MANILA (SE): Ignacio de Loyola has become the first Philippine-produced movie to receive the Best Film Award at the Mirabile Dictu International Catholic Film Festival in the Vatican.
 

HONG KONG (SE): A gunfight resulting in three brutal deaths took place in the Barangay Mansangaban Playground of Bais City, Negros Occidental, on 25 April 1993, in full view of around 100 people, including the children and families of the dead and the daughter of a barangay captain, who was later to be found guilty of the multiple murder.
 

MANILA (SE): The large gathering of predominately Filipino migrant workers paused prior to a celebration of Christmas at a Mass in Chater Garden on Christmas Eve to pray for the victims of Tropical Storm Tembin, which poured swathes of water onto Mindanao flooding many parts of the island on December 22 and 23.
 
Approximately 100 people are dead and a further 80 or so had not been accounted for by December 27. Few hold much hope for their welfare.
 

DILI (SE): Lucille Abeykoon, a social worker from the Human Rights Office Kandy in the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is wondering why one of the youngest countries in the world, Timor-Leste, has made so much progress in the protection of human rights, accountability and the rule of law, while her own land, which has been independent from its colonial power for 69 years, has made so little.
 

DA NANG (UCAN): People with an affiliation with unregistered Churches or religious groups were confined to their homes in Da Nang, Vietnam, for the duration of the gathering of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meeting that took place from November 6 to 11.
 
Hua Phi, a leader of the Cao Dai indigenous faith, said he was ordered by five security officers on November 4 not to leave his home until the APEC summit hadconcluded.
 

KARACHI (SE): To the background boom of a 19-gun salute, members of the Pakistan army, navy and air force formed an guard of honour for the body of Sister Ruth Pfau, who died on August 10, as it was carried into St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Karachi for a state funeral.
 
The flag of the Vatican City flew at half-mast high above the cathedral, alongside the Pakistani national flag. The requiem Mass was celebrated by Archbishop Joseph Coutts.
 

MANILA (UCAN): Argentinean Father Luciano Ariel Felloni, from the urban poor community of Novaliches in Manila, has been recognised as the Social Media Influencer of the Year by the Catholic Social Media Awards for his work in drawing attention to drug-related extrajudicial killings in The Philippines.
 
Father Felloni said on November 21 that he is able to use social media to explain the contribution the Church can make to the effort against drug use and distribution.
 

KATHMANDU (UCAN): Nepal has become the latest pariah state in the religious freedom field by making religious conversion illegal.
 
Seen as specifically aimed at the Christian faith, Kathmandu has now formed a bloc alongside its two neighbours, India and Pakistan, in which the small Christian minorities are facing increasing threats from the government against their faith.
 

VATICAN (SE): The Holy See and Japan are marking the 75th anniversary of the forging between the two states of full diplomatic relations in 1942.
 
In the Vatican, the celebrations revolved around a Mass celebrated at the Church of the Gesù in Rome by the Vatican secretary of state, Pietro Cardinal Parolin, on October 11, and a symposium at the Pontifical Gregorian University on the following day.
 

TAIPEI (AsiaNews): Presenting the Golden Ball Award in memory of her old teacher and friend, Father Jerry Martinson, who made his name famous across China and Taiwan for his comparing role on the Catholic television network, the Kuangchi Programme Service, as Uncle Jerry, Louise Tsuei quoted him as often saying, “Working in the media is like an act of faith, because, since we cannot see the public, we must firmly believe in what we are doing.”