The ISHR Hamburg working group is once again hosting its annual “Chain of Lights for Persecuted Christians.” As in previous years, representatives from politics, the church, and society will address this topic on the podium. The organisers will appeal to the heads of state in countries where the right to religious freedom is severely restricted, drawing attention to individual cases.

In previous years, around 100 people each year joined the event, marching through Hamburg’s city centre with colourful lanterns. The public is invited to participate, either as spectators or actively: holding candles and posters, collecting signatures, and distributing informational flyers to raise awareness of the situation. The International Society for Human Rights (ISHR) working group in Hamburg explains its motivation for holding the demonstration: “We don’t want to abandon persecuted Christians and we don’t want to spare the public, the confrontation with the truth.”

Action for Shagufta Kiran, a mother of four on death row

At the event in Hamburg, signatures will be collected for the appeal for the release of Shagufta Kiran, the Protestant Christian woman sentenced to death, “Prisoner of the Month for March 2025.” In the early morning hours of July 29, 2021, security forces from the Cybercrime Unit of Pakistan’s top investigative agency raided the apartment of the 40-year-old nurse and preacher and arrested her on charges of blasphemy. She was accused of sharing derogatory content about the Islamic prophet Muhammad via the social network WhatsApp in September 2020.

According to her defence attorney, she neither wrote nor endorsed the controversial message herself, but merely forwarded it in a chat room. On September 18, 2024, the court in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, handed down the death sentence, which is to be carried out after a seven-year prison term.

“We are pleased that the Supreme Court of Pakistan finally ordered the release of Pakistani Christian Anwar Kenneth on June 25 of this year. He had spent 24 years unjustly imprisoned on charges of alleged blasphemy,” writes the working group, which also advocated for him, as well as for fellow Christian Simon Nadeem. Sixteen-year-old Nadeem, along with his co-defendant, 20-year-old Adil Babar, was acquitted of blasphemy charges on July 8, 2025. Nadeem had been imprisoned since May 2023.

The ISHR working group is supported by the Evangelical Alliance Hamburg and the Council of Christian Churches (ACK).

📆 When: Saturday, November 22, 2025, 4 p.m.
📍 Location: Ida-Ehre-Platz on Mönckebergstraße, Hamburg