EU counts tens of thousands of human trafficking victims
The EU registered 30,146 victims of human trafficking from 2010 to 2012, according to a European Commission report out on Friday 17 October. The vast majority were trafficked for sexual exploitation, with women and children suffering the most. The latest trends offer a sobering glimpse into a crime that is thought to be significantly wider spread. ‘We do not claim to have measured the full extent of trafficking,’ said EU commissioner for home affairs Cecilia Malmstrom, who presented the report to mark the eighth EU anti-trafficking day. The data, compiled by the EU’s statistical office Eurostat, comes from national authorities and also notes it ‘does not aspire to measure the full extent of the phenomenon’.However it estimates that over 1,000 children were trafficked for sexual exploitation. Around 80% of the victims were women of which 95% were also trafficked for sex. Others, mostly male, were enslaved for labour
North Korea Jeffrey Fowle released
In September you were asked to pray for Jeffrey Fowle, the American who was detained by the North Korean authorities after leaving a Bible in his hotel room. CNN has reported his release this week. He was picked up by an American government plane on Tuesday and is now back in the US. It was not clear from the report how the release came about, but a senior State Department official confirmed to CNN that the North Korean authorities had indeed let him go. Last month Fowle told the network that he was due to go on trial soon and had pleaded with the US for help to secure his release along with two other Christians in prison with him
USA: Students embrace evangelism challenge
College students across the United States were joined by believers of all ages as they participated in Engage24, a one-on-one evangelism initiative that challenged Christians to share the Gospel with at least one person in a 24-hour time period. October 14 marked this observance on several college campuses this year and saw participation expand to churches. When the development of Engage24 began they encouraged college students to share their faith with a creative approach. ‘Instead of concentrating on how many people came to Christ on one particular day, we wanted to see how many college students would share their faith on that particular day. And if we did that first, then we could ultimately accomplish the goal of seeing people come to Christ.’ They rely heavily on Twitter to track results and read reports from students who had the opportunity to share the Gospel during the day. See also
North Korea Jeffrey Fowle released
In September you were asked to pray for Jeffrey Fowle, the American who was detained by the North Korean authorities after leaving a Bible in his hotel room. CNN has reported his release this week. He was picked up by an American government plane on Tuesday and is now back in the US. It was not clear from the report how the release came about, but a senior State Department official confirmed to CNN that the North Korean authorities had indeed let him go. Last month Fowle told the network that he was due to go on trial soon and had pleaded with the US for help to secure his release along with two other Christians in prison with him
USA: Students embrace evangelism challenge
College students across the United States were joined by believers of all ages as they participated in Engage24, a one-on-one evangelism initiative that challenged Christians to share the Gospel with at least one person in a 24-hour time period. October 14 marked this observance on several college campuses this year and saw participation expand to churches. When the development of Engage24 began they encouraged college students to share their faith with a creative approach. ‘Instead of concentrating on how many people came to Christ on one particular day, we wanted to see how many college students would share their faith on that particular day. And if we did that first, then we could ultimately accomplish the goal of seeing people come to Christ.’ They rely heavily on Twitter to track results and read reports from students who had the opportunity to share the Gospel during the day. See also
Back ‘British values’ or face closure, Christian school told
A successful Christian school could face closure for failing to uphold ‘British values’. The school was warned after an inspection by schools regulator Ofsted, in the wake of new regulations introduced by the Government. Ofsted criticised the school for not promoting other faiths, and it was told to invite a leader from another religion, such as an Imam, to lead assemblies. It was then told that unless it could demonstrate how it was going to meet these new rules, it could ultimately be closed. The regulations state that academies, free schools and independent schools must ‘actively promote’ the rights defined in the Equality Act 2010. Details of the case are disclosed in a letter to the Education Secretary Nicky Morgan from The Christian Institute, which is providing legal backing for the school via its Legal Defence Fund. The Institute warns that the new rules are already having ‘disturbing consequences’.
British Ebola survivor Will Pooley returns to Sierra Leone
British Ebola survivor Will Pooley is returning to Sierra Leone where he contracted the virus, despite being told he may not be immune to it. Being a nurse Mr Pooley said that returning to help the crisis in West Africa was the 'right thing to do'. No one has ever been recorded catching Ebola twice and it is thought Mr Pooley will have at least short term immunity against this strain of the disease but this has never been tested. He has said he will act as if he is not immune and take the same precautions as other British staff in Freetown, the capital. Mr Pooley is flying out to Sierra Leone on Sunday evening and will join a team from the King's Health Partners, a coalition of three NHS hospital trusts in London. ‘I chose to go before and it was the right thing to do then and it’s still the right thing to do now,’ he said.
UK Prison Service – a disgrace
Nelson Mandela said, ‘No one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails.’ The UK prison and probation ombudsman said he is ‘troubled’ and ‘appalled’ by the rising rates of prison suicide (125 inmates killed themselves between January 2013 and August 2014. 26% of those were on remand awaiting trial. The chief inspector of prisons expressed concern about prisoners spending too long in their cells with nothing constructive to do and Frances Crook of the Howard League for Penal Reform called plans for a super-jail for children a ‘recipe for child abuse’. When all else fails prison is an opportunity to intervene and attempt to put right what has gone wrong. Prisons are a tool for society and across the country churches are running Alpha for Prisons. Men and women prisoners are being given the opportunity to know Jesus through participating in this specially adapted course followed by caring for ex-offenders to keep them from re-offending. See
A million pensioners still living in poverty, says Age UK
More than a million pensioners are still living in poverty, partly due to their failure to claim benefits, the charity Age UK has claimed. In a new report it said, 1.6m pensioners in the UK are living below the poverty line, and are ‘floundering’ on low incomes. It conceded that the numbers living in poverty had fallen since 2000, but said progress had now stalled. The government said it was trying to help pensioners claim their benefits. The report, called How We Can End Pensioner Poverty, said that many pensioners ‘had been walking a tightrope in recent years,’ as food and utility bills have risen. But the biggest cause of poverty is that people are missing out on £5.5bn worth of public support. Age UK said, ‘It is nothing short of a scandal that there are still so many vulnerable older people in the UK living in poverty.’
UK money laundering
Schools, universities, solicitors, estate agents and financial advisers are elements of a growing industry of ‘gatekeepers’ to the UK for foreign money launderers. Currently hundreds of law firms across the country are undergoing checks from their regulator into how much care they take to keep out the criminals, because an international anti-money-laundering body, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), will soon visit the UK. FATF has become increasingly concerned about the rising number of legal actions being taken in London by foreign nationals, who have become a huge source of earnings, particularly for big city law firms. Fraud experts say much of this action is funded by laundered money from Russia and former Soviet republics. Analysts expect the inspectors from the Solicitors Regulation Authority to run into stonewalling as lawyers claim professional client privilege to keep information about their clients secret. A similar exercise on UK banks found guidelines breached.