Stories & Prayers: Killings

​Suzanne's Story
Suzanne was tending to a field alongside her father when Boko Haram militants suddenly appeared. They mercilessly murdered the Christian patriarch and shot Suzanne in the head, leaving her blind. Through the power of faith, she forgives her attackers and prays for them to accept Jesus as Lord. 
 
A Prayer for Suzanne
God, our hearts go out to the family members of those who have been senselessly killed. Please shield Nigerian Christians like Suzanne from harm and comfort them in their loss. Cause Nigeria's politicians to enact policies that will protect believers from religious extremism. Stop the bloodshed and bring peace to the land. Amen.
 
"For the more we suffer for Christ, the more God will shower us with His comfort…” 2 Corinthians 1: 5.
 
The 2025 Global Christian Relief Red List. Washington, D.C.

Conflict and modern slavery: Surviving the unimaginable, but thriving only when we disrupt the cycle

​Nadia Murad, a proud Yazidi woman, Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, and UNODC Goodwill Ambassador, is a leading advocate for survivors of genocide and sexual violence. The Yazidi community, largely located in the north of modern-day Iraq, is an ancient population united by their ethnic and religious identity. Throughout their long history, Yazidis have faced discrimination, persecution, and severe forms of exploitation. In 2014, in the most brutal of attacks, militants from the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terror group led a systematic campaign to destroy the Yazidi community. Sexual slavery was used as a weapon of the genocide. 
 
In this essay, we learn how Nadia’s own escape from ISIS captivity led to an unwavering pursuit of justice for her community and for survivors of sexual violence worldwide. Nadia explores the ways in which exploitation is both a weapon and consequence of war, and offers hope that with community-driven and survivor-centric approaches, persecuted communities can not only survive, but thrive. 
 
Genocide does not happen by accident. The enslavement and sexual abuse of women does not happen by accident. The decision by ISIS to brutalise and break my Yazidi community in Sinjar in Northern Iraq was no accident. Centuries of persecution had exacerbated our vulnerabilities, so that when the militants surrounded us in the summer of 2014, we were left like lambs to be slaughtered. 
 
When the terrorists entered my village of Kocho, men and women were immediately treated differently. The men were murdered and the young boys captured and brainwashed. Women and children were captured, forcibly converted, subjected to domestic servitude and many were forced to marry fighters. Through this institutionalised sexual violence — and the indoctrination of our children — they sought to destroy our community first through our bodies, and then in our minds. 
 
As with other genocides, they did so with precision and planning. They bureaucratised rape and violence against women, first with “guideline” pamphlets for fighters, then through the use of online platforms like Telegram to buy and sell women. They opened a road between Iraq and Syria for the express purpose of trading Yazidi girls, hoping their presence might lure more fighters from across the globe. 
 
The sexual violence ISIS unleashed on us was a weapon of war, but our experience was not wholly unique. If you look back at human history, the sexual enslavement and abuse of women and girls caught in conflict happens over and over. We read of it in Homer’s Iliad, we heard about it through the testimonies of the women during the Second World War and today we still watch as journalists report on it for the news. 
 
How can it be that, as we enter the third decade of the 21st century, a century in which society is making huge advances in so many ways, our treatment of women in conflict is still stuck in the Bronze Age? 
 
Why is it that even though I, and others, have told our story over and over, the international community seems to have lost interest in pursuing those who perpetrate sexual violence? 
 
While I am proud to have successfully advocated for the passage of resolution 2467 at the UN Security Council, which expands commitments to end sexual violence in conflict with a survivor-centric approach, it is not enough. 
 
Neither the International Criminal Court nor the national courts in Iraq have yet convened to formally try ISIS members for the genocide and sexual violence they perpetrated. To date, only two criminal proceedings have been brought against fighters and their co-conspirators. Both of which resulted in German courts handing down convictions for crimes of genocide, including through the systematic enslavement of Yazidi women and girls.
 
In the aftermath of the ISIS invasion, the UN Investigative Team to Promote Accountability for Crimes committed by Da’esh/ISIL (UNITAD) collected evidence against more than 2,100 perpetrators of sexual violence. So, two trials from over two thousand does not seem much of a future deterrent. I believe we must use every tool we have, from sanctions through to universal jurisdiction, to show the entire world that sexual violence in conflict will not be tolerated. 
 
My book “The Last Girl” is so-called because I want to be the last girl in the world with a story like mine. However, that will only be the case if the international community truly fights for justice, and if we address the gender inequalities and societal vulnerabilities that puts communities at risk of these kinds of barbaric crimes. 
 
That is why rebuilding communities and advocating for survivors of sexual violence became my mission. In 2018, I founded Nadia’s Initiative to create peace and safety for women and girls, and to support the healing and re-development of besieged Yazidi communities. As we approach the ninth anniversary of the genocide, more than 2,800 women and children are still missing and enslaved by ISIS. 
 
I began this essay by writing that genocide does not happen by accident. 
 
Sexual violence in conflict does not happen by accident. The root causes of our vulnerability as Yazidi women are achingly familiar to so many other marginalised groups whether in Afghanistan, Yemen, or Democratic Republic of the Congo. We must uproot poverty, inequality, political oppression, and the norms that legitimise such discrimination, wherever they are found. 
 
Secondly, we must take a holistic approach to increase access to basic needs and comprehensive protections where and when they are needed most. This should include embedding gender-responsive approaches and modern slavery considerations within all humanitarian responses, including facilitating access to justice. 
 
Finally, we must ensure that calls for justice and meaningful survivor-centric support for women and girls do not cease when global media turns its attention elsewhere. Only then will we begin to break the patterns of abuse that instil vulnerability to violence and exploitation throughout generations. 
 
Walk Free 2023. Global Slavery Index 2023. Minderoo Foundation Ltd. Australia.

Outlook: Three Reasons for Hope
Those who seek to defend the rights of religious believers do not despair in the face of the challenges ahead. Indeed, there are some strong trends that bring unexpected hope. For one, it has been utterly remarkable that, in the face of deadly wars and conflicts involving very powerful states-in two cases, nuclear powers-international politics has refused to allow deadly escalations.
 
Iran holds off from open war with Israel, preferring to back its more beleaguered proxies, Hamas and Hezbollah. The Gulf States have remained remarkably neutral, with the Abraham Accords holding firm. And there is evidence that China's President Xi Jinping is keen to prevent his Russian counterpart from escalating the conflict with Ukraine.
 
For another, it is strangely encouraging that mighty leaders of powerful states seem so thin-skinned and sensitive to criticism. China, for example, spends millions trying to head off human rights criticism at all its forums. As a Chinese house church leader mused, "You would wonder why they bother? It must be that they are paranoid and scared, and that is our opportunity." Christian NGOs believe afresh in the power of criticism to influence outcomes as many powerful dictators spend so much time and energy trying to quell it. Veteran Indian journalist, John Dayal, confirmed this by adding that "Hindu extremists do not fear the domestic church, because it feels they can bully them and starve them of money. What they do fear is the international church, which really got the story out about Manipur in ways that infuriated the leaders of the ruling party.”
 
Finally, the trust deficit that marks the modern world is also an opportunity. Outfits like the Bellingcat investigative journalism group, specializing in fact checking, exercise influence by utilizing open source research tools to hold nations to account. If the right evidence can be presented, it goes farther than before, especially with Artificial Intelligence tools emerging to help with their generation.
 
As a Washington policy maker confided, "If a Christian NGO uses figures ... let them offer evidence that is open source- or undeniable and they have more leverage than they dream." For this reason, GCR is pioneering the funding of open source research in the realm of persecution, the fruits of which are seen in this article and the analysis of the 2025 GCR Red List. The invitation is to collect undeniable information, fight better, share more, and work across all barriers to serve the persecuted of the world today.
 
Dr. Ron Boyd-MacMillan. The 2025 Global Christian Relief Red List. Washington, D.C.

​Climate Change and Human Rights: The Inextricable Link
Crises heighten the risk of all forms of modern slavery, and one of the greatest we currently face – the climate crisis – is no exception. In this essay, Vanessa Nakate,
Young Leader for the Sustainable Development Goals, and climate activist from Uganda, reminds us that the climate crisis is about more than statistics and targets; it’s about the millions of people around the world who are currently bearing the brunt of the crippling impacts of a warming planet. 
 
The climate crisis is a human rights crisis. The environmental consequences of climate change — ecological degradation, increasing global temperatures, rising sea levels, and extreme weather events — have devastating impact on communities around the world. Associated effects such as resource scarcity, loss of livelihoods, increases in poverty, and unequal access to health and education, push millions of people into precarious situations, and magnifying drivers of modern slavery. 
 
There is no escaping that rising temperatures are having a disproportionate impact on those who are already the most vulnerable in our world. During times of upheaval and fragility, any protections that women, children, migrants, and the poorest in our society have gained are more likely to be taken away. 
 
With the climate crisis, as so often is the case, women’s suffering is intensified by the structural gender inequalities that dominate their lives. The United Nations estimates that 80 percent of those displaced by climate change are female. Women in Uganda, for example are most likely primary caregivers who are responsible for feeding families and gathering water. They struggle the most when extreme weather hits. Women and girls are then especially vulnerable to sexual violence and being trafficked into sexual exploitation in and from emergency shelters, tents, or camps, that are designed to house and protect displaced communities, fleeing climate related events. 
 
The child bride is another invisible victim of the climate crisis. Extreme weather creates economic suffering and more precarious situations for families. Increasingly, parents are being forced to give away their children for marriage in order to secure some financial stability. In the Horn of Africa, increases in the rate of child marriages in drought- affected areas have been linked to the impacts of the climate crisis, particularly family poverty and interrupted education for girls. 
 
The irony is that these vulnerable groups are usually the least emitting in the world. The average citizen in Australia or Canada emits around 100 times more than the average citizen in Uganda, my country. And within our societies, the poorest contribute almost nothing to greenhouse gas emissions compared to the rich. Vast inequalities in energy access and usage, and carbon emissions, mean that people in the United States produce more emissions in a few days than people in many low-income countries produce in an entire year. 
 
Yet, many people in the Western world still blame overpopulation in countries like mine for our global environmental crises. This is not a population problem, it is a consumption problem. 
 
But it’s also a not an individual problem; it is a political one. People are reliant on systems built and perpetuated by powerful corporate interests. Governments continue to give subsidies to fossil fuels, which poison our air and heat our climate, while fossil fuel companies make billions in profits. 
 
I see my role as being to share the stories of many people I have had the honour to meet. One particular story has stayed with me and gives me motivation to keep going: in September 2022 I travelled to Turkana, Kenya, with UNICEF. I was there to meet children suffering from severe acute malnutrition as a result of years of drought caused by years of failed rainy seasons in the region. Millions of children in the Horn of Africa are suffering. One morning, I met a boy at a hospital in Lodwar, where the worst cases are referred. The boy hadn’t been able to access life-saving medical care in time and that evening, sadly, he passed away. 
 
There are many solutions that we need to fund and implement in the global south and across the world. The non-profit organisation Project Drawdown lists the most effective solutions we can take, ordered by the levels of emissions that would be saved if they were fully implemented. As well as lowering global greenhouse gas emissions and striving for the international targets, solutions in the short and long term should focus on the vulnerabilities to modern slavery and human rights infringements that so many are experiencing as a result of the crisis. 
 
One holistic response that I am particularly passionate about is educating girls in low and middle-income countries. Providing girls and young women with a full education drastically increases their resilience to climate shocks. They are more likely to have a secure income and less likely to rely on subsistence crops that are vulnerable to extreme weather. They know how to respond to floods or droughts when they hit. And they end up having smaller, healthier families. Educating girls not only equips them to lead better lives overall, it will provide a lifeline in our fight against the climate crisis. 
 
As an activist, my role is to highlight the human impacts of the climate crisis. I use my platform — a privilege many on the frontlines of the crisis are not afforded — to demand world leaders to act upon the reality and severity of climate change and to place human rights and justice at the heart of their efforts. In doing this, we must ensure that stories of activists, survivors, and diverse communities are being centred and heard. By prioritising emissions reductions, supporting vulnerable communities, applying a human rights lens to all responses, and working together across the global community, we can create a more just and sustainable future for all. 
 
Walk Free 2023. Global Slavery Index 2023. Minderoo Foundation Ltd. Australia.