The East Timor and Indonesia Action Network (ETAN) has called on East Timor's prosecutor-general to drop criminal defamation charges against local weekly Tempo Semanal and its editor, Jose Belo.

Civil libertarians are infuriated at special regulations coming into force for the upcoming Catholic World Youth Day event in Sydney, Australia, where Pope Benedict XVI will be the guest of honour.

The Council of Churches in Indonesia has joined calls for a controversial Dutch film about Islam made by far-right politician Geert Wilders not to be shown. In the past he called for the Qur'an to be banned.

Jesus forgave those who spoke against him, says Johan Maurer. But the churches find it difficult to follow in his footsteps, and instead seek restitution when they are offended. We need a more Christian way of responding.

Church leaders in Kenya have urged President Mwai Kibaki to reject proposed legislation regarding the media, which the country's Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, Wangari Maathai, has said would curtail press freedom.

The maverick Christian campaigner Stephen Green has won a legal challenge to a magistrate’s decision not to grant a private blasphemy prosecution against Jerry Springer The Opera. But the ultimate casualty of this could be the archaic blasphemy law itself.