeal after human rights investigators discovered the remains were those of victims of an unprovoked attack. The violence was directed against the "unarmed civilian villages" of Liang, Dengaji, Kawaji and Yawaji in southern Sudan's Upper Nile province in late April 2002. Nearly half of the original 6,000 Christians and other non-Muslims living in the region were killed in the attack, the organizations said in a statement. The Center for Religious Freedom reported that Sudanese government soldiers stuck in the early morning, killing villagers and burning their houses while they slept. "In a videotaped interview, Tunya Jok described his horror as he witnessed his 4-year-old daughter shot and killed as she fled from the government soldiers," the center reported. "Then his 6-year-old son was captured and beheaded by the soldiers." Human rights organizations also complained about the widespread persecution of Christians and continuing slavery in Sudan. (Assist News Service)

RETALIATORY ATTACKS BY CHRISTIANS INCREASE IN NIGERIA

Seventeen Christians from various church denominations in Aba, a city in Nigeria's southern Abia state, were arrested in late January following reprisal attacks on Muslims. Sources said that Christians were reacting to "incessant" assaults on believers in northern Nigeria by Muslim extremists. Abia state police authorities reported that the central mosque and several Muslim businesses were damaged in the Jan. 18-19 attacks. Clashes on Jan. 11 in central Nigeria's Plateau state left two Muslims and one Christian dead. Violence between Muslims and Christians flared up in the region in September 2001 and escalated throughout 2002. In November, religious riots ignited by a newspaper article led to the death of an estimated 1,000 people and the destruction of some 125 churches in the city of Kaduna. Muslim and Christian leaders have expressed frustration over the conflict. "The nation is sitting on a religious time bomb that can explode any moment with devastating consequences," said Kaduna State Gov. Alhaji Ahmed Makarfi. (Compass)

* HCJB World Radio, together with partners In Touch Ministries, SIM and the Evangelical Church of West Africa, began airing weekly half-hour programs in the Igbo language in 2000. The programs air via shortwave to Nigeria's 15 million Igbo speakers.

FLORIDA JAIL ENDS 'PRO-CHRISTIAN' POLICY AFTER INMATE COMPLAINS

Jail officials in Orlando. Fla., have dropped a policy of rewarding inmates who attended religious services with time off their sentences because the rule only benefits Christians, Charisma News reported. The decision was made in part because of a Muslim inmate who complained that his Christian counterparts were accruing days off their sentences while Muslims were not. "It's a valid criticism of the programming that was there," said Orange County Corrections Chief Timothy Ryan. "It wasn't equitable in the sense that if you were Jewish or an atheist, you should have access to the same opportunities." Earlier this month the jail officially put an end to an "extra gain time" policy in which inmates could deduct up to six days a month if they took part in one of several Christian-based programs. Ryan said the jail was exposing itself to a lawsuit if the practice wasn't stopped. A Muslim inmate complained for months that Christian inmates had ready access to chaplains and Bibles without questions asked. Harvey said Muslim inmates did not have access to an Islamic leader or the Koran on a regular basis. In a jail survey last fall of 2,500 inmates, 74 identified themselves as Muslims. (Religion Today)

SPAIN MAY BE ON VERGE OF SPIRITUAL AWAKENING, SAY MISSIONARIES

Long seen as being hostile to foreign missionaries, Spain continues to be a country where Christian leaders proclaim that a revival is coming. Bringing a Spaniard to the place of making a public confession of faith in Jesus Christ and leading him to join a church is "very difficult," says Dayana Elásmar, serving with Latin America Mission (LAM) in the rural town of Villanueva de la Serena. "The closest thing I can compare it to is working with Muslims," she explains "Here accepting Christ sometimes requires being rejected from your church and your community." Only about 88,000 of Spain's 40 million people are evangelical Christians -- 0.2 percent of the population -- while just 650 of 8,100 towns have evangelical churches. Although the number of believers in Spain is small, growth is slow but steady as missionaries battle against stereotypes that evangelical Christianity is only for poor and "dysfunctional" people. Edwin Kerr points out that religious liberty only has been guaranteed in Spain's constitution since 1978 after 450 years of persecution. He urges believers to "overcome their fear of working publicly and their cultural shame of being separate from the dominant Roman Catholic Church if they are to make any impact on their society." Elásmar adds that a revival could be on the horizon, "Something is happening every day in that there are more and more churches," she says. "Spain is living a key moment. . . . The point is not making that key moment happen, but being alert to God's voice and being able to move with God in each different area." (LAM News Service)

SLUGGISH ECONOMY DEALS DOUBLE BLOW TO NONPROFIT GROUPS

Many nonprofit groups are being dealt a double blow by the economy. On the one hand the sluggish financial picture is hurting their ability to raise money, and at the same time the demand for their services is going up. The Association of Christian Schools International is no exception, says spokesman Ken Smitherman. "We're finding that, in general, giving to our international ministries division has been exactly commensurate with the decline in giving to charitable organizations nationwide. We're probably off about 25 percent." As a result, the organization is making budget cuts "across the board, rather than withdrawing services or specific programs at this point." However, if present trends continue, some programs will have to be discontinued, Smitherman said. (Mission Network News)

RELIGIOUS LEADERS, SCIENTISTS ISSUE 'MANIFESTO' ON HUMAN CLONING

More than 25 religious and scientific leaders have signed a "manifesto on biotechnology" that calls for the banning of all human cloning, and legislation that will prevent discrimination based on genetic information. "We are thankful for the hope that biotechnology offers of new treatments for some of the most dreaded diseases," states the declaration. "But the same technology can be used for good or ill." Called the "Sanctity of Life in a Brave New World: A Manifesto on Biotechnology," signatories include Prison Fellowship founder Chuck Colson, Focus on the Family President James Dobson and physicians Ben Carson and C. Everett Koop. Other signatories, such as quadriplegic Joni Eareckson Tada, president of Joni and Friends, supported the use of adult stem cells for research rather than cells from embryos to address possible cures for the disability. "The search for a cure should never compromise the security of human dignity and respect for human life," she said. "The elderly, infirmed and disabled are exposed and threatened in a society which thinks nothing of creating a class of human beings for the explicit purpose of exploitation." (Religion Today)

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