Zprávy HCJB 17.3.2005

 MAURETÁNIE PATŘÍ K ZEMÍM, KDE EVANGELIUM MÁ JEN VELMI MÁLO PROSTORU.
   Západoafrická země Mauretánie zatím patří k nejchudším zemím, i když v roce 2006 se počítá se zahájením těžby ropy. Již před 1000 let v zemi zakořenili sunitští muslimové. Jen 0.16% obyvatel jsou křesťané a evangelizace se těžce pronásleduje. Víra v Ježíše Krista se tu velmi nevyplácí. Od roku 1983 zde platí islámské zákonodárství šaríja. V roce 1999, když se Mauretánie stala jedním ze tří arabských států, který navázal diplomatické styky s Izraelem, islámští extrémisté se tak rozlítili, že chtěli svrhnout vládu prezidenta Maaoya Sid’Ahmed Ould Taya. Ten ale převrat přečkal a připojil se k USA ve válce proti teroru. Operation World popisuje všechny Mauretánce jako „evangeliem nepoznamenaný“ národ, kde není žádný místní sbor a žádní místní kazatelé. Extrémní islámské pronásledování a nedostatek náboženské svobody nutí maličkou církev k životu v hluboké ilegalitě. (Voice of the Martyrs/Assist News Service)

*Tato a další zprávy jsou v originální anglické verzi zde.

 
 VŠECHNY ZPRÁVY V ANGLIČTINĚ
   REFUGEES FLEE SUDAN'S DARFUR REGION AS DEATH TOLL REACHES 180,000

The full horror of Sudan's violent genocide is still becoming known. An estimated 2 million refugees have fled in an effort to escape violence, starvation and death. The United Nations estimates that at least 180,000 people have died in non-conflict deaths in western Sudan's Darfur region in the past 18 months. "The world needs to come to grips with the intensity of the death toll . . . as many as 10,000 people a month are dying of malnutrition and starvation," said Ben Homan, president of Food for the Hungry. The agency's focus is to provide humanitarian aid while sharing the gospel. "We need to be thinking strategically about how we preserve life, and how we gain a day when we'll be able to sit down with people and hear their hearts and share our love for Christ," he said.

Voice of the Martyrs and its partner, Persecution Project Foundation, recently focused on a crisis relief outreach in Sudan. Ministry spokesman Brad Phillips says Muslims from Darfur are "fleeing other Muslims who are persecuting them on behalf of the government and are coming into southern Sudan, and it's Christians who are ministering to them. As a result, many of them are coming to Christ." The organization also has a radio station that reaches the Darfur region, leading to the formation of local churches. "What's exciting is to see some cultures that are traditionally closed off to the gospel now having the opportunity to receive the Word of God in the context of their situation," Phillips said. (Mission Network News)

OFFICIALS CONFISCATE LITERATURE FROM BAPTISTS AT UZBEKISTAN BORDER

For the third time in recent years, officials have confiscated Christian literature from Baptists returning to Uzbekistan. In the latest incident, literature was seized on Sunday, March 6, from seven church members from Tashkent, together with the car they were traveling in. The seven -- who were interrogated for six hours -- now face an administrative court, although a customs official insisted that they were being investigated not for importing religious literature but for crossing the border on an unmarked road. "For us as believers, Christian literature is a great treasure, and so we are highly concerned that this time our literature will be burned," said one of the church members. Religious Affairs official Begzot Kadyrov said that as members of an unregistered church, the seven have no right to import any religious literature which is subject to vigorous official censorship in Uzbekistan. (Forum 18 News Service)

* HCJB World Radio airs weekly Uzbek programs from an AM station outside the country. A total of 15 million people speak this language.

TENSIONS ESCALATE AFTER NIGERIAN POLICE KILL 2 MORE CHRISTIANS

Tensions have escalated sharply in the Christian community of Numan in northern Nigeria's Adamawa state as government security forces have been deployed to keep peace between Muslims and Christians following the shooting deaths of two Christian youths. Police killed Ezekiel Eli and Kingsley Zadok Imburu on Monday, Feb. 7, when the two joined a group opposing the arrest of a local Christian woman. Thirty Christian residents, including Rev. Nelson Malau, a pastor of the Lutheran Church of Christ in Nigeria, were arrested during the incident and are standing trial in Adamawa's state capital. Leaders of the Christian community in Numan have sent a letter to Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo calling for the immediate withdrawal of the extra soldiers and policemen and "asking him to carry out a full-scale investigation and independent inquiry" into the violence. The shootings came a little more than one week after a young Christian woman named Judith Lan'guti was shot to death, reportedly without provocation, by soldiers deployed to keep peace in the town between Muslims and Christians. (Compass)

HAGGAI INSTITUTE'S DOUG COZART DIES AFTER LIFETIME OF MINISTRY

Rev. Doug Cozart died on Saturday, March 12, after more than 50 years of Christian ministry, including 31 years with the Haggai Institute, a ministry founded in 1969 to equip Asian, African and Latin American Christian leaders who will train others to reach their own people for Christ. Cozart served at Haggai in many capacities, including vice president in charge of international advancement of the ministry. He spent most of his adult life in the Third World, having lived in South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, Vietnam and Singapore. After graduating from the University of Arizona with a degree in business administration, Cozart began his Christian service career with the Navigators in 1950. Three years later he was asked to go to Bombay, India. However, two refusals for visas prepared the way for him to go to South Korea where he met Dr. Bob Pierce and accepted his invitation to become World Vision's evangelistic director in the country. He later served as special assistant to the president for five years and would lead the ministry's relief, education and evangelism outreach in Vietnam. In 1974 Cozart joined the Haggai Institute, and in 1977 he moved to the ministry's Atlanta headquarters. In 1981 Cozart received a master's degree in ministry from the International Bible Institute and Seminary in Orlando, Fla., and in 1984 he received his a Doctor of Divinity degree. He is survived by his wife, Linda, and three married children. (Haggai Institute)

JUDGE POSTPONES JORDAN CUSTODY VERDICT FOR ANOTHER WEEK

In a final attempt to wrest custody of his niece and nephew away from their widowed mother, Muslim Abdullah al-Muhtadi demanded Tuesday, March 15, that an Islamic court in Jordan discount the testimony of his sister, Siham Qandah, because she is a Christian. Under Islamic law, the testimony of a non-Muslim only carries half the legal weight of a Muslim testifying in a sharia court that enforces Islamic law. Observers say that laying the "religion card" may represent al-Muhtadi's last resort in the case. Judge Mahmud Zghl set Tuesday, March 22, for the final verdict. King Abdullah II and other members of the Jordanian royal family have pledged that the children will not be taken away from their mother. Nevertheless, the three-year custody battle has yet to be resolved. (Compass)

MAURITANIA REMAINS ONE OF WORLD'S LEAST-REACHED COUNTRIES

The West African country of Mauritania is one of the world's poorest nations, although oil is set to flow in mid-2006. Sunni Islam has been entrenched in the country for more than 1,000 years. Only 0.16 percent of the population is Christian, and evangelism is severely repressed. Faith in Jesus Christ can be extremely costly. Sharia (Islamic law) has been the law of the land since 1983. In 1999, when Mauritania became one of only three Arab nations to establish diplomatic relations with Israel, enraged Islamist forces threatened to overthrow the government of President Maaoya Sid'Ahmed Ould Taya. He survived the coup and has joined with the U.S. in the war on terror. Operation World describes all Mauritanian people as "unreached" as there are no indigenous churches with indigenous leadership. The extreme Islamic repression and lack of religious liberty forces the tiny persecuted church deep underground. (Voice of the Martyrs/Assist News Service)

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