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Last month, 17 House Democrats wrote to DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe, challenging the group's exclusion, which they say is "ostracism," and contradicts the party's platform, which said, "We respect the individual conscience of each American on this difficult issue."

"Despite all the prattling about 'diversity,' 'openness,' 'inclusiveness,' and other such politically correct twaddle, it is clear that no difference of opinion on abortion will be tolerated," the FRC's Connor said about the news. "Prolife Democrats are victims of abortion apartheid. … No wonder the increasingly marginalized party continues to lose power, influence and elections."

India and its conversion laws:

• Christian council's charge against NCM chief | The All-India Christian Council has described the chairman of the National Commission for Minorities, Tarlochan Singh, as an "agent" of the Government and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad and threatened to boycott his scheduled visit to Gujarat on Saturday (The Hindu, India)
  
  
• Pope flays Hindu fanatics for conversion laws | Urged the Church in India to "courageously" proclaim the Gospel.
  
  
• Also: BJP condemns Pope over conversion statement | Hindu party decries "interference in the internal affairs of India" (PTI)
  
  
• Kanchi seer for laws to check conversion | Jharkhand should follow the footsteps of Tamil Nadu and enact a law to check the "forcible conversion", he said (UNI)
  
  
• Meet exposes chinks in Modi religion Act | The Gujarat government is in for a major embarrassment with the Vishwa Boudh Sangh (VBS) planning to organise a mass conversion on June 15, announcing that around one lakh Dalits would embrace Buddhism that day (The Indian Express)
  
  
• Gujarat: 'Communal forces terrorizing minorities' | Expressing anguish over the alleged persecution of Christians by the Gujarat Government in the form of clandestine surveys, the Tamil Nadu Bishops' Council (TNBC) today said the action clearly indicated that communal forces in that State were bent upon "intimidating and terrorizing the minorities" (The Hindu, India)
  
  
• Christian lobby warned against illegal conversions | VHP leader  Acharya Giriraj Kishore says Buddhists and Christians are conspiring against Hinduism (The Hindu, India)

Persecution and violence:

• Nsibambi praises martyrs | The more Christians are persecuted and killed the more the church grows, the Prime Minister Apolo Nsibambi has said (The Monitor, Kampala, Uganda)
  
  
• Cambodia continues Islamic crackdown | Police in Cambodia have shut down an Islamic school near the capital Phnom Penh, as part of an apparent crackdown on outside Muslim influences prior to a visit in June by the United States Secretary of State, Colin Powell. (Radio Australia)
  
  
• Were Uganda martyrs really martyrs? | Were these young men exemplary Christian martyrs or, as some have argued, fifth columnists guilty of treason against the state of Buganda, having sold out to impending colonialism? (Kintu Nyago, The Monitor, Kampala)
  
  
• Islamists burn to death Christian pastor, family | Massacre of 59 came as Sudan discussed removal from terror list (WorldNetDaily)

Religious freedom and discrimination:

• Vietnam pastor awaits state nod on church, Bibles | Y Ky E Ban is the public face of state-sanctioned Christians that Hanoi showed to foreign reporters on a recent rare trip to the restive region (Reuters)
  
  

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June (Web-only) 2003, Vol. 47