Virgin Atlantic has ditched its gender-neutral uniform policy for its team flying the England squad on a ‘Gay Pride’ jet to the Qatar World Cup amid concerns for their safety.
The airliner said it worried the crew on today’s Three Lions’ flight to Doha could be at jeopardy persecution from strict Qatari authorities if they were found to be wearing the new LGBT-friendly outfits.
Virgin had previously announced a new ‘fluid approach’ to uniforms in September, in which the travel giant said staff could choose what clothes their wear ‘no matter their gender‘.
But a spokeswoman has this evening told MailOnline that cabin crew on Tuesday’s flight would have no choice on their uniforms following a risk assessment.
‘The safety and security of our people and customers is always our top priority,’ the official told MailOnline.
‘As part of our policy, we complete a risk assessment on all countries we fly to, considering laws and attitudes towards the LGBTQ+ community and expressions of identity on a case-by-case basis.
‘Following a risk assessment, it was recommended the policy was not applied on today’s charter flight to ensure the safety of our people.’
Qatar has faced a barrage of criticism over the way it treats the LGBT community.
Responding, the country has insisted all fans will be welcomed to the sporting spectacle ‘without discrimination’.
But Qatar has the most stringent homophobic laws in the world. It is illegal to be homosexual in the Gulf country and same-sex relationships can be punishable by death.
Virgin Atlantic said Qatar was not one of its normal destinations and was specially charted to fly out the England team.
(…) The alleged attacker - who was already known to the police - was arrested shortly after the crime at the entrance of his flat on Avenue Condorcet in Villeurbanne by police officers from the Groupe de Sécurité de Proximité (GSP). Actu 17
A confrontation that escalates. On Wednesday November 16, a man in a djellaba attacked passers-by in Villeurbanne, as reported by Le Progrès. The crime took place in the Tonkin district and although the motives of the attacker are not yet known with certainty, they are said to have originated in an altercation that occurred at the BP petrol station in Tonkin at around 5.45pm. For reasons as yet unknown, a man wearing a djellaba got into an argument with the petrol station operator, who then threw him out of the petrol station.
After this altercation, the 25-year-old man, who lives in Villeurbanne, went out into the street, more precisely on the Boulevard du 11-Novembre-1918, where in his rage he attacked passers-by. With his bare hands, he allegedly choked four people, including a woman who is still in danger of dying after violent blows to her face. She suffered from cerebral oedema and was unconscious when the emergency services arrived. The fire brigade and Samu rescue service attended to her at the scene for one and a half hours before she could be taken to a hospital in the region as an absolute emergency. The three other victims suffered lighter injuries, but at least one of them was hospitalised. The perpetrator was arrested moments after the crime at around 6pm on Avenue Condorcet in Villeurbanne, near his home. He was taken into police custody and the Sûreté départementale was charged with the investigation of attempted murder. According to the current state of the investigation, a terrorist background is not assumed, but the deed of a mentally disturbed person is favoured.
According to Le Progrès, the young man, who has Moroccan nationality and is staying in France illegally, was turned away from the petrol station for reasons that are still unknown.
A Nigerian national who had been refused asylum in France was arrested on Wednesday for an attack on border force agents which left two police officers injured.
The incident occurred in the French Mediterranean resort of Port-la-Nouvelle on Wednesday morning during what was supposed to be limited to a simple identity check at the Narbonne train station.
When police asked him for his identification, the 24-year-old suspect refused to provide papers and began striking the officers, according to French newspaper L’Independent.
“It turns out that the respondent is an asylum seeker in France. It was refused to him. A decision for which he appealed,” said the Alliance Union of Aude in a statement. The police officers asked the individual to follow them, but he refused and fought back “very” violently.
After several minutes of trying to arrest the man, the police officers eventually pinned him down.
The two police officers, both middle-aged males, sustained minor injuries and later complained of knee and back pain.
Their attending physician who examined them prescribed 15 days off work, and a medical examiner of the Medical-Judicial Unit will decide Thursday on the duration of their temporary incapacity to work. According to local reports, the officers will have limited range of movement due to their injuries.
France has struggled to deport rejected asylum seekers and migrants scheduled for deportation. Despite French President Emmanuel Macron setting the goal of a 100 percent deportation rate, the actual rate is less than 7 percent. With the murder of 12-year-old Paris girl Lola by an illegal Algerian immigrant who was supposed to have already been deported, the issue of mass migration has once again dominated headlines and French political talk shows.
Himank Bansal being assaulted by Muslim students (still from video)
On Saturday, 12 November 2022, a video went viral on social media where a student of the ICFAI Foundation for Higher Education (IFHE) in Hyderabad, Himank Bansal, was being beaten up by the other students of the institute and forced to chant ‘Allahu Akbar’. Post the assault, Himank had filed a police complaint and the perpetrators were booked under stringent sections of 307, 342, 450, 323, 506, R/W 149, IPC, and Sec 4(I),(II), and (III) of the Prohibition of Ragging Act of 2011.
In the complaint, Himank had detailed the circumstances of the assault where he revealed that one Umar was the first to initiate the assault. In his complaint, Bansal mentioned that one of his friends from 1st year BA-LLB course, Dipasha Sharma, called him a paedophile for being friends with a girl 3 and a half years younger than him. When Bansal tried to defend himself by saying he doesn’t want any sexual relations with her and cited references from Islamic scriptures to explain how he is not wrong, the girl shared his messages with everyone else in college.
As per the complaint by Bansal, subsequently, 15 to 20 guys burst into his hostel room and beat him up while accusing him of hurting religious sentiments. The assaulters further asked him to chant Allah-hu-Akbar while beating him up. He was also threatened during the course of the assault, as were his family members.
The group of students also asked him to remove his trousers, and upon refusal further physically assaulted him. Himank Bansal has named several of these people in his complaint with details of their respective actions during the assault.
Hyderabad: Hindu Law student Himank Bansal, Student, was brutally beaten and forced to chant ‘Allah Hu Akbar” in IBS campus by Muslims.
Let us simplify this – Himank Bansal was assaulted because the Muslim students believed that he had insulted their Prophet and therefore, deserved to be brutalised.
After the case of Nupur Sharma, where her innocuous quoting of the Hadiths ended up in her getting death threats from thousands of Islamists and Islamic countries en masse demanding an apology from her, there was a thunderous conversation about how such mindless blasphemy violence, in action and words, can be stopped. If lessons are to be drawn, the first and foremost thing that we must realise is that with the Islamists, threats are never “just” threats. Soon after the Nupur Sharma incident, Salman Rushdie was shot in consonance with a Fatwa that was issued against him over 3 decades ago. Therefore, it is safe to assume that once the Islamic community believes that an individual has committed blasphemy, they are doomed for life – sooner or later, some fanatic with a knife (or a gun) is going to get to them to avenge the perceived insult to their religion.
Armed with this knowledge, one would imagine that the establishment in India would be far more circumspect when it comes to allegations of “blasphemy” – it is a choice that has to be made, essentially – does one want to endorse the perpetual threat to life for spoken words or recognise the fanaticism and danger of endorsing such action by the Islamists.
There have been several cases where the spoken word led to violence because of the fanaticism of one community. Recent ones that come to mind include Kishan Bharwad, Harsha, Priyantha Kumara Diyawadana from Pakistan, Samuel Paty from France and so many more. In India, two cases that perhaps garnered the most attention were that of Kamlesh Tiwari and Kanhaiya Lal (A result of the hate that was showered upon Nupur Sharma post her remarks). In the case of Kamlesh Tiwari, before he was murdered by Islamists, he was jailed by the authorities for alleged hate speech – of course – the thousands and lakhs of Muslims who had taken to the streets calling for his death with slogans of “Sar Tan Se Juda” were not touched. In fact, even Owaisi, who had so much as called for his murder, was not booked for his speech. Kamlesh Tiwari was not only thrown in jail for his alleged speech, but his murder also garnered little sympathy from the usual suspects, including the Judiciary, because the establishment held him responsible for his own murder. The trope that we heard often back then was, “we condemn violence and murder, however, his speech was hate speech – we must condemn such sowing of hate as well”.
In the case of Kanhaiya Lal too, his brutal murder, the video of which was splashed all over social media, was met with a wall of silence or whataboutery, that essentially blamed him for his own fate – “Nupur Sharma committed blasphemy and indulged in hate speech against the Muslim community, therefore, when one supports such hate, hate is going to come to them, even though violence in condemnable”.
While the establishment has always been rather thoughtless when it comes to Jihadi violence, in the case of Kanhaiya Lal, one would imagine that being blind to the Jihadi hate would be rather difficult, considering the killers videographed the brutal murder and then gloated about their “service to Islam”, also on video. With the visuals of the pavement being turned red with Kanhaiya Lal’s blood being viral, one would think that no matter how strong the urge to whitewash the crimes of the Islamic community was, at least this murder would shake their conscience.
So what emboldened the entire Left-Liberal ecosystem to either maintain stoic silence or whitewash the gruesome murder of Kanhaiya Lal? When Nupur Sharma approached the Supreme Court for a mundane plea, hoping to get the investigation clubbed so she does not have to travel to remote parts of the country with death looming over her head, she was chastised for “hate speech”, the death threats against her were justified and instead of the Jihadis, it was Nupur Sharma who was held responsible for the murder of Kanhaiya Lal.
“She has a security threat or she has become a threat to the security of the nation?”.
“The way she has ignited the whole country and she has the cheek and courage to come to the court to ask for discretionary relief?”, “This lady is singlehandedly responsible for the burnings in the country”.
“This lady [has a] completely loose tongue that she keeps on making all irresponsible statements and she claims that she is a lawyer with 10 years standing? This is shameful”.
“This is the outcome of what happened unfortunately at Udaipur”.
“Even if we have laid down that law, this is a fit case that we refuse to apply that law”.
“These are the people who are not religious at all. They have no respect for any religion. A religious person will have respect for other religions also. It is all to gain cheap popularity and just to achieve some political or nefarious agenda that all these statements are made”.
“This petition also shows her obstinate character and her arrogance that she thinks that the Courts of the Magistrate are too small for her”
“Yes everyone has a right to speak, in a democracy, the grass has the right to grow and a donkey has the right to eat”.
The case of a journalist is at a different pedestal as compared to a citizen or spokesperson who goes on the channel and starts lambasting others making irresponsible statements without even an inkling of the ramifications and serious consequences that how seriously it will disturb the fabric of the society”.
“When the conscience of the Court is not satisfied. We must mould the law accordingly”.
The court had said, at that time, that it was Nupur Sharma’s speech quoting the Hadith which ended up in the country burning and led to the murder of Kanhaiya Lal by Islamists. Essentially, if Nupur Sharma had just not exercised her freedom of speech when a Muslim panellist was insulting her faith, the fanatical Muslims would not have been angry enough to pick up the knife and murder Kanhaiya Lal. In the process, the court had at that time refused to give her the relief sought (which they had given to several people before that) because they believed she needed to pay for her speech – even if that meant risking her life.
Without saying as much, the court insinuated that the Muslim community could legitimately chant “Sar Tan Se Juda” and act on their threat because they had been offended by someone talking about their religion – the act of aggression was “understandable” because of the initial spoken word. If one looks at the comments objectively, there was really no substantial difference between the pronouncement by a Sharia Court and the pronouncement by our Supreme Court in this case – or perhaps – the difference was that the Sharia Court would have been merciful and killed the “accused” immediately while the Supreme Court refused to get their hands dirty and threw Nupur Sharma to the wolves instead.
With the court’s conduct in cases of serious death threats and murder when it comes to “blasphemy” allegations against Islam, one has to imagine that those who brutalised Himank Bansal truly believe that they can get away with their assault – or at least – suffer no serious consequences for it.
If one truly removes their glasses, chequered with prejudice, bias and an undying urge to protect the Islamists from any criticism, the cause for the death threats given to Nupur Sharma, the murder of Kanhaiya Lal and Kamlesh Tiwari and the assault against Himank Bansal have a common thread – Islamic fanaticism – a beast difficult to tame when the establishment is enslaved by debilitating spinelessness.
In the case of Nupur Sharma, the court refused to call out Islamic terrorism and violence, as a result, the observations of the court are, till today, cited to justify the branding of any speech about Islam as “hate speech” with a caveat that “hate begets hate” and therefore, any death threats that accrue to the person who dares to comment on religion are justified. The court in this case, and in most cases, justifies rampant and often fatal violence in the name of “blasphemy” by giving the preceding speech the colour of “hate speech”. First and foremost, there is no law that truly defines what “hate speech” is in the Indian Constitution. We mostly have IPC section 295 (A) which prescribes punishment for deliberate and malicious acts, intended to outrage the religious feelings of any class by insulting its religion or religious beliefs.
Such branding of “hate speech” hinges on the fact that all religions must be respected and co-existence comes from mutual toleration and admiration for different religions. When we say that all religions need to coexist without taking offence to each other, we are essentially saying that one of the most important tenets of survival in a multicultural nation like India is religious pluralism and stemming from that argument, the court came down heavily against Nupur Sharma expecting even Hindus to be offended at her criticism of Islam.
Religious Pluralism essentially says that firstly, all religions must acknowledge that certain truths exist in other religions as well, thereby declaring that it is not only their own religion that is the ‘only truth’. Further, it says that all religions must acknowledge that every religion teaches basic universal truths that have been taught since before the advent of religion itself.
When one delves into the principles of religious pluralism as a construct that can enable religions to co-exist without sectarian violence, it becomes important to ensure that all religions are brought down to the same surface level and hence, the claim that all religions are the same takes a beastly proportion where cultural context is often lost. When one tries to do that, it becomes remarkably clear that Islam and Hinduism are not the same. While Islam wants to annihilate Hinduism, Hinduism prescribes no such thing. Islam wants to convert or murder the Kafir, subjugate heathens and establish their Dar-ul-Islam because the Dar-ul-Harb is haraam. When dealing with a traditionally hostile faith, one cannot say that the faith that they are hostile and violent towards is the same as the said faith. Islam, if allowed, sanctions taking offence to the very existence of Kafirs and submits to no law of the land other than that of the God they believe in. It is true that Islam has a strict legal and political foundation to it. Hence, to essentially say that all religions are equal and aspire toward the same universal truths is a fallacious statement that is made by people who either harbour malice, or ignorance.
It is also pertinent to mention here that the higher the intolerance of a community, the more important it is for that community to be mocked, so the intolerance threshold is breached and that offence is normalised. Islamists have to be desensitised to criticism of their faith to a large extent because no other community is today taking to the streets demanding ‘Sar Tan Se Juda’ at the slightest ‘provocation’. Hindus, on the other hand, would have traditionally been more than happy to not utter a word about Islam had they not been beaten, mocked, insulted and humiliated by the very Islamists who are crying victims today.
When the two religions are not the same (one being hostile and the other being the victim of that hostility), they don’t aspire towards the same universal truths, and when one religion is theologically opposed to the other’s very existence, to say that Hindus must be equally offended when Islam is mocked is an expectation that far divorced from reality. One has to acknowledge that Hindus are powerless globally. While Islam has the support of the Ummah, Hindus are usually the recipient of hostility.
The court by branding criticism of Islam as “hate speech” is essentially telling the Hindu community that they either suffer through humiliation, death, rape and brutality or they become as intolerant as the Islamists, because every time a Hindu is threatened and brutalised in the name of Blasphemy, he, the victim, will be branded as the aggressor because he dared to offend an intolerant minority. The court thus emboldens the Islamists who don’t particularly need egregious provocation to go on a murderous rampage.
The court, by placating an intolerant minority and justifying the violence and branding their victims as purveyors of hate, is setting a precedent where the truth is hidden with the crimson colour of the blood that is shed by the Islamists. The truth about Islamic terrorism will need to be acknowledged by the Court sooner or later – the only question is how many dead bodies would have piled up by then.
A Syrian man faces trial in Vienna after allegedly nearly stabbing a fellow Syrian man to death because the latter was applying himself to learning German on a course they attended.
The two Syrians, both with refugee status, attended a German language course in Vienna together earlier this year, but after one of the young men applied himself to the course more studiously, the 22-year-old defendant allegedly stabbed him in the neck several times.
The migrant now faces trial in an Austrian courtroom, accused of attempted murder by the Vienna prosecutor, who claimed the stabbing took place after the defendant began insulting the victim, the newspaper Kronen Zeitungreports.
“The victim was particularly ambitious in the German course, and made rapid progress,” the prosecutor told the courtroom this week. “The defendant, therefore, referred to his course colleague as a ‘nerd’, who in turn called the later perpetrator ‘lazy’.”
According to the prosecutor, the arguments continued outside of the classroom and led to the alleged stabbing, which saw the victim’s carotid artery ruptured.
Christina Salzborn, the judge in the case, questioned the Syrian on why he had a knife in his possession at the language course in the first place. Using an interpreter, the Syrian claimed he had used the knife to cut apples he would bring to the school.
The migrant admitted to the attack, claiming: “After class, Odai went after me, wanted to hit me. So I pulled the knife out of my pocket. I hoped he would take it as a threat and run away.”
Andreas Reichenbach, the lawyer for the Syrian, alleged that “the victim repeatedly teased and provoked my client. He also said they should meet to settle this among men.”
The bizarre incident comes as Austria has seen a surge of migrant arrivals this year, with the country’s Interior Ministry estimating that as many as 70,000 or more asylum seekers applied for asylum between January and September.
Ongoing issues regarding migrant crime as well as corruption scandals for the ruling Austrian People’s Party (OeVP) have led to a surge in support for the populist Freedom Party of Austria (FPOe), with a poll released last week by Austrian newspaper Kurier having the FPOe as the most popular in the country.
An asylum seeker who was subject to police bail conditions after being accused of rape at a migrant hotel has “gone missing” after U.K. authorities failed to securely transfer him from one hotel to another, it has emerged.
The 39-year-old suspect was due to return to a police station in north-east London in early January for further questioning, after being accused of raping a teenage boy at a hotel housing asylum seekers in the London borough of Waltham Forest.
Remix News reported on the initial story earlier this month when news of the attack, which took place on Oct. 5, came to light. Labour MP Diane Abbott sparked fury by suggesting attacks such are these are “what happens when you demonize migrants” in a swipe at Home Secretary Suella Braverman.
The Telegraph newspaper reported that the suspect was transferred to another hotel accommodating asylum seekers in Buckingham, about 125 kilometers away. However, according to Greg Smith, the Conservative MP for Buckingham, the suspect had not been escorted by police to the new hotel and his whereabouts is now unknown.
Smith told the House of Commons on Tuesday: “Buckinghamshire Council learned third-hand from a London borough just this morning that an asylum seeker who is under investigation for a very serious offense was transferred to the asylum hotel in Buckingham. He was not escorted into the premises and has since gone missing.”
Smith blasted the blunder as “wholly unacceptable” and called on U.K. authorities to locate the man and place him in “secure accommodation” as long as necessary.
The Metropolitan Police and the U.K. Home Office were quick to dissolve themselves of blame, with the Telegraph reporting that the “Met Police maintains the Home Office is responsible for transport and accommodation and that it was wrong to suggest officers should have escorted him to the hotel.”
Meanwhile, a comment from the Home Office read: “The bail conditions of this suspect is a matter for the police and we do not have any powers to detain him. There is no evidence he has absconded.”
Sadly, there have been multiple reports of rape and sexual assault from facilities housing predominantly large groups of adult males claiming asylum in the U.K. after arriving in small boats via the English Channel.
The Home Office has now block-booked more than 200 hotels across Britain and Northern Ireland to temporarily house individuals entering Britain via small boats and claiming asylum, along with resettled Afghans; the move is costing U.K. taxpayers around £7 million a day.
Home Office figures revealed that more than 37,000 migrants are currently being accommodated in hotels, and the number continues to rise every day as more arrivals are picked up in the English Channel and escorted to Britain.
The latest figures from the beginning of this week put the number of arrivals via the English Channel so far this year at 41,769, with a further 30,000 supposedly thwarted by French police patrolling that country’s northern beaches.
African countries are well represented among foreign students in France. According to data from Campus France for the 2021-2022 academic year, more than 400 000 students in French universities came from abroad, including the European Union. Of these, over 100 000, or more than a quarter, came from the African continent.
There are six African countries in the top 10 of the nations most represented on French university benches. The Maghreb monopolises the top places, with Morocco in the lead: Moroccan students numbered more than 40 000 in higher education last year, representing more than 10 percent of all foreign students in France.
Algeria is next, with 31 000 representatives. Senegal ranks fifth, followed by Tunisia. The Ivory Coast comes next in eighth place, and Cameroon closes the top ten.
For all of these countries, these figures have increased significantly since 2016. While the increase slowed down during the Covid-19 crisis in 2020, it has since resumed.
The current year is not expected to change this trend. The start of the 2022-2023 academic year has seen a record number of applications from foreign students.
Souleymane Sangaré is the president of the association of African students in Toulouse (south-west France). He is currently studying for a master’s degree in law and since his arrival in France, he has been helping students from the continent who wish to come to France or who are already in French faculties. Although their difficulties are numerous, Souleymane Sangaré welcomes the increase in the number of students who come to pursue their studies in France.
A Nigerian Sufi musician facing the death penalty for a blasphemy charge has filed an appeal with the country’s Supreme Court, according to a human rights group that says the case has the potential to overturn Sharia-based blasphemy laws in Northern Nigeria.
Yahaya Sharif-Aminu, who was convicted of blasphemy in 2020 for sharing audio messages deemed blasphemous toward the Islamic prophet Muhammed, has filed an appeal that challenges the constitutionality of the blasphemy law of Kano State and has the potential to overturn such laws in Northern Nigeria, the human rights group ADF International, which is supporting the case, said Monday.
“As a country with immense influence throughout Africa and the Muslim world, Nigeria has an unprecedented opportunity to lead the way toward abolishing draconian blasphemy laws that continue to plague minorities around the globe,” said Kelsey Zorzi, director of advocacy for Global Religious Freedom for ADF International.
Sufism, a mystical form of Islam that emphasizes the inward search for God and shuns materialism, is a minority faith in Nigeria. However, people from the Sufi faith are often persecuted in Muslim-majority countries and regions.
Yahaya was convicted without a lawyer and sentenced to death on Aug. 10, 2020, by the Hausawa Filin Hockey upper-Sharia court. The conviction was overturned due to procedural irregularities, and a new trial was ordered last January.
The musician appealed the retrial order, arguing that the case should be dismissed entirely and the blasphemy law be ruled unconstitutional. In August, a Court of Appeal upheld the constitutionality of the blasphemy law and affirmed the retrial order.
Yahaya remains in jail without bail while awaiting the retrial, where he still faces a potential death penalty, said ADF International, a division of the religious liberty advocacy organization Alliance Defending Freedom. It added that in a country of more than 200 million, split nearly evenly between Christians and Muslims, blasphemy laws are a significant driver of societal tensions.
Yahaya has been detained since March 1, 2020, according to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom.
Blasphemy laws punish the innocent for expressing their beliefs, silence people from sharing their faith, and perpetuate societal violence, ADF International said.
Kano State’s blasphemy law, codified at section 382(b) of the Sharia Penal Code, inflicts severe harm only on minority Muslims but also on Christian converts and others.
In May, a 25-year-old Christian student in Nigeria’s Sokoto State, Deborah Emmanuel, was beaten to death and her body burned after her Muslim classmates purportedly found a blasphemous message she had sent to a school WhatsApp group, according to the U.S.-based group International Christian Concern.
A video of the mob attack on Emmanuel, who was a member of the Evangelical Church Winning All and a student at the Shehu Shagari College of Education, went viral on social media.
The video shows her lying still on the ground as she tried to protect her head with her left arm as male and female students gathered around, beating her with sticks, throwing large stones, and shouting, “Allahu Akbar,” or “Allah is greater.” She pleaded with her classmates not to kill her.
“The justice system in Nigeria should be protecting people who express their faith peacefully, not punishing them with death,” said legal counsel Sean Nelson of Global Religious Freedom for ADF International.
Nigeria’s Christians are routinely targeted, kidnapped and even killed by Islamic militants, including radical Islamic Fulani herdsmen and terror groups Boko Haram and the Islamic State West Africa Province.
In September, an international coalition of 35 religious freedom advocates and 33 organizations from across the political spectrum called on the U.S. State Department to redesignate Nigeria as a “country of particular concern” — a designation signifying governments that have “engaged in or tolerated particularly severe violations of religious freedom — and appoint a special envoy to evaluate Christian persecution in the West African country.
In 2021, ICC designated Nigeria as one of the world’s top “Persecutors of the Year” for its savage treatment of Christians.
“Nigeria is one of the deadliest places on Earth for Christians, as 50,000 to 70,000 have been killed since 2000,” the ICC Persecutor of the Year report stated.
Open Doors USA, which monitors persecution in over 60 countries, reported that at least 4,650 Christians were killed between Oct. 1, 2020, and Sept. 30, 2021. That is an increase from 3,530 the previous year. Additionally, more than 2,500 Christians were kidnapped, up from 990 a year earlier.
