An American martyr

INDIA: American missionary John Allen Chau, 26, was killed by hostile members of the Sentinelese tribe after arriving on North Sentinel Island, a normally off-limits territory in the Bay of Bengal. Southern India saw at least 60 attacks against Christians in the first nine months of 2018 (compared to 36 a year ago), yet prominent media led with the “illegal” visit of the “adventure tourist” to the “endangered” tribe that “defends its island” by shooting him to death with arrows.

UNITED KINGDOM: British Member of Parliament Rehman Chishti resigned as both vice chairman of the Conservative Party as well as Prime Minister Theresa May’s trade envoy to Pakistan—citing not only May’s handling of Brexit negotiations but the U.K.’s failure to give asylum to Asia Bibi. “We should have had the conviction to lead on this matter,” Chishti said in his letter to May.

Britain’s Foreign Office opposed granting Bibi asylum, yet apparently had no qualms granting asylum to the former Iranian officials who argued for the death fatwa against author Salman Rushdie, along with other Muslim extremists.

PAKISTAN: On the night before her final hearing before Pakistan’s Supreme Court, Asia Bibi had a dream. “I saw in a dream that all the doors of the prison are open,” she described, “and I’m worrying that if the jail superintendent comes she will be very furious.”

FRANCE: Interpol rejected the Russian front-runner as its new president, choosing instead South Korean Kim Jong Yang.

CAMEROON: Security forces rescued three students and a teacher while others escaped during a shootout. The attempted kidnapping at Lords Bilingual School came two weeks after separatists kidnapped then released 80 students taken from a Presbyterian school in Bamenda.

UNITED STATES: A U.S. district judge in Detroit has dismissed charges against two Michigan doctors and six others in a major case involving female genital mutilation of at least nine minors. The judge said a U.S. law barring the practice is unconstitutional.

CAMBODIA: A decade-long tribunal on genocide carried out under Pol Pot has ended with guilty convictions against two senior henchmen for the brutal 1970s leader.

BRAZIL: Those 4,000-year-old termite mounds that cover an area the size of Great Britain are visible from space.

I’M READING: Strength in What Remains by Tracy Kidder. Happy Thanksgiving. Globe Trot will return on Monday.

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