FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 21, 2003

Contact:
Anne Johnson, Director of Communications, (202) 523-3240, ext. 27

WASHINGTON - The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), an independent and bipartisan federal agency advising the Administration and Congress, has elected Dean Michael K. Young to serve as Chair. Commissioner Young succeeds Felice D. Gaer, who was elected Vice Chair together with Nina Shea. The election follows the Commission's practice of alternating the post of Chair yearly between Democratic and Republican appointees. The Chair is chosen by the Commissioners themselves.

Commissioner Young is dean of the George Washington University Law School. Prior to that, he was the Fuyo Professor of Japanese Law and Legal Institutions at the Columbia University School of Law. At Columbia, he also served as Director of the Center for Japanese Legal Studies, the Center for Korean Legal Studies, and the Project on Religion, Rights and Religious Freedom. Dean Young has been a Visiting Professor and Scholar at the Law Faculties of the University of Tokyo, Waseda University and Nihon University. He has also been a Japan Foundation Fellow at Columbia University. During the Administration of President George H. W. Bush, he served as Ambassador for Trade and Environmental Affairs, Deputy Under Secretary for Economic and Agricultural Affairs, and Deputy Legal Advisor to the U.S. Department of State. He currently serves as a member of the Brown v. Board of Education 50th Anniversary Commission and the Trade and Environmental Policy Committee, Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, Executive Office of the President.

Commissioner Gaer is the Director of the Jacob Blaustein Institute for the Advancement of Human Rights of the American Jewish Committee. She is a member of the Committee Against Torture, a United Nations treaty monitoring body that reviews governmental compliance with the Convention Against Torture. Nominated by the United States and elected in 1999, she is the first American to serve on the Committee. Felice Gaer was appointed as a public member of nine U.S. delegations to UN human rights negotiations between 1993 and 1999, including the UN Commission on Human Rights, the World Conference on Women, and the World Conference on Human Rights. She is also a member of the steering committee of Human Rights Watch/Europe and Central Asia and the International Human Rights Council of the Carter Center. Ms. Gaer is the author of more than 25 articles on international human rights topics. In 1995, she was awarded the Alumnae Achievement Award from Wellesley College.

Commissioner Shea is the Director of the Center for Religious Freedom of Freedom House in Washington, D.C. She has been an international human rights lawyer for 25 years and has for 18 years focused specifically on the issue of religious persecution. Before her appointment to this Commission, on which she has served from the beginning, Ms. Shea served on the Advisory Committee on Religious Freedom to the U.S. Secretary of State. She has organized and sponsored numerous fact-finding missions to Sudan, China, Egypt, and elsewhere and has testified regularly before Congress about the governments of these countries. She is the author of In the Lion's Den, a book on anti-Christian persecution around the world. She was appointed as a public delegate on the U.S. delegation to the UN Commission on Human Rights in 2001.

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
July 15, 2003

Contact:
Anne Johnson, Director of Communications, (202) 523-3240, ext. 27

WASHINGTON - The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), an independent and bipartisan federal agency advising the Administration and Congress, will participate in the meeting of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) on freedom of religion or belief in Vienna, Austria on July 17-18, 2003, in association with the U.S. delegation. This will be the fourth OSCE meeting in which the USCIRF has participated in this way. The meeting will focus on freedom of religion or belief in the contexts of permissible limitations; promoting tolerance and freedom of religion or belief; and the role of the media concerning freedom of religion or belief. Commissioners Preeta Bansal, Felice D. Gaer, and Dean Michael K. Young will join U.S. Ambassador to the OSCE Stephan M. Minikes in all aspects of the delegation's work, including offering advice to the U.S. delegation and discussing specific ways to promote tolerance, education, and respect for religious freedom in the OSCE region, including the former Soviet Union states.

Commissioners will also meet with experts monitoring violations of religious freedom in the OSCE region, including in Uzbekistan, Russia, and France, who will be offering information and recommendations regarding U.S. policy to improve these situations. The Commission will also seek bilateral meetings with representatives of Uzbekistan, Russia, France, and elsewhere. The USCIRF recently visited and reported on religious freedom in Belarus and Russia, and has recommended that the State Department designate Turkmenistan a "country of particular concern (CPC)."

One issue of concern to the USCIRF regarding several OSCE member states is legislation that establishes overly restrictive criteria for official registration or recognition of religious groups. The Commission will meet privately with several experts and NGO representatives who are very

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 14, 2003

Contact:
Anne Johnson, Director of Communications, (202) 523-3240, ext. 27

WASHINGTON -- On July 10, 2003, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) held its second off-the-record roundtable on religious freedom in China in the U.S. Capitol building. The USCIRF created this series to foster dialogue among senior Administration officials, members of Congress, human rights experts, NGOs, and representatives of religious groups to advise the Administration and Congress on U.S. policy options for promoting religious freedom and human rights in China. Commissioners Felice D. Gaer, Nina Shea, and Dean Michael K. Young were joined by State Department officials John Hanford, Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom, and Lorne Craner, Assistant Secretary of State for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, as well as Congressional staff and experts from academia, commissions, and advocacy, religious, and human rights organizations.

The July 10 roundtable focused on the status of the Uighurs in Xinjiang. Participants discussed the extent to which the Chinese government has permitted or restricted religious freedom among the Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang, in the context of the government's Uighur and religious freedom policies. Participants suggested steps the U.S. government could take to advance the protection of human rights, including religious freedom, of the Uighurs. Participants also received updates on the Chinese government's ongoing activities to restrict the rights of Falun Gong practitioners, Tibetans, and unregistered house church members like Pastor Gong Shengliang, as well as on the status of the Hong Kong government's implementation of Article 23 ( see USCIRF July 1 press release ).

The USCIRF has produced reports on the status of religious freedom in China and has recommended that China be listed by the State Department as a "country of particular concern" (CPC). Under the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 (IRFA), a CPC is a country whose government has either engaged in or tolerated particularly severe violations of religious freedom, defined as violations that are "systematic, ongoing, and egregious." IRFA sets forth that the policy of the United States is to oppose particularly severe violations of religious freedom. The Commission's report on China may be viewed USCIRF's web site

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.

Felice D. Gaer, Chair

• Dean Michael K. Young, Vice Chair Preeta Bansal, Richard Land, Bishop William F. Murphy, Bishop Ricardo Ramirez, Leila Nadya Sadat, Nina Shea, Ambassador John V. Hanford III, Ex-Officio Joseph R. Crapa, Executive Director