40.3 million

Mary Fatemeh Mohammadi joined other protesters in January who flooded Tehran’s Enghelab Street and headed to Azadi Square in the city center. For three days, thousands of Iranians braved tear gas, arrests, and sporadic gunfire in an outpouring of anger and grief following the downing of a Ukrainian passenger jet. Authorities had lied and covered up the cause of the Jan. 8 crash: an Iranian soldier firing a rocket at what he mistook as an American cruise missile. 

Chinese authorities detained more than 300 Uighur Muslims for reasons like having too many children or being friends with “a suspicious figure living overseas,” according to a leaked document published by the German news outlet Deutsche Welle. The translated 137-page document includes a database of names, identification numbers, and behaviors of more than 1,800 Uighurs from Karakax County in the Xinjiang region.

About 20 suspected extremists killed 24 people, including the pastor, at a Protestant church in Burkina Faso on Sunday. The attackers injured 18 and kidnapped three others in the town of Pansi in Yagha province, near the border with conflict-hit Niger. They burned down the church and looted oil and rice from the community before leaving on their motorbikes.

They said it was the best Christmas in 30 years. On Dec. 25 thousands of Sudanese filled the streets of Khartoum, welcoming not only the birth of Christ but also news that they could celebrate it openly. 

President Omar al-Bashir outlawed public Christmas celebrations in 2011. Throughout a 30-year dictatorship, his Islamist-led government cracked down on Christian worship, confiscated church property, and jailed, tortured, and killed Christian believers. A civil war waged under Bashir’s command against the predominantly Christian south killed more than 2 million people.

Front-line protester Lucas Yu knew after storming Hong Kong’s Legislative Council building on July 1 that he would need to flee his home of Hong Kong. Police had rounded him up at a previous protest, and he knew they would be hunting down protesters who had broken into and briefly occupied the government building. So, heeding advice shared online, Yu boarded a flight to Taiwan, which protesters view as a haven.

Hong Kong authorities barred Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch (HRW), from entering the territory last week. He had come to Hong Kong to launch the group’s latest annual report on human rights around the world with a special focus on China.

“I had hoped to spotlight Beijing’s deepening assault on international efforts to uphold human rights,” Kenneth Roth said in a statement. “The refusal to let me enter Hong Kong vividly illustrates the problem.”

Islamic extremists killed kidnapped Pastor Lawan Andimi, leader of the Christian Association of Nigeria in northeast Adamawa state, on Monday afternoon. A Nigerian journalist who reported on a video of the killing tweeted that Andimi died alongside a soldier.