Pence leads effort to redirect UN aid to Iraqi Christians

IRAQ: On Tuesday, Vice President Mike Pence convened a meeting with top U.S. officials—including UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, USAID director Mark Green, Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan, and White House budget director Mick Mulvaney—to redirect U.S. aid to Iraq’s victims of genocide, primarily Yazidis and Christians. The meeting came weeks after Pence told a Washington gathering the Trump administration will redirect aid now flowing through the UN primarily to Muslim communities affected by ISIS. Former lawmaker and religious freedom advocate Frank Wolf, who also attended the 90-minute meeting, told me, “It was the first time I have ever been in a meeting where everyone was so on message and committed to making it happen.”

ZIMBABWE: An apparent coup overnight has landed in house arrest one of Africa’s longest-serving heads of state, 93-year-old Robert Mugabe. Military leaders say they moved to “pacify a degenerating political, social, and economic situation,” largely sparked a week ago when Mugabe sacked his vice president, making way for his wife, Grace—long an opponent of the military—to take his place. But it’s far from clear whether democracy will be restored to the ailing south African nation: The military could be further cementing control for Zanu-PF, Mugabe’s long-dominant party, under new leadership.

CHINA: In rural Yugan county, believers have been told to take down images of Jesus, crosses, and gospel verses they hang in their homes, and to hang portraits of President Xi Jinping instead.

“We only asked them to take down [religious] posters in the center of the home. They can still hang them in other rooms, we won’t interfere with that. What we require is for them not to forget about the party’s kindness at the center of their living rooms,” said a party worker.

DENMARK: As ISIS fighters depart Syria and Iraq, trying to blend back into society, why aren’t more countries doing this? Denmark’s Supreme Court has stripped Danish ISIS fighter Enes Ciftci of his citizenship, sentenced him to prison, and will expel him from the country.

TURKEY: Jailed American pastor Andrew Brunson has composed a hymn in captivity, sung here by a Turkish friend living in Izmir. “You are worthy, worthy of my all/My tears and pain I lift up as an offering/Teach me to share in the fellowship of your suffering/Lamb of God you are worthy of my all.” On Tuesday, members of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) held a press briefing, giving details of their meeting with Brunson in jail last month. Commissioners said he was in bad physical shape, living in unbearable conditions, and allowed to leave his cell only one hour a week. USCIRF also berated the State Department for failing to meet the annual deadline for designating “countries of particular concern” for religious violations.

IRAN: Here’s a helpful fact sheet on how to help earthquake victims in Iran without running afoul of the U.S. trade embargo. More than 580 are dead from Sunday’s quake, with thousands injured and displaced. The affected area in Iran and Iraq was the scene of grim fighting in the Iran-Iraq War, and ground zero for chemical weapons attacks Saddam Hussein launched against the Kurds.

GREECE: Emerging—and amazing—images from a miniature stone discovered a year ago in the Griffin Warrior tomb are forcing historians to rethink everything they know about ancient Greek art.

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