Aid to the Church in Need: India’s Christian victims left to rot in slums

India’s Christian victims left to rot in slums

Posted by Press release on 21/8/2009, 9:40 am
Board Administrator

ACN News, Friday, 21st August 2009 – INDIA

India’s Christian victims left to rot in slums

- One year on Christians in Orissa too terrified to return to their villages

By John Newton

CAMPS for Christians who fled mob violence in Orissa last August have been forcibly closed – but refugees are still too scared to return home.
Speaking from India, journalist Anto Akkara told Aid to the Church in Need, the charity for persecuted and other suffering Christians, that, while the state government had officially dissolved the camps, there are still about 1,000 Christians living in tents.
At their height the displacement camps housed 50,000 refugees, many of whom have gone back to their villages.
But Akkara said that most of the Christians who have not returned are living in the slums of Bhubaneswar, the state capital of Orissa, east India, fearing the government will not be able to protect them should violence erupt again.
His remarks follow the US Commission on International Religious Freedom’s decision earlier this month to put India on its “Watch List” for “the government’s largely inadequate response in protecting its religious minorities.”
Marie-Ange Siebrecht, ACN’s India expert said the national government’s assistance for Christian refugees in Orissa is still unsatisfactory.
She said: “The government is dissolving the camps now, but this does not solve the problems of the refugees, because the Christians dare not venture back into their villages because of threats of fundamentalist Hindus.”
Additionally she said that displaced Christians usually lack the means to support themselves, since compensation payments promised by the government have often “gone missing.”
Siebrecht’s remarks follow demands from local church representatives that the national authorities should provide better protection for religious minorities.
She added her voice to those demanding that the state government of Orissa should create safe areas, so that all Christians can return to their villages without fear of attack.
ACN has been supporting successful schemes in places where there may be fears that Christians will be the target of attacks if they return – peace-building projects are being organised under the auspices of Archbishop Raphael Cheenath of Cuttack-Bhubaneswar.
As part of these peace-building projects, which ACN is backing, all groups – especially the young – have been encouraged to undertake joint activities to help rebuild trust and cooperation.
ACN provided initial emergency relief for those in the camps, temporary tent chapels where Mass could be said, and has promised help to Archbishop Cheenath to rebuild churches and other buildings destroyed in the violence.
During last August’s pogroms against Christians more than 70 people were killed, 5,031 homes were attacked, and 171 churches targeted.
Help to rebuild the Church in Orissa remains a top priority for Aid to the Church in Need.

Editor’s Notes:

Directly under the Holy See, Aid to the Church in Need supports the faithful wherever they are persecuted, oppressed or in pastoral need. ACN is a Catholic charity – helping to bring Christ to the world through prayer, information and action.

Founded in 1947 by Fr Werenfried van Straaten, whom Pope John Paul II named “An outstanding Apostle of Charity”, the organisation is now at work in about 130 countries throughout the world.

The charity undertakes thousands of projects every year including providing transport for clergy and lay Church workers, construction of church buildings, funding for priests and nuns and help to train seminarians. Since the initiative’s launch in 1979, 46.5 million Aid to the Church in Need Child’s Bibles have been distributed worldwide.

For more information, contact please contact the Australian office of ACN on (02) 9679-1929. e-mail: info@aidtochurch.org or write to Aid to the Church in Need PO Box 6245 Blacktown DC NSW 2148.Web: www.aidtochurch.org

This message is locked.

Responses are not allowed!

Aid to the Church in Need PO Box 6245 Blacktown DC NSW 2148 ABN: 62 418 911 594
Ph/Fax (02) 9679-1929 e-mail: info@aidtochurch.org web: www.aidtochurch.org