Share

United States to release annual report on worldwide religious freedom

The United States, however, urged governments not to use the threat of violent extremism as a pretext for targeting legitimate religious groups, urged the protection of minorities, and condemned blasphemy laws that are used to suppress minorities. Taking a broader view of the religious practices and violations, the report released by Secretary of State John Kerry, however, gave a thumbs up to the Indian authorities as they “continued to enforce laws created to protect “religious sentiments” and minimize the risk of religious violence, which a few argued had the effect of limiting freedom of expression related to religion”.

Advertisement

The “International Religious Freedom Report” has no direct impact on USA policy towards the countries it studies, but Kerry said it would serve as reference for diplomats and activists lobbying for change.

The report also cited abuses by Shi’ite militias in Iraq, the al-Nusra Front in Syria, Boko Haram in Nigeria, the Lashkar i Jhangvi in Pakistan, anti-Semitism in France and Germany and discrimination against the Rohingya minority in Myanmar, also known as Burma.

“Most prominent, and most harmful, obviously, has been the rise of global terrorist groups such as Daesh, al-Qaida, al-Shabaab, Boko Haram”. Members of religious minorities were disproportionately affected. “Terrified young girls have been separated out by religion and sold into slavery”.

Meanwhile, in Vietnam, government authorities continued to harass unregistered religious groups, especially those suspected of involvement in political activity, while in Laos national authorities failed to prevent abuses by officials in remote areas of the country, according to the report.

“There’s been a Christian community there for 1,600 years, across the Nineveh Plain church bells have pealed for 1,600 years”.

“Even when the central government officials acknowledged certain actions, they often said the actions taken by local officials were not based on religion, but on local officials’ duty to maintain order”. “That’s part of the free marketplace of ideas and discourse”, he said.

Saperstein condemned efforts to “de-legitimise” the Jewish state, and argued that: “It’s right on the cusp of that line when it holds one country to different standards than it would hold another country”.

Government officials frequently withheld permission to build or fix mosques or other places of worship not belonging to the country’s Buddhist majority, the report said, while Buddhists were often favored by “unwritten government policies” for promotion into higher civil service or military ranks.

Advertisement

On a mobile phone?

Iraqi Christians attend a mass at St. Joseph's Chaldean Church an Eastern Rite church affiliated with the Roman Catholic Church in Baghdad Iraq