U.S. State Department: Religious Freedom Low In Pakistan,China,Afghanistan.

[T-Rex]

U.S. State Department: Religious Freedom Low In Afghanistan, Pakistan.

By BRADLEY KLAPPER 07/30/12 03:20 PM ET AP

U.S. believes Afghanistan and Pakistan are not accurately defending religious freedom.

WASHINGTON — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Monday the jury was out on whether Egypt's Islamist political parties will equally represent non-Muslims, and said the Obama administration's future relationship with President Mohammed Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood would depend on how they respect the rights of Coptic Christians, women and other minorities.

Speaking to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Clinton recounted the discussions she had with Morsi and Egyptian Christians when she visited Cairo earlier this month. She said Egypt was still grappling with the challenge of religious liberty as it seeks to establish a democracy after decades of dictatorship.

"I heard from Christians who want to know that they will be accorded the same rights and respect as all Egyptians in a new government led by an Islamist party," Clinton said. "They wonder, will a government looking explicitly to greater reliance on Islamic principles stand up for non-Muslims and Muslims equally? Since this is the first time that Egypt has been in this situation, it's a fair question."

Clinton, addressing the Washington think tank after the State Department released its annual assessment of religious freedom around the world, commended Egypt's new president for saying "clearly and repeatedly, in public and private, that he intends to be the president of all Egyptians." She noted Morsi's pledge to include women and Christians in top leadership positions, and said the U.S. would now monitor how senior government roles are distributed in Egypt's new government.

"We are going to judge by actions, not words, and the actions are just at the very beginning stages," Clinton said.

"We are prepared to work with the leaders that the Egyptian people choose," she said. "And our engagement with those leaders will be based on their commitment to universal democratic principles."

Monday's religious freedom report criticized U.S. allies Afghanistan and Pakistan, while also taking aim at chronic violators Iran, China and North Korea.

It said Afghanistan's courts interpret Islamic law to punish non-Muslims for exercising their faith. Pakistan has issued death sentences for cases of blasphemy and despite increased extremist attacks on minorities or even pro-tolerance Muslims there, authorities have rarely investigated perpetrators.

"When it comes to this human right_ this key feature of stable, secure, peaceful societies_ the world is sliding backwards," Clinton said.

The report particularly highlighted blasphemy and religious "defamation" laws in Muslim countries.

It lamented long prison sentences and lashings for people in Saudi Arabia charged with "insulting" the Muslim Prophet Muhammad, and warned that people in Pakistan who've only criticized the blasphemy laws have been killed. Those who have been killed include liberal politician Salman Taseer and Shahbaz Bhatti, the only Christian minister in the Cabinet.

Government efforts against "violent extremists" also came under scrutiny.

The report said Bahraini, Russian, Iraqi and Nigerian authorities don't always distinguish terrorism from peaceful religious practice.

Iran's government was criticized for imprisoning leaders of the Baha'i community and for the plight of imprisoned Christian pastor Youcef Nadarkhani, who faces possible execution.

Respect for Tibetan Buddhists deteriorated last year, while many religious and spiritual groups remain outlawed in China, the report said.

In North Korea, it added, "religious freedom simply does not exist."

U.S. State Department: Religious Freedom Low In Afghanistan, Pakistan

Religious Freedom ‘Declines Markedly’ in China
2012-07-30

The US State Department hits out at China for its policies on Tibetan Buddhists and Uyghur Muslims in an annual report on global religious freedom.

AFP

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton speaks at the Carnegie Foundation in Washington after the release of the State Department's 2011 International Religious Freedom Report, July 30, 2012.

China has suffered a sharp decline in religious freedom while Burma has made little progress on the issue despite democratic reforms, the U.S. State Department said in an annual report to American lawmakers.

It said that abuse of religious freedom remained a concern in Vietnam, including cases involving arrests, detentions, and convictions of religious practitioners.

The State Department’s 2011 Religious Freedom Report that reviewed the situation across the globe last year slammed China, saying there was a “marked deterioration” in Beijing’s respect for and protection of religious rights in the world’s most populous nation.

It cited increased restrictions on Tibetan Buddhist monks and nuns and clampdowns on religious practices ahead of sensitive anniversaries, as well as “severe” repression of Muslim Uyghurs in the volatile Xinjiang region.

Burma, which ushered in a new, nominally civilian government in 2011, “took steps” during the year toward overcoming its legacy of “intense religious oppression,” but continued to impose restrictions and monitor meetings by religious organizations, it said.

In Vietnam, authorities held religious prisoners, refused to allow churches to register, and harassed believers, the report said, amid calls by rights groups to President Barack Obama’s administration to re-designate the country as a “Country of Particular Concern”—a label that the U.S. government gives to countries for ongoing, egregious violations of religious freedom.

At a briefing on the release of the report, Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious freedom Suzan Johnson Cook said that freedom of religion went “hand in hand” with freedoms of expression, speech, and assembly, and that governments in Asia and around the world had “misused” laws to restrict freedom of all three.

“Religious freedom is often the bellwether for other human rights,” including freedom of expression, speech, and assembly, she said.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the "global picture" for religious freedom, with over a billion people worldwide living under governments that "systematically" repress people's beliefs, was "sobering."

"When it comes to this human right, this key feature of stable, secure, peaceful societies, the world is sliding backwards," she said, speaking at the Carnegie Center for International Peace after the report's release.

China

Chinese authorities’ restrictions on religious practices among Tibetans and Uyghurs were “severe,” the report said.

The State Department placed blame on authorities for stoking tensions that led to the recent wave of Tibetans setting themselves on fire in protest against Chinese rule.

"Official interference in the practice of these religious traditions exacerbated grievances and contributed to at least 12 self-immolations by Tibetans in 2011," the report said.

Further self-immolations this year—which brought the current total to 44 since 2009—continue to demonstrate Tibetans’ “desperation” under China’s rule, Johnson Cook said.

In China’s far northwestern Xinjiang region, home to the mostly Muslim Uyghur group, religious restrictions were closely tied to political repression, the report said.

The government’s concern over “separatism, religious extremism, and terrorism” had contributed to restrictions on Muslims, with authorities “failing to distinguish between peaceful religious practice and criminal or terrorist activities,” it said.

Outside of Tibet and Xinjiang, Chinese officials restricted the activities of both registered and unregistered groups, including members of underground Christian “house churches” and members of the Falun Gong spiritual movement, the report said.

Some Falun Gong adherents had reportedly been held in “ankang” psychiatric institutions, while authorities had raided house churches and confiscated Bibles, it said.

Individuals had been harassed or detained for assembling for worship, expressing their beliefs in public and private, and publishing religious texts, it added.

The U.S. had raised issues concerning house churches, Falun Gong, Uyghur Muslims, and Tibetan Buddhists, during talks at the U.S.-China Human Rights Dialogue in Washington last week, Johnson Cook said.

“That’s a continuing conversation and we will not let up,” she said.

Burma

The report slammed the Burmese government for marginalizing the Muslim Rohingya, a minority which has been at the center of deadly communal violence in western Burma’s Rakhine state since June of this year.

“The government continued to refuse to recognize the Muslim Rohingya ethnic minority as citizens and imposed restrictions on their movement and marriage,” it said.

At the same time, it praised Burma for the “limited” steps it took toward greater religious freedom during 2011, when a new government took power in the country after decades of rule under the former military junta.

Burma had eased some restrictions on building churches and had generally permitted followers of registered religious groups to worship as they chose, the report said.

But it had also “frequently limited religious freedom” and continued to impose restrictions on certain religious activities.

Some Buddhist monks arrested during the 2007 “Saffron Revolution” protest movement led by monasteries had been released, it said, but noted others remained in prison serving long sentences.

Vietnam

In Vietnam, government practices and “bureaucratic impediments” had restricted religious freedom in 2011, while reports of rights abuses remained at levels consistent to the year before, the State Department said.

Christians had faced particular challenges in the country, the report said, noting an incident of detainees being treated harshly after a protest over the closing of a cemetery in Con Dau parish.

Authorities had harassed individuals for their religious beliefs and some religious groups for their political activism, it added.

But it praised authorities for allowing new religious groups to register and pursing talks with the Vatican concerning the country’s Catholic community.

Laos

The State Department praised Laos for a “slight trend” toward improvement in protection of religious rights through public education outreach in the provinces.

But it slammed local and district-level authorities for being lax in their enforcement of laws and policies protecting religious freedom.

Local authorities sometimes demonstrated suspicion of non-Buddhist communities and showed intolerance for minority groups, particularly Protestant Christians, it said.

Cambodia

Cambodia was one of the few Southeast Asian nations to stand out for relative tolerance of religious rights in 2011, the report said.

The State Department said there were no reports of abuses of religious freedom and few reports of societal abuses or discrimination based on religion last year.

“The constitution and other laws and policies protect religious freedom and, in practice, the government generally respected religious freedom,” it said.

North Korea

Religious freedom “simply does not exist” in isolated North Korea, the report said.

“Government policy continued to interfere with individuals’ ability to choose and to manifest their religious beliefs,” the report said.

Though little is known about the isolated country, some reports from refugees and defectors and missionaries indicated that North Koreans who had contact with foreigners or missionaries were subjected to harsh penalties, it said.

Reported by Rachel Vandenbrink.

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Religious Freedom

Original Report:
International Religious Freedom Report for 2011

A country where people can be imprisoned indefinitely on the basis of suspicion talks about religious freedom in other countries.