NEWS BRIEFS

CBN News Roundup

May 24, 2005

CBN.com – Karzai Denies Koran Rumor Caused Riots

(CBN News) - Afghan President Hamid Karzai says that the riots in his country last week were not prompted by a Newsweek article.

The story mistakenly reported that American interrogators at Guantanamo Bay flushed a Koran down the toilet. Sixteen people were killed in the riots in Afghanistan.

Karzai says the riots were more "a political act" against Afghanistan's stability and partnership with America. But he didn't quite let the magazine off the hook. Karzai says it was irresponsible to bring up such a serious matter in a gossip column.

Despite Muslim protests about the treatment of the Koran, critics point out that Saudi Arabia's Islamic government routinely destroys Christianity's holy book, the Bible.

Someone owning a Bible there can be arrested, deported or killed.

Jerusalem Gay Fest Delayed One Year

JERUSALEM (AP) - This summer's international gay festival in Jerusalem, WorldPride 2005, has been cancelled.

Organizers of the 10-day festival including street parties, workshops and a gay film festival is being put off until August 2006, because it would coincide with Israel's planned withdrawal from Gaza and West Bank settlements this August.

The head of a Jerusalem gay rights group insists that the postponement is not in response to Muslim, Jewish and Christian protests that the festival would desecrate the holy city.

Although the international festivities have been delayed for a year, the local Jerusalem Pride event will still take place on June 30th.

India Court Releases Missionary Family’s Killers

(CBN News) - An appeals court in India has released convicted killers of a Christian missionary and his children.

Thirteen radical Hindus were convicted of murdering Australian missionary Graham Stains and his two young sons about six years ago. they killed them by setting them on fire as they slept in a car outside a church.

Now an appeals court has freed seven of the men, and reduced the death sentence for another man to life in prison.

The incident was one of India's worst hate crimes against Christians in recent years.

Ten Commandments Returned to Ind. County Building

(CBN News) - A copy of the Ten Commandments is hanging again in a county building in Indiana.

The Commandments were removed last year after the Indiana Civil Liberties Union said it violated the First Amendment.

But in March, an appeals court said the display avoided an "excessive entanglement" between government and religion. The court also added that the Ten Commandments had a secular appeal.

This is the second Commandments case in the last few years in Elkhart County. In 2002, the city of Elkhart removed a monument from in front of its city hall.

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