FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 17, 2005

Contact:
Anne Johnson, Director of Communications, (202) 523-3240 

WASHINGTON - U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) Vice Chair Nina Shea will testify on Monday, June 20, before the House International Relations Committee (HIRC) Subcommittee on Africa, Global Human Rights, and International Organizations at a hearing on human rights and religious freedom in Vietnam. The hearing will be held in Rayburn House Office Building, Room 2172, at 2:00 p.m.

The hearing is being held on the day that Vietnamese Prime Minister Phan Van Khai arrives in Washington for meetings with President George W. Bush and Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld and other U.S. officials. Prime Minister Khai's visit comes 30 years after the end of the Vietnam War and 10 years after the normalization of U.S.-Vietnamese relations.

Vice Chair Shea will testify that while trade and military ties have increased, significant problems in U.S.-Vietnamese relations remain, particularly in the area of human rights, including religious freedom, which will hinder the further growth of the relationship. Vietnam's economic openness has not led directly to political openness, and freedoms of speech, assembly, association, and religion continue to be significantly restricted.

The Commission recommended beginning in 2001 that Vietnam be designated a "country of particular concern," or CPC, for severe violations of religious freedom. In September 2004, the State Department designated Vietnam a CPC. Last month, the State Department announced it had reached an "agreement" with Vietnam to avoid more stringent actions, which can include economic sanctions, required for countries designated as CPCs. However, as the Commission noted when the agreement was announced, the actions taken by Vietnam signal only promises of improvement and not actual measurable progress in addressing the problems that resulted in Vietnam's CPC designation.

In her testimony, Commissioner Shea will outline the religious freedom concerns that remain, troubling new developments, and recommendations for U.S. policy to address these issues.

Commissioner Shea's testimony will be available on the Commission's web site at www.uscirf.gov at 2:00 p.m. on Monday, June 20.

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom was created by the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 to monitor the status of freedom of thought, conscience, and religion or belief abroad, as defined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and related international instruments, and to give independent policy recommendations to the President, the Secretary of State and the Congress.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 3, 2005

Contact:
Anne Johnson, Director of Communications, (202) 523-3240

WASHINGTON - The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) today released Policy Focus on Uzbekistan a roundtable "Human Rights and Instability in Uzbekistan"at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. USCIRF Commissioner Michael Cromartie represented the Commission and was joined by Robert Templer, Director of the Asia Program at the International Crisis Group, who presented Crisis Group's report, "Uzbekistan: the Andijon Uprising," on recent events in Uzbekistan. The roundtable was chaired by Dr. Martha Brill Olcott, Senior Associate at Carnegie.

Policy Focus on Uzbekistan includes a number of recommendations for U.S. policy. Many of those recommendations were formulated on the basis of a Commission trip to Uzbekistan in October 2004, when the Commission met with Uzbek government officials, human rights activists, religious leaders, and former prisoners in the Ferghana Valley, including in Andijon, as well as in Tashkent and Samarkand.

In April 2005, the Commission recommended to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice that the State Department designate Uzbekistan as a "country of particular concern," or CPC, in accordance with the 1998 International Religious Freedom Act, due to its egregious, systematic, and ongoing violations of religious freedom. CPC designation carries with it the requirement that the U.S. government take specific policy actions, up to and including the cessation of economic and security assistance.

In addition to recommending that Uzbekistan be designated as a CPC, the Commission recommends that:

• U.S. statements and actions should be coordinated across agencies to ensure that U.S. concerns about human rights conditions in Uzbekistan are reflected in all dealings with the Uzbek government;
• U.S. assistance to the Uzbek government, with the exception of assistance to improve humanitarian conditions and advance human rights, should be made contingent upon establishing and implementing a specific timetable for the government to take concrete steps to improve conditions of freedom of religion or belief and observe international human rights standards;
• U.S. security and other forms of assistance should continue to be scrutinized to ensure that this assistance does not go to Uzbek government agencies, such as certain branches of the Interior Ministry and the Justice Ministry, which have been found to be responsible for religious freedom violations; and
• The U.S. government should reinstate Uzbek-language radio broadcasts at the Voice of America (VOA), and should use VOA and other appropriate avenues of public diplomacy to explain to the people of Uzbekistan why religious freedom is an important element of U.S. foreign policy as well as specific concerns about religious freedom in their country.

Policy Focus on Uzbekistan is available on the Commission's web site at www.uscirf.gov and may also be obtained by contacting the Commission's Communications Department at [email protected] or (202) 523-3240, ext. 38.

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom was created by the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 to monitor the status of freedom of thought, conscience, and religion or belief abroad, as defined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and related international instruments, and to give independent policy recommendations to the President, the Secretary of State and the Congress.