Church bells rang out across Asia yesterday as millions of Christians celebrated Easter, while Pope Benedict XVI made his first address to the world's Catholics on the day commemorating Christ's resurrection, highlighting concern over Iran's nuclear drive and conflicts and poverty across the globe.
The faithful packed churches from the Philippines -- the largest Christian nation in Asia -- to communist Vietnam and China, where some worshippers prayed in hiding for fear of official persecution.
In strictly Muslim Afghanistan -- gripped last month by furore over the case of Abdul Rahman who faced the death penalty under Afghan law for converting to Christianity -- pockets of underground Afghan Christians held highly secretive gatherings.
Political overtones
In the Philippines, many marked the most important event on the Christian calendar with a traditional pre-dawn reenactment of Mary Magdalene's meeting with the newly risen Christ.
The country's senior church leader, Manila archbishop Cardinal Gaudencio Rosales, said in a message read out at masses nationwide that the Philippines should follow the example of Christ to rise above months of political crisis.
At the weekend, Philippine President Gloria Arroyo announced a moratorium on executions, commuting all death sentences to life imprisonment in an apparent concession to the country's powerful Roman Catholic Church.
In China, all officially sanctioned Christian churches were to hold Easter services, according to Pastor Wang Di at the protestant Chongwenmen Church in Beijing.
Secret worship
However, for those Chinese worshipping in "underground" or unregistered house churches, Easter services would be conducted behind locked doors.
"As we are unregistered, the congregation has to meet secretly, but this is the case every week, not just because it is Easter," Hua Huiqi, member of an underground Beijing church, said by phone.
Thousands of Catholics flocked to churches in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi, starting with a midnight mass at the neo-Gothic St. Joseph's Cathedral, built during the time of French colonial rule.
The Missionaries of Charity founded by Mother Teresa in India's eastern city of Kolkata held a special mass.
In Australia, the head of the Anglican Church said in his Easter message that modern society had distorted the true meaning of Christ's resurrection.
"Instead of it being about the re-creation of the earth and human society being put to rights, we've turned it into another worldly concern to do with going to heaven when you die," said Primate Phillip Aspinall, archbishop of Brisbane.
At the Vatican, Pope Benedict XVI called for peace across the world yesterday, his 79th birthday.
An estimated 80,000 pilgrims packed St Peter's Square and nearby streets as Benedict led his first Easter Sunday mass as Pope, and later greeted Catholics around the world in his Urbi et Orbi (to the city and the world) message.
In a veiled reference to Iran's nuclear standoff with the international community, he called for "serious and honest" talks which would help achieve "an honorable solution" for all parties.
He urged that peace would "finally prevail" in Iraq, where violence "continues mercilessly to claim victims."
Benedict said he was praying that leaders and international organizations "be strengthened in their will to achieve peaceful coexistence among different races, cultures and religions, in order to remove the threat of terrorism."
Similarly, "patient and persevering dialogue" was needed in the Middle East, "to remove both ancient and new obstacles."
Palestinians
"May the international community, which reaffirms Israel's just right to exist in peace, assist the Palestinian people to overcome the precarious conditions in which they live and to build their future, moving towards the constitution of a state that is truly their own."
Much of his appeal focused on Africa, particularly Sudan's troubled Darfur region, where he said the humanitarian situation was "no longer sustainable."
The pontiff lamented that "many wounds have yet to be healed" across the continent, particularly in the Great Lakes region, the Horn of Africa, the Ivory Coast, Uganda, Zimbabwe and other nations "which aspire to reconciliation, justice and progress."
Super Typhoon Kong-rey is the largest cyclone to impact Taiwan in 27 years, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said today. Kong-rey’s radius of maximum wind (RMW) — the distance between the center of a cyclone and its band of strongest winds — has expanded to 320km, CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said. The last time a typhoon of comparable strength with an RMW larger than 300km made landfall in Taiwan was Typhoon Herb in 1996, he said. Herb made landfall between Keelung and Suao (蘇澳) in Yilan County with an RMW of 350km, Chang said. The weather station in Alishan (阿里山) recorded 1.09m of
NO WORK, CLASS: President William Lai urged people in the eastern, southern and northern parts of the country to be on alert, with Typhoon Kong-rey approaching Typhoon Kong-rey is expected to make landfall on Taiwan’s east coast today, with work and classes canceled nationwide. Packing gusts of nearly 300kph, the storm yesterday intensified into a typhoon and was expected to gain even more strength before hitting Taitung County, the US Navy’s Joint Typhoon Warning Center said. The storm is forecast to cross Taiwan’s south, enter the Taiwan Strait and head toward China, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The CWA labeled the storm a “strong typhoon,” the most powerful on its scale. Up to 1.2m of rainfall was expected in mountainous areas of eastern Taiwan and destructive winds are likely
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday at 5:30pm issued a sea warning for Typhoon Kong-rey as the storm drew closer to the east coast. As of 8pm yesterday, the storm was 670km southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻) and traveling northwest at 12kph to 16kph. It was packing maximum sustained winds of 162kph and gusts of up to 198kph, the CWA said. A land warning might be issued this morning for the storm, which is expected to have the strongest impact on Taiwan from tonight to early Friday morning, the agency said. Orchid Island (Lanyu, 蘭嶼) and Green Island (綠島) canceled classes and work
KONG-REY: A woman was killed in a vehicle hit by a tree, while 205 people were injured as the storm moved across the nation and entered the Taiwan Strait Typhoon Kong-rey slammed into Taiwan yesterday as one of the biggest storms to hit the nation in decades, whipping up 10m waves, triggering floods and claiming at least one life. Kong-rey made landfall in Taitung County’s Chenggong Township (成功) at 1:40pm, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. The typhoon — the first in Taiwan’s history to make landfall after mid-October — was moving north-northwest at 21kph when it hit land, CWA data showed. The fast-moving storm was packing maximum sustained winds of 184kph, with gusts of up to 227kph, CWA data showed. It was the same strength as Typhoon Gaemi, which was the most