Sometime in the past year, Daniel stopped meeting his Christian friends at cafés for tea and long talks about their faith.
Daily life had grown too dangerous in the country of Yemen, a poor country in the Arabian Peninsula, currently in its tenth year of civil war. Daniel (his pseudonym for security reasons) has felt the discouraging effects of this isolation, which felt necessary to his community because of increasing violence against Christians in the country.
“I am really afraid that these people are on their way of not having a strong faith,” he said. But the current geopolitical climate means his loneliness is likely to persist.
The relentless bloodshed of civil wars and other deadly conflicts in Yemen, as well as in Sudan, Somalia, and Myanmar, has traumatized many and left them homeless or bereft of loved ones. Increasingly, these hostilities have crippled the local church, according to the 2025 edition of the World Watch List (WWL), released today by Open Doors. The number of Christians subjected to violence worldwide increased in 2024, researchers said, and among the 50 countries where persecution is most severe, 29 reported an increase in violence.
Yemen ranks No. 3 on this year’s WWL, thanks to the decade-long conflict ostensibly between the Houthi ethnic rebel group and the federal government, but one where Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, and Iran have all sought control. A weak national government and the Houthis’ rise has left minorities like Christians exposed in the nation of 34 million and shut down their house churches.
In areas controlled by the internationally recognized government, the church hardly fares better. Some Christians have been arrested for leaving Islam and “blaspheming” the religion. In its last reporting period, Open Doors learned of authorities detaining Christians solely because of their faith or because of the false accusations of family members or others as a way to harass them.
Beyond the threat of violence, Christians suffer from hunger, often cut off from social circles, food, medical attention, financial help, or other resources because they don’t show up to the mosque on Fridays. Houthis have blocked the country’s harbors, limiting what enters the country and forcing people to rely on their connections in the black market.
“I would love to see people on their Facebook pages or whatever social media saying, ‘Hey, we are praying for you, Yemen!’” Daniel said.
In Somalia, the Islamist militant group and al-Qaeda affiliate al-Shabab has killed Christians merchants on the spot. But community and family members may also betray loved ones who have converted from Islam, and those accused may face death threats.
Myanmar, a country where Christians make up 8 percent of the population, now sits at No. 13, rising four places from 2024. Most Christians hail from half a dozen ethnic-minority parties. In the Kachin region, Christians have been subjected to what has been described by one activist as a “slow genocide,” particularly after the military coup in 2021.
Though neither country ranked in the top 50, Russia and Ukraine now sit at No. 56 and No. 69 respectively on WWL’s 2025 list. In Ukraine, much of this persecution pertains to war and an ongoing power struggle within the Orthodox Church. After the government banned the Russian Orthodox Church in 2024, it closed numerous congregations.
In Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine, Russian forces and affiliated groups have targeted churches outside the Russian Orthodox Church. In one incident, Russian militants, or “cossacks,” have seized Ukrainian Greek Catholic churches in Ukraine’s Donetsk region and barred would-be attenders. Russian forces sentenced a priest to 14 years in prison when he opposed the integration of his Ukrainian Orthodox Church diocese into the Russian Orthodox Church.
Meanwhile, in Russia last year on Pentecost Sunday, gunmen in Dagestan, a predominantly Muslim part of the country, attacked two Orthodox churches and a synagogue and killed a priest and more than half a dozen security officers. The government also punished Christians for allegedly discrediting the Russian Armed Forces, distributing religious literature, and conducting unspecified missionary activities.
Violence is one of six categories Open Doors uses to judge the danger a Christian faces in any given country, and it includes killings, detentions without a proper trial, abductions, and property destruction. Christians most at risk for this type of terror include Nigeria and Pakistan, which both earned 16.7 points, the maximum score and the highest of any country. The 20 countries with the highest violence scores include 15 countries in Africa, 3 in South Asia, 1 in Southeast Asia, and 1 in Latin America.
Overall, more than 380 million Christians live in nations with high levels of persecution or discrimination. That’s 1 in 7 Christians worldwide, including 1 in 5 believers in Africa, 2 in 5 in Asia, and 1 in 16 in Latin America.
The violence index for sub-Saharan African countries listed among the 50 most dangerous in the world for Christians has risen by an average of one point since the WWL’s 2023 list. The region is subject to an “incessant flow of attacks on Christians and Christian communities by Islamic terror groups,” Open Doors said.
Sudan’s civil war, fought between its army and an alliance of regional militias, has had devastating consequences for its population, including Christians. WWL’s most recent research period reported 44 Christians killed, 100 Christians sexually assaulted, and 100 Christian homes and businesses attacked. Sudan includes people from both Arab and Indigenous African backgrounds. Christians, who make up the majority of the latter, can face persecution for both their faith and their ethnic identity. Currently, the civil war has displaced more than 11 million out of Sudan’s 49 million people.
The number of Christians killed for faith-related reasons from October 2023 to September 2024, the period Open Doors analyzed, dropped from 4,998 to 4,476. Researchers attributed the drop to a reduction in violence against Christians in Nigeria, with 3,100 deaths recorded in the 2025 WWL compared to 4,118 in the 2024 WWL. Yet they cautioned that this data should not be interpreted as evidence that attacks on Christians by Boko Haram, Fulani herdsman, Lakurawa, and other groups have decreased. Instead, the violence no longer concentrates in Nigeria’s North Central region but now exists along the borders between Burkina Faso and Mali and Chad and Cameroon.
Outside Nigeria, the number of Christians killed for their faith increased compared to last year (1,376 in WWL 2025 versus 880 in WWL 2024), largely due to increasing violence in places like the Democratic Republic of the Congo (355 in WWL 2025 versus 261 in WWL 2024) and Burkina Faso (201 in WWL in 2025 versus 31 in WWL 2024, as a result of the action of jihadist groups affiliated with the al-Qaeda network).
Nearly 5,000 (4,744) Christians around the world were detained without trial, the highest number since 2020. India (No. 11) had 1,629 detentions recorded during the period covered by the report.
The number of attacks on churches or other public properties linked to Christians (which includes the closure of churches), fell from 14,766 cases reported in 2024 to 7,679 in 2025. Much of this comes from Open Doors changing their estimates in China, where researchers cannot confirm reports and data. Where numbers cannot be verified, estimates are given in round numbers of 10, 100, 1,000, or 10,000, assumed to be higher in reality. In the 2024 WWL, they reported 10,000 attacks, compared to 1,000 this year.
In Rwanda, Open Doors said the government closed 4,000 churches, citing unmet building-code issues and pastoral and theological requirements.
The number of Christians raped or sexually harassed for faith-related reasons rose from 2,622 in WWL 2024 to 3,123 in the WWL 2025 reporting period. The 2025 report acknowledged the challenge of gathering these numbers, given victims’ trauma and cultural taboos. Another sensitive data point: the number of forced marriages of Christians to non-Christians. Open Doors reported that the number increased from 609 cases in WWL 2024 to 821 in the WWL 2025 reporting period.
Acts of violence often force Christians to leave their homes in search of safety elsewhere. Open Doors recorded 183,709 Christians seeking safety in their own countries in WWL 2025, a reduction in comparison with the 278,716 cases in WWL 2024. The number of people leaving their own countries rose from 16,404 in the WWL 2024 to 26,062 in this year’s report.
In most cases, this forced migration cannot be measured precisely, so once again researchers estimated by order of magnitude, emphasizing that estimates are conservative and represent the “absolute minimum” of attacks and atrocities, meaning the actual figures are likely much higher.Open Doors approximated that Azerbaijan forced out 10,000 Christians for faith-related reasons during the reporting period. CT’s 2023 report noted that 100,000 ethnic Armenians had left the Nagorno-Karabakh region after Azerbaijani forces entered. Open Doors said that there are ethnic and political reasons present in this conflict and that the faith component is present but not acute.
In some countries, persecution has driven the church underground, making it hard for researchers to track information on its well-being. This year’s list ranked China as No. 15, up from No. 19 in 2024, noting that “the era of the church’s relatively open presence fades deeper into memory.”
Afghan Christians have responded to the Taliban by marginalizing themselves further, limiting the government’s scope of repression. The Taliban is reportedly working to erase Christian presence in the territory, so most believers have gone underground to avoid being judged by the Taliban’s Islamic courts. Tiny communities meet in homes, trying to share the gospel in a hostile environment.
However, this isolation also makes it challenging to verify potential attacks on Christians. As a result, though Open Doors ranked Afghanistan No. 10 this year, down from No. 1 in 2022, they scored it a 5 for violence, the lowest among the top 10 countries overall.
Algeria went from the 15th to the 19th position, with its overall score dropping by two points since Open Doors reported no new attacks on churches. While this appears to be an encouraging sign, the government’s closure of all Protestant churches in the country has left no room for new attacks. Without violent incidents—and without churches—Algeria’s overall score decreased.
The Christian community in Gaza has shrunk from around 1,000 to barely 700 since the Israel-Hamas War began in October 2023. At least 300 Christians have left the region, with at least 43 reported deaths in Gaza. Open Doors ranks the Palestinian Territories (which includes the West Bank) as No. 62.
Though the Middle East and Africa continue to be dangerous places for Christians, some countries in Southeast Asia and Latin America have improved.
In Indonesia, the number of attacks on churches and the number of deaths decreased significantly in a time when the country was focused on electing a new president. Efforts to combat terrorism helped the violence score of the fourth-largest nation in the world drop from 11.5 points to 5.7 points, and the nation now ranks No. 59 compared to No. 42 in 2024. In September, Pope Francis visited Jakarta, Indonesia’s capital, as part of an effort to promote interfaith dialogue, especially significant given Indonesia’s status as the largest Muslim-majority country.
In Colombia, the presence of guerrilla groups and drug cartels with significant territorial control had created a situation where anyone opposing their objectives, including churches, could become a target of violence. In February 2024, a ceasefire reduced violence against Christians, and the country’s total score dropped by two points, placing it at No. 46.
Open Doors also included Nicaragua as a hopeful case, arguing the situation could have been worse without the sanctions imposed by the European Union in 2022 and by the United States and Canada in 2024. These sanctions target 21 individuals, including President Daniel Ortega and his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, and involve asset freezes and travel bans.
During the 12-month World Watch List reporting period, 94 Christians—mostly Roman Catholic priests, but also pastors and missionaries—were expelled from the country. Nicaragua ranked 30 in WWL 2025, the same position as the previous year.
CT previously reported the WWL rankings for 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, and 2012, as well as a spotlight in 2010 on where it’s hardest to believe. CT also asked experts in 2017 whether the United States belongs on persecution lists and compiled the most-read stories of the persecuted church in 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, and 2015.
Read Open Doors’ full report on the 2024 World Watch List here.
Methodology
Open Doors scores each nation on six components and each category can receive a maximum score of 16.7 for a maximum total score of 100. Researchers consider a score of more than 40 points as high.
Their methodology takes into account violence, as well the pressure to reject their faith that believers experience from neighbors, friends, extended family, and society as a whole. The total score is determined based on answers from an extensive questionnaire.
- Private life: the inner life of a Christian and his or her freedom of thought and conscience.
“How free has a Christian been to relate to God one-on-one in his/her own private space?” - Family life: pertaining to the nuclear and extended family of a Christian.
“How free has a Christian been to live his/her Christian convictions within the circle of the family, and how free have Christian families been to conduct their family life in a Christian way?” - Community life: the interactions Christians have with their respective local communities outside their families.
“How free have Christians been individually and collectively to live their Christian convictions within the local community? How much pressure has the community put on Christians by acts of discrimination, harassment or any other form of persecution?”. - National life: the interaction between Christians and the nations they live in. This includes rights and laws, the justice system, the state, and other institutions.
“How free have Christians been individually and collectively to live their Christian convictions beyond their local community? How much pressure has the legal system put on Christians? How much pressure have agents of supra-local life put on Christians by acts of misinformation, discrimination, harassment or any other form of persecution?” - Church life: the collective exercise of freedom of thought and conscience, particularly as regards uniting with fellow Christians in worship, service, and the public expression of their faith without undue interference.
“How have restrictions, discrimination, harassment or other forms of persecution infringed upon these rights and this collective life of Christian churches, organizations and institutions?” - Violence: deprivation of physical freedom, serious physical or mental harm to Christians, or serious damage to their property. This is a category which can affect or inhibit relationships in all other areas of life.
“How many cases of such violence have there been?”
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