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May 21, 2013 | By USCIRF

WASHINGTON, DC - The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) today welcomed the State Department's release of its 2012 International Religious Freedom Report.

"USCIRF congratulates the State Department - particularly its Office of International Religious Freedom and Ambassador-at-Large Suzan Johnson Cook -- for its admirable work reporting on the many ways religious freedom is violated around the world,” said USCIRF Chair Katrina Lantos Swett. "Given that religious freedom conditions are deteriorating in many countries, the State Department's extensive documentation of the nature and extent of these violations is especially important. The next crucial step is for the Secretary of State to promptly designate the worst violators as "countries of particular concern,” or CPCs, under the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 (IRFA).”

IRFA requires the United States annually to designate as CPCs those governments that "engage in or tolerate” systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of religious freedom, and to take action to encourage improvements in each CPC country. IRFA provides a range of options for such action, from bilateral agreements to sanctions. However, the United States has not made CPC designations since August 2011.

"Prompt CPC designations will send the signal that the United States prioritizes religious freedom. These designations, followed up with vigorous U.S. diplomatic activity, also provide the U.S. government with an effective tool to help end abuses and promote this fundamental human right,” continued Lantos Swett.

Prompt CPC designations are also vital because sanctions on the currently-designated CPCs will expire in August 2013. "Allowing sanctions to expire would send the inaccurate message that religious freedom is improving in those countries or that religious freedom is not important to U.S. foreign policy. That message would be especially misguided given the severity of the violations in many nations that top the U.S. foreign policy agenda, and the strong correlation between religious freedom, stability and security,” said Lantos Swett.

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) recently released its own Annual Report which highlights the status of religious freedom globally and identifies those governments that are the most egregious violators. In its Report, USCIRF recommended that the State Department again designate the following eight countries as CPCs: Burma, China, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and Uzbekistan. USCIRF also found that seven other countries meet the CPC threshold and should be so designated: Egypt, Iraq, Nigeria, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Vietnam.

To interview a USCIRF Commissioner please contact USCRIFat (202) 523-3258 or [email protected]

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May 20, 2013| By William Shaw and M. Zuhdi Jasser , and Azizah al-Hibri

When President Obama meets with President Thein Sein of Myanmar (Burma) today, he should emphasize Washington"s commitment to Myanmar"s progress, while stressing the importance of preventing discrimination and violence against ethnic minority Muslims and Christians.

WASHINGTON

When the president of Myanmar (Burma), Thein Sein , meets with President Obama at the White House today, he will undoubtedly stress how his government has taken steps toward democratic reform. Indeed, in recent years, Myanmar has released hundreds of religious and political prisoners. It has eased Internet and media controls. It has held limited parliamentary elections.

To read the entire op-ed please visit The Christian Science Monitor .

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May 16, 2013 | By USCIRF

WASHINGTON, D.C.- The two-year armed conflict in Syria has left at least 80,000 people dead and more than 5 million displaced. In his May 13, 2013 press conference with UK Prime Minister David Cameron, President Obama noted the difficulty of "putting things back together” in Syria after "the furies have been unleashed.”

These "furies” include a brutal conflict that increasingly is sectarian in nature. The recent massacre in Bayda and the kidnapping of bishops of the Syriac and Greek Orthodox Churches underscore the fact that what began as a political struggle in Syria has become a war in which sectarian rhetoric and religiously-motivated violence have led to sectarian divides.

"We are deeply worried for the lives of Archbishop Mor Gregiorius Yohanna Ibrahim of the Syriac Orthodox Church and Bishop Boulos Yazigi of the Greek Orthodox Church, who were kidnapped on April 22 while providing humanitarian aid to the war-ravaged people of Syria,” said USCIRF Chair Katrina Lantos Swett. "These two religious leaders put aside their own safety by travelling to one of the worst areas of fighting to help those Syrians left with few basic necessities after more than two years of war. The United States and the international community must leave no stone unturned to free the Archbishops and halt sectarian violence,” said Dr. Swett.

The civil war in Syria began in March 2011 when peaceful protests by mostly Sunni Muslim opponents of the al-Assad regime called for the repeal of the country's abusive emergency law, space for political parties, and the resignation of President Bashar al-Assad. The civil war that has now entered into its third year has caused at least 80,000 deaths 1.3 million refugees and at least 3.6 million internally displaced people. The brutal massacre by al-Assad's armed forces in the town of Bayda on May 2 claimed the lives of dozens, including women and children, largely from that town's Sunni Muslim community.

"The use of sectarian violence and rhetoric will destroy any hope that Syria will emerge from this war as a representative democracy in which human rights and religious freedom for all Syrians is promoted and protected,” said Dr. Lantos Swett. "The kidnapping of the Archbishops and the massacre of innocents are only the latest attempts to inflame tensions between religious communities and divide them along sectarian lines. The al-Assad regime and some opposition forces, including those foreign to Syria who espouse violence based on extreme religious ideologies, increasingly are stoking sectarian tensions as a tactic in the civil war.”

USCIRF's report, " Protecting and Promoting Religious Freedom in Syria ” includes preliminary findings and recommendations on the situation in Syria and underscores the detrimental effects of sectarianism on Syria's current and future religious freedom environment.

To interview a USCIRF Commissioner please contact USCRIFat (202) 523-3258 or [email protected]