In The Media

People travelling abroad for the purpose of assisted dying will not be breaking coronavirus travel rules, the health secretary has said.

BBC

The head of the Catholic Church in England and Wales has predicted the government will shortly abandon the ban on church services during the new lockdown.

The Independent

SPAC Nation claims it is helping disadvantaged young people – but former members say that its leaders encourage young congregants to take out loans and give huge sums to the church.

BBC

Fashion brands including Boohoo and Nike have denied the use of suppliers or manufacturing in the Xinjiang region of China as they expressed "shock" surrounding allegations regarding the forced labour of Uighur Muslims.

Shropshire Star

Police are investigating online threats against the unnamed teacher - who works at the Emmauscollege high school in Rotterdam - after they were accused of blasphemy by some Muslim students over a cartoon in support of the controversial French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.

Mail Online

French President Emmanuel Macron has said his country is fighting "Islamist separatism, never Islam", responding to a Financial Times article that he claimed misquoted him and has since been removed from the newspaper's website.

RFI/Yahoo

A Paris criminal court sentenced a 29-year-old Algerian man Thursday to life in prison for killing a woman and trying to bomb a church near the French capital in a failed 2015 attack that investigators said was plotted by Islamic State group extremists in Syria.

The Independent

Why would being offended by a cartoon lead a man to attack a church, asks Seth J. Frantzman.

The Jerusalem Post

The UN special investigator on religious freedom urged countries to repeal laws undermining the right of minorities to worship and hold beliefs, pointing as examples to China's detention of Uighurs, 21 countries that criminalize apostasy, and sweeping surveillance of Christians in North Korea and Muslims in Thailand.

Associated Press

A senior manager of the National Bank of Pakistan was killed by the bank's security guard over the allegation of blasphemy, police said on Thursday. The deceased's family said that it was a murder by the accused over a personal grudge, claiming that the guard took the cover of blasphemy to save himself.

Kashmir Reader

Egypt's minister of higher education has suspended a university professor following claims that he 'insulted the Qur'an'.

Middle East Monitor

A sixth of India's 1.3-billion population are Dalits, whose low status in Hinduism's hereditary social hierarchy exposes them to daily violence and abuse.

Yahoo!/APF

A former family court magistrate who was sacked after he claimed in an adoption case that a child should be placed "with a mother and a father" is taking his case to the Court of Appeal. NSS chief executive Stephen Evans is quoted.

Pink News

Serving police officers and legal experts have highlighted concerns with the Scottish Government's embattled Hate Crime and Public Order (Scotland) Bill.

The National

Ataubaq Taj, from Salford, was said to be a supporter of Islamic State.

Manchester Evening News

Austria's chancellor has joined President Macron of France in declaring a common European front in a "war on Islamism" after four people were killed in a terror attack in central Vienna.

The Times (£)

The attack in Vienna may be a sign that the incitement against Western democracies is spreading.

The Telegraph

France has refused to restrict its freedom of expression standards, in a way that Indian free speech advocates can only envy, says Mitali Saran.

Deccan Herald

Human rights groups are calling on Poland to drop charges against three women who face jail for sharing posters of the Virgin Mary with a rainbow-coloured halo.

Pink News

Italy's lower house of parliament on Wednesday passed an anti-discrimination bill that makes violence against women and LGBT+ people a hate crime, with those found guilty of such attacks risking longer prison terms.

Reuters

In the world of Malta's Christian organisations and faith schools, a cultural war is being waged against the Equality Bill, a new set of rules that places a renewed onus on employers to curb discriminatory practices.

Malta Today

Conservative US Supreme Court justices on Wednesday appeared sympathetic to religious rights claims against Philadelphia brought by a Catholic Church-affiliated agency after the city refused to use the group in its foster care program because it would not accept same-sex couples as prospective foster parents.

Reuters

The move means security chiefs believe that an attack is highly likely but there is no specific intelligence of an imminent incident.

BBC

The French model respects the universality of values without pitting communities against each other, says a collective of Muslim intellectuals.

Le Monde

French president's defence of European values in the face of extremism must be supported, says Roger Boyes.

The Times (£)

European Muslims must honour the victims of jihadism and affirm our allegiance to religiously neutral governance, says Yasmin Alibhai-Brown.

iNews

Members of the government-appointed 'Places of Worship Taskforce' have released a letter sent to the Prime Minister strongly disagreeing with the decision to suspend public worship for the duration of the month-long lockdown.

Church Times

The watchdog ruled that one episode of a religious education series contained three breaches of the Broadcasting Code.

The JC

A '40 Days For Life' vigil was staged every day outside a British Pregnancy Advisory Service clinic in York.

The Press

Poland's rightwing government has delayed implementation of a controversial court ruling that would outlaw almost all abortion in the country, after it prompted the largest protests since the fall of communism.

The Guardian

A 13-year-old Christian girl in Pakistan who was allegedly abducted and forced to convert and marry a Muslim man has been rescued, officials said.

BBC

Afghans are mourning the 22 mostly students killed in a horrific attack a day earlier on Kabul University, an attack claimed by the Islamic State.

The Independent

An Islamic State sympathiser led a terrorist shooting attack on Vienna on Monday night, killing at least three people, authorities have said, as Austrian police searched for accomplices that might still be at large.

The Guardian

An Islamist group in Bangladesh, Hefazat-e-Islam, has given the country's government a 24-hour ultimatum to cut diplomatic ties with France, as thousands of protesters marched towards the French embassy in Dhaka on Monday.

The Independent

Over 100 prominent Indian personalities said they were disturbed by the 'convoluted logic of some self-appointed guardians of Indian Muslims in rationalising cold-blooded murder'.

Scroll.in

To defend the right of freedom of expression is the only way to keep debate and democracy alive, says French government spokesperson Gabriel Attal.

Politico

DUP MPs Jim Shannon and Ian Paisley called on the Prime Minister to "initiate a national day of prayer to enable those to seek God" to help people deal with the greater coronavirus restrictions.

Premier Christian News

Senior clergy members say they were not consulted over provisions for a second national lockdown and will write to the Government to question why "certain exemptions" have not been made.

Yahoo News

The Vatican has said comments by Pope Francis on civil union laws in a documentary last month were taken out of context and did not signal a change in Church doctrine on homosexuals or support for same-sex marriage.

The Independent

The leaders of five of Parliament's political groups have written to the Polish Prime Minister to denounce the ruling by Poland's Constitutional Tribunal which imposes a near-total ban on abortion in the country.

The Parliament Magazine

The court's abortion ruling has brought to a head a growing sense of alienation from the church, says Magdalena Moskalewicz.

The Washington Post

Thousands of farmers are taking part in ongoing mass protests across Poland after their country's government voted to ban the £1.4 billion industry of non-stun kosher and halal meat for export in an animal rights Bill.

Farmers Guardian

Support for assisted dying in Scotland has strengthened, five years on from Margo MacDonald's attempt to change the law, with the majority in favour describing themselves as SNP voters, a poll suggests.

The Herald

If there were ever a time for this law to pass, it is now, says Amanda Ward.

The National

Cardinal Vincent Nichols says he has seen no evidence to justify ban on services.

The Guardian

Scotland's proposed hate crime legislation would not prevent satirical magazines like Charlie Hebdo poking fun at Islam, the justice secretary has insisted.

The Times (£)

Labour peer Lord Alf Dubs has appealed for donations to fund the salary of a campaigner against faith schools.

The JC

An alleged member of the group calling itself Islamic State has been charged with a series of terror offences.

BBC