=== Aum Shinrikyo
1. Don't forget Tokyo subway gas attack: survivors and bereaved families
2. Subway staff remember victims of 1995 AUM gassing

=== Scientology
3. Tom Cruise Ends another Affair
4. Update: Cruise Still With Scientology
5. Cruise Dumps Scientology - NOT!
6. [harassment has become so commonplace that it is no longer newsworthy]
7. A Thorn in the MPAA's Side

=== Buddhism
8. 'Vietnam Buddhist burns herself to death'
9. Vietnam sect leader allowed home, status unclear

=== Islam
10. Cows slaughtered over delay in Buddha statues destruction
11. Taliban Explains Buddha Demolition
12. Muslim destroyers reach for the heart of Jewish holy sites

=== Mormonism
13. Visiting Reporters Complain Venues Tour Turned Into a Pitch for Church, State
14. Mormons under pressure on drink

=== Hate Groups
15. More teens buying white power music
16. Speakers with anti-Semitic ties coming to B.C. rally
17. Klan Highway Sign Isn't Welcome, Say Potosi, Mo., Residents

=== House of Prayer (Atlanta)
18. Church disputes claims of abuse
19. DFCS to take 10 more kids from members of Atlanta church in wake of abuse probe

=== Other News
20. French Sect Members Tried for Baby-Killing
21. Ex-dean of BU chapel on leave for illness
22. Families seek help from dangers of cults
23. 'Volatile' Prophetic Writings Set to Stir Further Controversy (Rick
Joyner)

=== Noted
24. False Prophets in Poland
25. Christian ministers to embrace Rainbow
26. The Work, the FBI and a habit of silence (Opus Dei)

=== Books
27. Religion researcher's 40-year quest to tabulate every believer on earth


=== Buddhism

8. 'Vietnam Buddhist burns herself to death'
BBC, Mar. 20, 2001
http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/asia-pacific/newsid_1231000/1231496.stm
[Story no longer online? Read this]
Officials in a village in Southern Vietnam say they have found the charred body of a woman, but deny suggestions that it is that of a Buddhist dissident who reportedly burned herself to death yesterday.

Reports from the Overseas Hoa Hao Buddhist Association say that the 75-year-old head of the women's league of the movement Nguyen Thi Thu set fire to herself in Tan Hoi village yesterday, in protest against the detention of the group's leader and demanding religious freedom.
(...)

Hanoi has recently recognised the mainstream Hoa Hao sect, but does not tolerate alleged radicals.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]


9. Vietnam sect leader allowed home, status unclear
Reuters, Mar. 19, 2001
http://www.mediacentral.com/
[Story no longer online? Read this]
HO CHI MINH CITY, March 19 (Reuters) - The elderly chairman of a dissident Buddhist sect says he was detained and beaten for 30 hours in communist Vietnam at the weekend but has been allowed to return home under police guard, a reliable source said on Monday.

Authorities in a southern province, meanwhile, denied a report from an overseas branch of the same Hoa Hao sect that one of its supporters had doused herself with petrol on Monday morning and burned herself to death in a protest to demand religious freedom.

The source, who did not want to be identified, said 82-year-old Hoa Hao chairman Le Quang Liem had told him by telephone he was held in police custody more than 24 hours from early Saturday and hit in the face and stomach.

Liem also said his daughter had been beaten after she went to the police station where he was held in Ho Chi Minh City to demand his release, the source said.

Police have refused to comment and Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Phan Thuy Thanh said she had no information.
(...)

Communist officials in the southern province of Dong Thap also denied a report from Nguyen Van Coi, chairman of the Overseas Hoa Hao Buddhist Association, who told Reuters that 75-year-old Nguyen Thi Thu had burned herself to death in Tan Hoi village.

''No such thing happened here, that's wrong,'' an official from the local people's committee said.

The overseas association said police took the body after using batons to beat off Buddhist who tried to stop them. It said before she died, Thu's last words were ''Religious Freedom for Vietnam'' and ''Religious Freedom for the Hoa Hao Buddhists.''

The reported incidents came on the 54th anniversary on Monday of the disappearance of Hoa Hao prophet Huynh Phu So after his abduction by communist independence forces in 1947.
(...)

The Hoa Hao claim about four million adherents in Vietnam and have long complained of persecution stemming from their previous armed opposition to communism during the Vietnam War.
[...more...]   [Need the full story? Read this]
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