China targeting Christians after Uyghurs? WeChat handles, Bible apps hit; reports of worse

China has been facing the ire of the global community for a number of reasons ranging from Coronavirus origins and the suppression of WHO investigation, its aggression in the Indo-Pacific waters, its human rights violations over the religious persecution of Uyghur Muslims, and implementing a new security law in Hong Kong threatening democracy and autonomy of the trade city.

However, the communist country has now come into the spotlight for unwanted reasons once again, this time over the alleged religious persecution of Christians. International media reports have stated that China has removed Bible apps from its own versions of app stores and has also shut down the WeChat accounts of some of the prominent upholders of Christianity, in a blow to the online presence of the people following the Christian faith in the country.

Below is a tweet by Paster Yi Liu who claims, "Some good Christian WeChat public accounts have been killed one after another."

According to International Christian Concern, a Washington based NGO for human rights of Christians and religious minorities, the landing page of WeChat accounts of the people practising Christianity now says, "[We] received a report that [this account] violates the ‘Internet User Public Account Information Services Management Provisions’ and its account has been blocked and suspended."

China planning to 'contextualise' Bible?

Reports have also stated that the CCP is planning to 'contextualise' the Bible and come out with a Bible with Chinese characteristics to make it more culturally acceptable and include the core values of socialism. The policy of 'Sinicizing' of the churches has been implemented nationwide and thousands of churches have either been damaged or closed while in some parts of China, children under the age of 18 are not allowed to attend church, as per reports.

Gravely, a report by Radio Free Asia (RFA) stated that China is detaining Christians in the country at secretive and mobile transformation facilities and forcing them to renounce their faith and several incidents of this nature have been reported in the country.

The state-backed United Front Work Department is allegedly behind the oppression of Christians, working in tandem with the state security police. The mobile facilities for detention could be set up anywhere even in some basement and are staffed with people from several government departments and the members of the Chinese Community Party. Their main target is Christians who are members of house churches, said the RFA report quoting a Christian who was detained for 10 months after a raid on his church in 2018.

The detainees are allegedly beaten, tortured and abused in addition to facing intimidation, insults and threats by the staff members comprising various government employees. Quoting the victim of religious persecution, the report by RFA said the victims were held in a windowless room for nearly 10 months, during which time they were beaten, verbally abused and mentally tortured by staff, eventually compelling them to resort to self-harm.

According to the US Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF)'s report of 2021, China has detained and tortured Catholic bishops who refused to join the state-backed Catholic association.

China under the lens

China has been facing widespread criticisms across the globe for a range of issues. The communist regime has been under the lens of the international fora for alleged human rights violations and the alleged systemic ethnic cleansing of the Uyghur Muslims by sending millions of them to detention camps. Moreover, it also implemented the draconian national security law in Hong Kong threatening the autonomy of the city which led to widespread protests by Hong Kong civilians in 2020. The global community has also called out China's aggression in the Indo-Pacific waters and the South China sea with the US, India, Japan and Australia forming "the Quad" to keep the Chinese aggression under check. China's misadventure in Ladakh while indulging in a faceoff with the Indian Army has also been criticised by the Global community. Moreover, the precise origin of COVID-19 to date remains a mystery as the WHO investigating team was not given complete access by China to probe the origins of the virus and several international reports have pointed to the fact that the virus may have been a lab leak and not a naturally occurring phenomenon; thus the global community is demanding transparency from China over the probe into the COVID-19 origins.