The latest diplomatic row with North Korea, centred around a film made by Sony Pictures, appears to be successfully obscuring a human rights tragedy unfolding in the country. The North Korean government is apparently restructuring its prison camp system, and subjecting prisoners to arbitrary relocations and executions in order to do so; a South Korean newspaper reports that prisoners are being moved one at a time, during the night, to avoid detection by satellites. An international human rights watchdog says that North Korea is “clearly implementing” a “policy of genocide to eliminate the camps”, especially Camp 15, the atrocities in which formed much of the evidence presented to a recent UN Commission of Inquiry report.
In Argentina, a court case filed by an animal rights organisation has succeeded in obtaining a judgment that an animal deserves limited human rights. The case concerned a shy orang-utan who the campaigners say is stressed and depressed, and want to be transferred from a zoo in Buenos Aires to a sanctuary in Brazil. They argued that the ape “has sufficient cognitive functions that it should not be treated as an object.” The court agreed that the ape deserved the rights of a “non-human person.” But the zoo’s head of biology said that the orang-utan’s perceived shyness was a normal part of orang-utan behaviour, and that the campaigners did not understand ape biology and were therefore mistaken in ascribing human emotions to it.
A city in the Philippines, on the popular tourist island of Bohol, declares its support for the Bible by requiring every motorbike-taxi in its island province to have a Scripture verse painted on the back. The official verse painter said, “Years ago people used to paint obscene messages and images on their tricycles, but now when you read the Word of God you can’t help but feel alive.” The law was passed 22 years ago, and city officials say that it has resulted in lower crime rates, stronger families, and a relatively peaceful city. Only 3000 such taxis are allowed and their verses are assigned by the city along with their taxi licences, so it is unlikely that any taxi will carry the verse 2 Kings 9:20, which reads “His driving is like that of Jehu son of Nimshi – he drives like a madman.”
The Yazidi community from Iraq which was threatened with near-extinction by Islamic State forces, has been speaking of the trauma it suffered. Perhaps the most shocking part of their story is not merely that many women and girls were taken and used as sex slaves, but the extent to which that practice was officially organised; Islamic State even produced a pamphlet with the title “Questions and Answers on Taking Captives and Slaves.” Women who have escaped or been ransomed talk of being sold into slavery – girls with blue eyes cost more – and if they were beaten or injured, they were simply re-sold once they had recovered. An estimated 3500 women and girls are still missing.
Four Egyptians Christians who had travelled to Libya for employment were kidnapped at the border when returning home in August; the kidnappers allowed the bus driver and his three Muslim passengers to continue. There has been no news of them since. The group that kidnapped them, Ansar al-Sharia, was declared a terrorist group by the United Nations in November.
In Indonesia, Muslim leaders are supporting the new Christian governor of the capital city and slamming Muslim hardliners for attempting to stir up unrest against him. One Islamic leader said, “The majority of Jakartans and Indonesians are accepting of the values of democracy. The Islamic Defenders Front … is only spreading hatred amongst religious followers and races.” The comment about ‘race’ is because the new governor is of Chinese extraction.
A topless Femen activist who deliberately desecrated a Parisian church last Christmas has been found guilty of “sexual exhibitionism” and given only a suspended one month prison sentence. She stood in front of the church altar (along with a posse of journalists and photographers) shouting “Christmas is cancelled” and holding two pieces of liver which she later described as “symbols of the aborted infant Jesus”, saying she “left the bloody holy fetus at the foot of the altar.” The act was condemned by the Mayor of Paris but not by any Government minister, which may explain why she did not face a more serious charge relating to anti-religious activities.
The leader of a Belfast pro-life group, which has been holding a vigil outside a Marie Stopes abortion clinic in the city for five years, was yesterday fined and given a restraining order. The head of the clinic claimed that she had been harassed by the pro-lifer’s comments, including “May God forgive you”, and “witchy laughter”.
There are some people who say that it’s best to die doing what you love, but congregants at Shiloh Baptist Church in Chicago were still shocked and devastated when their 60 year old pastor suffered a heart attack in the pulpit. He was singing Pharrell Williams’ song “Happy” at the time. The three churches that he pastored decided to celebrate his life with a memorial concert.
A poll to find the greatest Christian rock guitarist of all time by Classic Christian Rock Zone has given the award to Phil Keaggy. The award was based on a survey that got more than 24,000 responses, along with judgments from journalists and other figures in the Christian rock music scene (though these received less weighting than the public vote). Keaggy has won the GMA Dove [US Christian music] Award for the Instrumental Album of the Year no less than seven times. Others in the top five were Rex Carroll of Whitecross; Tonny Palacios of Guardian; Kerry Livgren, formerly of Kansas; and Chris Impelliteri of the eponymous fast-metal band. U2’s The Edge came in 10th place; Stu G of Delirious came 58th; and the only woman (and oldest entrant, having peaked in popularity in the 1930s and 40s) in the list, Sister Rosetta Tharpe, came in 92nd.
In technology news, a 3D printer has been used for the first time to ‘email’ a spanner from Earth to space. Instructions for how to make a ratchet wrench (socket wrench) were emailed to an astronaut on the International Space Station, and a wrench was “printed”. The wrench will not be used; instead it will be brought back to Earth for tests.
And finally, a newly retired 61 year old Seattle man decided to make a difference when he realised that most of the city’s office blocks threw away toilet paper that had less than a quarter of a roll left at the end of the day. He asked janitors to collect the stubs instead of discarding them, and then he collected them and drove them to a local food bank, where they proved very popular. He has just retired as the Toilet Paper Man at the age of 76 after a bout of pneumonia, by which stage he was collecting from nearly a quarter of downtown Seattle, and delivering three truckloads of toilet rolls per fortnight. The food banks have promised to keep the service going with other drivers.
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