In yet another horrific attack on human rights and lives of Christians, we have learned of the attack in the Mediterranean sea of Christians onboard a migrant ship from Africa headed towards Africa. Many flee the constant violence, war, and poverty in Africa and flee to Italy. But on April 16, 2015, 12 Christians were targeted for their religious identity and thrown overboard to drown by extremists who rejected their universal human rights to religious freedom, as guaranteed by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), Article 18, and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), Article 18.  As the world learned the news of this horrific attack, this was reported by major news media.

CNN reported: “Muslims who were among migrants trying to get from Libya to Italy in a boat this week threw 12 fellow passengers overboard — killing them — because the 12 were Christians.” “Italian authorities have arrested 15 people on suspicion of murdering the Christians at sea, police in Palermo, Sicily, said. The original group of 105 people left Libya on Tuesday in a rubber boat. Sometime during the trip north across the Mediterranean Sea, the alleged assailants — Muslims from the Ivory Coast, Mali and Senegal — threw the 12 overboard, police said. Other people on the voyage told police that they themselves were spared ‘because they strongly opposed the drowning attempt and formed a human chain,’ Palermo police said.”

NBC News also later reported: “Italian police arrested 15 African men suspected of throwing about a dozen Christians from a migrant boat in the Mediterranean Sea on Thursday, as the crisis off southern Italy intensified.” “Police in the Sicilian capital Palermo said they had arrested the men — who were from Ivory Coast, Mali and Senegal — after survivors reported they had thrown 12 people from Nigeria and Ghana to their deaths and threatened other Christians. The 15 were arrested on charges of multiple homicide motivated by religious hatred. ‘The motive for the resentment was traced to their faiths,’ police said. ‘Twelve people are said to have drowned in the waters of the Mediterranean, all of them Nigerian and Ghanaian.'”

According to a report on the attack, the Daily Mail stated that a witness interviewed by the Italian newspaper La Repubblica reported the attack was based on rejecting the right to Christian prayer. The news report states: “Those who witnessed the African Christians being murdered on the crammed dinghy told investigators how Nigerian Muslims became angry at Christian who started praying. ‘They told him that they would throw him overboard if he didn’t stop praying to God,’ he said, according to La Republica. The witness added: ‘They started shouting, two pushed the lad and he fell in the sea and drowned.'”

Update: In addition to this horrific tragedy, a boatload of migrants capsized on Saturday night April 18.   The Italian news agency ANSA said the boat may have held 700 passengers.  Pope Francis was among those following the news. “There are fears there could be hundreds of dead,” Francis told the faithful in St. Peter’s Square. He bowed his head in silent prayer as did many of the tens of thousands in the crowd.  The Repubblica has also been following this report.