After Pakistan blocked Wikipedia for three days over accusations of not removing allegedly blasphemous content, the online encyclopedia is up and running again.
On February 3, the Wikimedia Foundation, the organization that manages the popular crowd-sourced online directory, announced via Twitter that Pakistan’s Telecommunications Authority blocked Wikipedia and its other projects.
A week after far-right Danish-Swedish activist Rasmus Paludan burned the Quran in Sweden, which sparked outrage across the Muslim world, Swedish authorities have reportedly denied giving a Muslim man permission to burn the Torah in front of the Israeli embassy as a protest.
Last year, a trial court in Pakistan sentenced an innocent Christian man to death by hanging for committing blasphemy against Prophet Muhammad. The man was a minor when he was falsely accused of a crime he did not commit.
The chief of the Atheist Society of India was detained after making blasphemous comments about Hindu deities in Kondangal.
On December 31st, Dalit activist and Telangana president of Bharata Nasthika Samajam (Atheist Society of India) Bhairi Naresh was detained for making sacrilegious comments on Swamy Ayyappa and other Hindu gods.
The National Assembly of Pakistan has increased the punishment for disrespecting “sacred personalities.”
On January 17th, The National Assembly unanimously passed the Criminal Laws (Amendment) Bill to increase punishment for the disrespect of Ahl-e-Bait, Khulfa-e-Rashideen, Sahaba-e-Kiram, and Ummahatul Momineen.
Anti-abortion priest Frank Pavone was defrocked by the Vatican over “blasphemous communications on social media” and “persistent disobedience” to his bishop, who persistently asked him to stop his partisan activism for former US President Donald Trump.
Cases of custodial torture in blasphemy cases raise concern among Pakistani rights activists.
Human rights activists in Pakistan have urged the authorities to modify some of the principles of criminal justice to ensure the grounds for fair trials and express their concern about the rapid increase in cases of custodial torture in the country.
According to a report written by Theodoros Benakis, China's genocidal policy against Uyghurs, an ethnic Turkish group that resides in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region (XUAR), hit a new low. The Wumao army (also known as the "50 cent army"), known to be the trolls of the Chinese government, has hurt the religious sentiments of Uyghur Muslims on social media several times.
BBC Africa released a new documentary this week shedding light on the obstacles humanists and atheists face in Nigeria while telling the story of a Nigerian imprisoned for blasphemy charges.
The program, narrated by BBC journalist Yemisi Adegoke, documents Mubarak Bala’s landmark case, which reveals the threats to religious freedom and tolerance in the West African country.
