South Asia

The first coronavirus case was reported in April with serious health and economic consequences. The lockdown has left transgender people, rickshaw drivers, migrant workers and day labourers hungry. In Assam the Church’s North East Diocesan Social Service Society has helped 43,738 families. Recent flooding has compounded the ongoing coronavirus emergency.

Centrally located on the island, the Kandakadu Rehab Centre has become a COVID-19 cluster, with 629 people infected. About 50,000 Sri Lankans have lost their jobs abroad from lockdowns and plan to come home.

Hindu extremists beat two pastors with sticks and kicks after dragging them out of a house. they also took some Bibles and a mobile phone. In Uttar Pradesh, police arrested a pastor for allegedly engaging in forced conversion.

The Vanguard Group focuses on the Chinese market. Shanghai and Shenzhen on the rise after the collapse due to the first wave of Covid-19. World of production bucks the trend and hastens plans to leave China and return to their countries of origin, especially the United States, the European Union, Japan, Taiwan and India.

NGOs accuse the AIIB of not respecting its social and environmental pledges. In India and Bangladesh, entire communities have been forcibly relocated to build new infrastructures. The European Union calls for respect for international standards.

Priests have given up part of their allowance to provide food and coronavirus kits to those in need. About 33 per cent of Bihar residents live below the poverty line. Some 1.3 million unemployed migrant workers need help. The Church is committed to fighting illiteracy.

For the anniversary, a Mass was celebrated in the chapel of the Motherhouse of the Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata, next to the tomb of the Mother. The homily of Fr. Dominic Gomes, vicar general of the archdiocese. "Mother Teresa highlighted the deepest meaning of service - an act of love towards the hungry, the thirsty, the stranger, the naked, the sick, the prisoner (cf. Matthew 25: 34-36) is done towards Jesus himself" .

"The pandemic has highlighted and aggravated social problems". "When the obsession with owning and dominating excludes millions of people from primary goods; when economic and technological inequality is such as to tear the social fabric; and when dependence on unlimited material progress threatens the common home, then we cannot stand by”.

A five-storey building with 40 flats and more than 200 residents collapsed around 7 pm. Similar incidents are frequent during the rainy season. Many had invested their life savings and now have lost everything, says local priest. For them, this is a second blow after losing job and wages as a result of COVID-19.

The cabinet plans to scrap the 19th amendment to the constitution adopted in 2015. The Rajapaksa brothers appear keen on eliminating term limits on the president as well as other restrictions on the office. This has alarmed the opposition. The reforms that have modernised the country should not be abolished.

A Muslim businessman offers over a thousand dollars to Christians who convert to Islam, almost six thousand if an entire Christian family converts. His video praising Islamic proselytising goes viral: even young Muslims are pushing young Christians to abandon the Christian faith. For human rights advocate, the authorities must stop such hatemongers.

In 2008, Hindu nationalist violence destroyed 395 churches and places of worship of Adivasi and Dalit Christians; 6500 houses. At least 100 people killed; 40 women raped, harassed and humiliated; schools, social services, health centers destroyed or vandalized; more than 75 thousand people displaced; many cases of forced conversion to Hinduism. Until now, no criminal jailed. Out of 3,300 complaints, only a few hundred accepted. Many families are unable to return to their villages of origin for fear of being killed