"Christians continued to experience severe persecution for their faith on an alarming scale,” said US based International Christian Concern (ICC) with Website www.persecution.org.
The well-informed organization said there were several trends, including a crackdown on house churches in China in the lead up to the Beijing Olympics.
In addition there was “a continuing campaign by radical Muslims to exterminate Christians from Iraq”, and “an escalation of radical Hindu attacks against Christians in India, which culminated at the very end of 2007 with a series of mob attacks on Christians villages in the state of Orissa.” Up to nine people were killed in that violence.
The countries on the ICC list are: North Korea, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, China, Pakistan, Eritrea, Egypt, India, Laos, and Indonesia.
200 MILLION PEOPLE PERSECUTED
The group said there are over 200 million Christians worldwide “who live in countries where there is social or governmental anti-Christian hostility,” from harassment, job discrimination, and imprisonment, to rape, torture, and assassination.
"Even though Christians are one of the largest religious groups persecuted for their faith, their plight is almost entirely ignored by the mainstream media. It is troubling that a human rights issue of this magnitude is so often ignored," ICC said.
ICC Police Analyst Jeremy Sewall said he hopes the Hall of Shame report will help motivate "persecuting countries and leaders to take concrete action to uphold religious freedom for all their citizens."
Meanwhile, "we hope that this report will be a useful tool for policymakers and fellow advocates to put even greater pressure on those countries that continue to flagrantly violate the most fundamental human right of religious liberty," Sewall added.
