The top court in India’s Karnataka state has upheld a ban issued by the state’s pro-Hindu BJP government on Muslim women wearing the hijab in educational institutions.

The High Court said on Tuesday that wearing the head covering was not an essential religious practice in Islam. The decision surprised many including opposition parties and minority groups as it came amid a volatile sociopolitical situation in India.

Supporters of the Islamic political party Jamaat-e-Islami protest against the hijab ban in Karnataka educational institutes in Karachi on Feb. 10. (Photo: AFP)

Tensions were high in Karnataka after parents and students staged sit-in demonstrations in front of various institutions after Muslim students wearing hijabs were not allowed inside. Hindu groups have been opposing the hijab in Karnataka.

Muslims argued that wearing a hijab is protected under religious freedoms granted in India’s constitution. Critics have accused India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party of Hindu hegemony and blocking the democratic rights of minorities. 

Hong Kong’s pro-Beijing government has ordered prominent UK-based rights group Hong Kong Watch to shut down its website, accusing it of endangering China’s national security. Hong Kong's Security Bureau accused the group of colluding with foreign forces to endanger national security.

The offense warrants maximum penalties of up to life imprisonment and monetary fines. The order on Monday is the first against a foreign advocacy group under Hong Kong’s draconian national security law that China imposed to muzzle dissent, democracy, and freedom in the former British colony in June 2020.

The Kowloon peninsula of Hong Kong across Victoria Harbour. The national security law is one of many seismic legal and political changes seen in Hong Kong in recent years. (Photo: AFP)

China’s communist regime heavily restricts the internet on the mainland, but Hong Kong generally does not censor the web. It allows residents to access sites and content even if they are critical of Beijing.

Hong Kong Watch chief executive and UCA News columnist Benedict Rogers pledged not to remain silent despite the threat of financial penalties and a jail term if he returns to Hong Kong from his UK base.

Catholic officials in South Korea have visited two areas hit by a deadly wildfire and promised to offer aid to affected families. Officials from Andong Diocese and members of St. Vincent de Paul Society paid visits to communities in Uljin and Samcheok who were struck by the wildfire in the first week of March.

The government estimated that 13,000 hectares of forest had been affected and some 6,324 people were evacuated. President Moon Jae-in also visited the sites and announced a financial aid package to cover costs of repairing houses and other properties.

Won Yong-dae, a Catholic from Andong Diocese, stands in front of charred vehicles in a burned out junkyard in Uljin. (Photo: Park Won-hee/Catholic Times of Korea)

Uljin parish priest Father Choi Sang-hee said several Catholic families had lost everything including their houses and means of livelihood.

Following the fire, the church offered food and rest for 10 people before helping them to shift to an evacuation center. Father Choi said the church will assist affected communities in all possible ways. 

Cambodia’s government has honored French Bishop Olivier Michel Marie Schmitthaeusler of Phnom Penh with the prestigious National Order of Merit award for social development. The 51-year-old bishop is a member of the Paris Foreign Missions Society.

He received the award from Minister of Environment Say Samal on March 8. The minister said the award was recognition of the Church’s commitment to social development in the fields of education, art, culture, social work and health care, particularly for the community in Takeo province in southern Cambodia.

French Bishop Olivier Schmitthaeusler with government officials, staff and students at St. Paul Institute after receiving the National Order of Merit medal on March 8. (Photo: Eglises d’Asie)

Bishop Schmitthaeusler came to Cambodia as a young priest in 1998. He served as a parish priest and director of diocesan commission for education. He set up schools and a vocational training center for poor rural children.

He also established the Peace Center, Peace Village and John Paul II Center for Life for families with AIDS patients. He became apostolic vicar of Phnom Penh in 2009.

A human rights group in the Philippines has expressed concerns after the nation’s police department announced the final phase of President Rodrigo Duterte’s deadly war on drugs.

Police chief General Dionardo Carlos said police are launching a rehabilitation and education scheme for about one million drug users who surrendered to the government amid the height of the drug war since Duterte came to power in 2016.

Philippine police gathered over the body of a suspect killed during an anti-drug operation at an informal settlers' area near a port in Manila in November 2016. (Photo: AFP)

The brutal campaign saw thousands of suspected drug dealers and users murdered by unknown assassins or gunned down during police operations, triggering global outrage. The official death toll is around 6,500 but rights groups claim the tally is much higher. Some groups put the figure as high as 30,000.

Rights group Karapatan says it is skeptical over the change in tactics and suspects more killings will occur during Duterte’s last period in office before the presidential election in May.

Thousands of Sri Lankans are lining up in long queues in front of gas outlets and filling stations after a massive economic crisis triggered an acute shortage of daily essentials including food, medicines, fuel and power.

Fuel prices have skyrocketed, which came as a huge shock for ordinary people who cannot bear it. Sri Lanka is grappling with a debt crisis triggered by a dollar issue that is blamed on poor management of the country’s foreign exchange.

People queue to buy liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) cylinders amid shortages of essentials in Sri Lankan capital Colombo on March 14. (Photo: Ishara Kokikara/AFP)

The nation is struggling to pay bills for imports including gas, medicines, fuel and food. The Sri Lankan rupee has fallen 30 percent and the government has sought advice from the International Monetary Fund to overcome the crisis.

A Catholic priest said power cuts and fuel shortages have hampered prayer services and activities during Lent. Catholic bishops and priests recently joined fishermen in Negombo to appeal for government help as fuel shortages and higher prices threaten their livelihoods.  

Catholics in northern Vietnam have rushed aid to ethnic communities badly affected by heavy hailstorms that destroyed numerous houses and vast cropland. Hailstones as big as chicken eggs coupled with whirlwinds hit three districts of the mountainous province of Son La in the first week of March.

The disaster intensified suffering for communities already reeling from a shortage of food due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Church officials said the natural calamity didn’t cause deaths but badly damaged properties and crops.

Hmong villagers receive money from OMI Charity Group members in Son La province on March 9 after hailstorms hit their area. (Photo supplied)

In Hua Nhan commune, at least 700 Hmong ethnic families had roofs of their houses broken and fruit trees damaged, while young poultry were killed. Many farmers also lost their strawberry beds equivalent to 4,400 US dollars each.

Catholic parishes helped affected families and called on people from other places to come to the aid of people with food and money. Oblate Father Joseph Bui Cong Dung said without substantial support the ethnic families would face massive starvation amid a poor harvest. 

Police in Indonesia’s Christian-majority Papua province shot dead two protesters and injured four others during a street protest against a proposal to break up the province. The victims reportedly suffered fatal gunshot wounds when police chased away the crowd in Yahukimo district on Tuesday.

Police claimed they were forced to take firm action against protesters for committing anarchy by burning nearby shops. Human rights lawyer Emanuel Gobay said the police should be held accountable for the deaths.

Papuans hold a rally to oppose the Indonesian government's proposal to break up the country's predominantly Christian provinces in Yahukimo district on March 15. (Photo supplied)

Papuans have been up in arms against the Indonesian government's proposal to break up the predominantly Christian provinces of Papua and West Papua into six. Protesters say the move will enable Jakarta to tighten government control over the restive region and further marginalize its indigenous people.

The region has experienced unrest and loss of lives amid an armed insurgency for independence since its annexation by Indonesia in 1960s.

Parliamentarians from Southeast Asian nations have called on regional bloc ASEAN to take urgent steps to press Myanmar’s military to end the suffering of people. The call from ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights came in response to a damning report from the United Nations that accused the military of committing war crimes.

The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights said on Tuesday that the Myanmar military was committing “systematic and widespread human rights violations and abuses, some of which may amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.”

Myanmar people line up to fill containers amid water shortages due to power outages in Yangon on March 14. (Photo: AFP)

Charles Santiago, chairman of ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights, said ASEAN has failed disastrously to stop atrocities committed by Myanmar’s military and to provide life-saving humanitarian assistance to 14 million people, a fifth of the population in the country.

At least 1,600 have been killed and thousands arrested by the junta since the military coup in February 2021.