Christians being fed to the lions … and no one seems to care

We need an ambassador for religious freedom to stand against persecution.

Pakistani hardliners call for Asai Bibi’s execution. Picture: AFP

The fate of Asia Bibi, the Pakistani Christian woman condemned to death on a ludicrous charge of blasphemy, could be decided as early as this month.

In 2009 she made the awful mistake of drinking water from a well. For this she was abused and told that as a Christian she was unclean and could not therefore share anyone else’s drinking cup. There was an argument, and she and her family were badly beaten.

During the beating, she confessed to blasphemy. A long and tortuous legal process ensued and she was subsequently sentenced to death. After nine years in jail, Bibi was finally acquitted on appeal last October. Her confession under torture could not be relied on.

Her suffering didn’t end there. Huge mobs demonstrated against her in the streets, demanding her death. An Islamist group appealed against her acquittal, and this could be determined this month.

For a time after she was released, Bibi had to move from house to house in fear of her life. She is now, with her husband, in a protected situation at an undisclosed location.

Hers is one of very few cases of the persecution of Christians to pierce the determined Western indifference to Christian suffering in many parts of the world.

Yet Bibi’s plight has not produced the response from governments you might expect. Britain and the US have not offered her asylum. But all the leading Western nations are in active discussion about her fate.

Canada has been the most forward, suggesting it will take Bibi and her family and offer them a safe life. Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton has said: “If the discussions with Canada fall through, we will facilitate bringing Asia Bibi to Australia.”

Wilson Chowdhry, of the British Pakistani Christian Association, tells me he believes every Western nation should routinely offer Bibi asylum.

Sources suggest numerous nations are worried that if they take Bibi, their embassies, especially in Pakistan, will be attacked or will at least face hostile demonstrations. And the issue could also cause unrest among their resident Muslim populations. This is a particularly acute worry in Europe.

Yet if a fear of terrorists prevents helping even someone in Bibi’s situation, then the terrorists have effectively won.

The biggest and least reported story in the world in 2018 was the savage increase in the persecution of Christians in many parts of the world.

Christians are not the only persecuted religious minority in the world. Muslims in several contexts, Ahmadis, Yazidis and numerous others also face persecution. But as the nonpartisan Pew Centre records, Christians are the most persecuted religious minority in the world. And there is in the West an appalling reluctance to discuss this issue or take any action in connection with it.

The scale of the persecution is enormous. According to Mike Gore, chief executive of Open Doors, the leading Protestant non-governmental organisation working in this area, persecution of Christians is now worse than it has been at any period since biblical times.

“I would say the persecution of Christians is increasing rapidly,” he says.

Bernard Toutounji, head of the equivalent Catholic body, Aid to the Church in Need, makes a similar judgment: “The situation is continuing to get worse, especially in Pakistan, China and across the Middle East. The Western world in general is asleep at the wheel.”

Open Doors estimates about 215 million Christians in different parts of the world face serious, ongoing persecution. The true figure, Gore thinks, is higher as this encompasses only the 100 biggest nations. Another widely held estimate is that about 250 Christians are killed for their beliefs every month. These estimates are naturally ­imprecise but no one really disputes them.

The Western world is just beginning to talk about the problem seriously.

Foreign Minister Marise Payne tells The Weekend Australian: “Australia is deeply concerned about restrictions on Christian communities imposed by some governments and non-state actors around the world.

“Bringing attention to restrictions on religious freedom is a key priority of our current membership of the UN Human Rights Council. We will continue to use every possible avenue to express Australia’s opposition to the targeting of Christian communities internationally. Australia raises concerns over the rights of Christians through ­bilateral representations to other states, human rights dialogues and the multilateral human rights ­system.”

The Coalition government has made specific representations about the situations in China and Pakistan, two nations where the persecution of Christians is ­increasing. At the Human Rights Council and in the UN General Assembly, Australia co-sponsors resolutions supporting freedom of religion. It has had no publicity but last year Canberra took Beijing to task over its increased persecution of Christians.

Payne says: “Australia is an active participant in the Universal Periodic Review process of the Human Rights Council. We referred to increasing restrictions in Christian believers in our ­statement at China’s UPR last ­November.”

And on Pakistan, Payne says: “Australia has consistently expressed concern to Pakistan authorities over the treatment of minorities and misuse of blasphemy laws. We have monitored closely individual cases, especially Asia Bibi’s case since her conviction in 2010.

“The Australian government welcomed the October 31 decision of the Supreme Court of Pakistan to overturn Ms Bibi’s conviction for blasphemy and order her release from prison. The Australian government made ­almost 20 representations in ­Islamabad and Canberra since 2010.

“We will continue to use appropriate forums, including the Human Rights Council, to convey our concerns that blasphemy laws can be applied to discriminate against religious belief or practice and be misused to settle personal scores and grievances.

“We will continue to urge the government of Pakistan to ensure Ms Bibi’s safety and security following her release, and as she plans for her future.”

Payne rightly points out that Canberra campaigns against all religious persecution, but her willingness to speak up explicitly for Christians is welcome.

No one can doubt the intensifying persecution internationally. The congressionally mandated US Commission on International Religious Freedom has painted a consistently worsening picture. Its official 2018 report recommends that the State Department add six new countries to the list of nations it designates as countries of particular concern regarding the systematic abuse of religious freedom.

The six new nominees, which have long had bad records on religious freedom but in the commission’s view now deserve elevation to the highest status of concern, are Pakistan, Nigeria, Russia, the Central African Republic, Vietnam and Syria.

The Christian NGOs report a slight improvement overall in the latest situation in Syria and Iraq because of the territorial defeat of Islamic State, which was dedicated, among its other aims, to committing genocide against the Christians of the Middle East.

The 10 countries the US commission already has on its countries of particular concern list, and which it believes should stay on that list, are North Korea, China, Myanmar, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Eritrea, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

Open Doors in its 2018 report lists the five worst countries for Christians as North Korea, ­Afghanistan, Somalia, Sudan and Pakistan.

Chowdhry says Pakistan is the most violent place for Christians. Hundreds of Christian girls are kidnapped, raped and taken in forced marriages each year, and hundreds of thousands of Christians live in semi-slave conditions as bonded or indentured labourers, which leaves women and girls particularly open to abuse.

One of the biggest developments of last year was the decision by the Beijing government to ­reverse its policy on religious ­toleration and to institute a wide-ranging crackdown and oppression against Christians.

In February last year, Beijing issued a new set of regulations governing religious affairs. This led to a massive increase in persecution, including of many ­licensed and previously officially approved state churches. Bibles are no longer available online, churches are not allowed to admit people under the age of 18, crosses have been removed and smashed, and some churches have been forced to install face-recognition cameras in the pulpit of the pastor so that the identity of everyone who attends can be recorded.

According to ChinaAid, about 100,000 Christians were arrested last year, many of them for relatively short durations, but plenty remain in custody.

This crackdown makes it even more baffling to Chinese Christians that the Vatican has chosen this moment to make peace with the Beijing government and give it the key role in appointing Catholic bishops in China. This deal has not saved Catholics from persecution in the new crackdown.

Although it seems to have been heavily directed at the Protestant home church movement, numerous Catholic priests have also been arrested, notwithstanding the Vatican agreements.

All of this is leading to a belated and still very tepid political response from Western governments. On Boxing Day, British Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt announced the commissioning of a major independent inquiry into the persecution of Christians around the world and how the British government might ­respond.

In making the announcement, Hunt captured some of the causes of the crippling Western ambivalence on this issue. He said Christianity was on the brink of “extinction in its birthplace”, the Middle East, and that “Christians often endure a disproportionate burden of persecution”.

Hunt said a misguided political correctness should no longer hamstring the Western response: “Perhaps this is born out of the very British sense of awkwardness at ‘doing God’. Perhaps it’s an awareness of our colonial history, or because Britain is a traditionally Christian country, some are fearful of being seen to help Christians in desperate need.”

Hunt is grievously understating the debilitating consequences of these sensitivities. In 2015, then prime minister Tony Abbott announced Australia would take an extra 12,000 Syrians from persecuted minorities. This meant predominantly Christians, and a bit more than 80 per cent of the people we took were indeed Christian.

They were certainly suffering severe persecution and attempted genocide by Islamist groups, yet there was an outcry in Australia from progressive opinion that we might be specifically helping Christians. The persecution of Christians in that region is so pervasive that it is often not safe for them even in UN refugee camps because they can suffer another round of religious persecution there. The UN High Commissioner for Refugees outrageously criticised Australia for taking too many Christians, a grotesque criticism that would not be levelled at any nation for helping any other group.

Father Mick Kelly, a Jesuit priest working with refugees in Bangkok, tells me of his frustration and anger on behalf of 1500 Pakistani Christian refugees stranded there. About 500 have been officially designated as refugees. But Kelly believes the UN process is biased against the Christians.

Even if they speak excellent English, they are often forced to make their statements through an Urdu interpreter. This means a Christian is complaining of Muslim mistreatment of Christians through a Muslim interpreter of whom he or she may be afraid.

Kelly says these people are hardworking and energetic and that if Australia took them there would be no danger of creating a pull factor through Bangkok because Thailand itself has cut off the easy entry of Pakistanis on tourist visas. He says some of the Pakistanis have burn marks from torture, written fatwas have been issued for their deaths, and they can they never return to Pakistan.

The persecution of Christians is a grave international crisis. The Morrison government should do four specific things.

First, it should take Kelly’s Pakistanis in Bangkok.

Second, it should create an ambassador for religious freedom. The US and Britain have such ambassadors. We have ambassadors for women and girls, the environment, non-proliferation and all sorts of other issues. The ambassador should advocate against all religious persecution, but because Christians are the most persecuted religious minority in the world, the ambassador would talk mostly of the persecution of Christians.

Third, beyond the ambassador, the government should make the persecution of Christians a regular and prominent part of its international dialogue.

And fourth, behind the scenes or publicly, it should do whatever it can for Asia Bibi.