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August 1, 2012| by Azizah al-Hibri and M. Zuhdi Jasser

The following op-ed article appeared in the Washington Post on August 1, 2012: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/guest-voices/post/ramadan-and-religious-freedom/2012/08/01/gJQA9HqBQX_blog.html

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), on which we serve, extends its warmest wishes to the world"s 1.6 billion Muslims, nearly a quarter of its population, at the advent of Ramadan, the most holy month in the Islamic calendar.

From North and South America to Europe, and Africa and Australia to Asia, including the Middle East, Ramadan reminds Muslims of the soulful ties that bind them together. For Muslims, it is a month to strengthen faith in God and reaffirm love and reliance upon Him and His Word as revealed through the message of the Prophet Muhammad. The month also is an opportunity for Muslims to fulfill God"s commandment to fast from sunrise to sunset (2:185), an act that joins Muslims together as equals. It is also far more. Whether reciting the Qur"an, offering prayers, performing charity, or sharing in the nightly Iftar dinner, Ramadan is a month for self-reflection and atonement. It also is a time for Muslims to come closer to God, scripture, family, friends, and neighbors, while gaining a deeper understanding and empathy for those who are less fortunate.

Given all that is happening in today"s world, Ramadan provides an especially important inflection point this year. In this time of reflection, we are particularly disturbed that Muslims and non-Muslims alike continue to have their right to freedom of thought, conscience, and religion violated by governments, religious extremists, and sometimes even their misguided neighbors.

As USCIRF Commissioners, we serve an independent, bipartisan U.S. federal government commission that monitors these violations around the world and makes recommendations to the President, the Secretary of State and Congress. We promote and defend international standards of religious freedom and advocate equally for all, regardless of creed. Both the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights declare that countries must uphold principles of religious freedom, including the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; freedom to change one"s religion or belief; and the freedom to manifest one"s religion or belief peacefully. Many countries do not adhere to these principles -- although they are signatories to international agreements -- leading to the oppression and harassment of, and violence against, those who believe and those who do not believe. As Commissioners, we continue to urge the U.S. government to hold countries accountable for violating international standards of human rights and religious freedom.

During this holy month of Ramadan, we trust that all Muslims will reflect on how this freedom relates to their devotion to God as well as to the Qur"anic injunction: "Let there be no coercion in religion” (2:256). Thus, faith can bolster the inalienable right to religious freedom for those of different religions and beliefs. It is our hope that in this holy month, Muslims will remember that God imparted to this world people of great diversity, including diversity in religions and beliefs. As the Qur"an states repeatedly, "Had God so willed, He could have made [all human beings] a single people…” (42:8). Furthermore, He created differences among us not to divide us but to have us learn from one another (49:13).

It is also our hope during Ramadan that non-Muslims will take this opportunity to get to know better their Muslim neighbors and friends, and break bread with them at an evening Iftar. Only through friendship and dialogue can we discard oppressive stereotypes and build communal bonds.

Finally, it is our hope that all of us remember that the respect and freedom, including religious freedom, which we seek for ourselves are only as possible, protected, and meaningful as the freedoms we allow for others and help them achieve.

Ramadan Kareem!

*Azizah al-Hibri and M. Zuhdi Jasser serve as Commissioners on the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF).

Please contact Samantha Schnitzer at [email protected] or (202) 786-0613 to interview a USCIRF Commissioner.

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July 31, 2012| by Katrina Lantos Swett and Robert P. George

The following op-ed appeared in  The Moscow Times on July 31, 2012..:  : 

Has Russia truly changed its ways on human rights? Certainly its new law restricting public protests fuels grave and widespread concerns. Moreover, in at least one key area, religious freedom, Russia has not changed in many respects. This assessment should provoke serious discussion as the United States faces decisions about its relationship with its former Cold War foe.

 Russia is poised to enter the World Trade Organization later this month. To reap trade benefits from its entry, the United States would have to exempt Russia from the trade restrictions of the 1974 Jackson-Vanik amendment, which includes Russia due to its past restrictions on the right to emigrate during the Soviet period.

What should the United States do? It should continue to hold Russia accountable.

Over the past decade, the Kremlin has exploited legitimate security concerns about violent religious extremism by restricting the rights of nonviolent religious minority members. Its major tool is an extremism law. Enacted in 2002, the law imposes sanctions on religious extremism, which it defines as promoting the "exclusivity, superiority, or inferiority of citizens" based on religion. The law now applies to peaceful actors and actions. In addition, individuals who defend or sympathize openly with those charged also may face charges.

Once a higher court upholds a prior ruling that religious material is "extremist," the material is banned, with convicted individuals facing penalties ranging from a fine to five years in prison. As of June, the government has banned 1,254 items, according to the Sova Center, a Russian nongovernmental organization.

Russian citizens who preach that their particular faith is superior to others are potentially liable to prosecution. As written, this dangerously broad law can easily entrap peaceful members of religious groups, including those among the country's Muslims, who number from 16 million to 20 million, simply for alleging the truth or superiority of their beliefs.

These concerns are not merely hypothetical. When a court in 2007 banned Russian translations of 14 Koranic commentaries by Turkish theologian Said Nursi, security wasn't the issue. It was Nursi's assertion of Islam's "exclusivity." Fifteen Nursi readers have stood trial on extremist charges related to banned materials, and five have served the maximum three-year prison terms, Forum 18 news service reported. Six known Nursi readers are being investigated on these charges, including Ramil Latipov. In a chilling throwback to the Soviet era, authorities want Amir Abuyev, a Nursi reader in Kaliningrad, to undergo a psychiatric evaluation.

The bans on Nursi texts are among a series of sweeping prohibitions of Islamic materials under Russia's extremism law. Responding on June 18 to an Orenburg court's earlier banning of 65 Muslim texts issued by "literally all Islamic publishers in Russia," the Council of Muftis protested that this constituted the "revival of total ideological control … [and is] unacceptable in a democratic society."

While most banned religious material is Islamic, Russia also has used the extremism law to target non-Muslim groups.

Prominent among these groups is the pacifist Jehovah's Witnesses. Four are on trial: Yelena Grigoryeva, Maxim Kalinin and married couple Andrei and Lyutsiya Raitin. In 2009, a city court in the Altai republic ruled 16 Jehovah's Witness publications extremist. On May 4, authorities conducted at least 16 raids in the Orenburg region on Jehovah's Witness homes and places of worship, including a 15-hour raid on an elderly couple's home.

The same holds true for the Church of Scientology. In August 2011, a Tatarstan city court ruled 13 Scientology items extremist. As of April 2012, a St. Petersburg prosecutor has targeted a film on psychiatric abuse by the Scientology-funded Citizens Commission on Human Rights. In May, seven Scientology materials were added to the Federal List of Extremist Materials.

For a year, Russia's relations with India had worsened until a higher court overturned a ruling in Tomsk which had banned a Hare Krishna version of Hinduism's holy book, the Bhagavad Gita.

Simply stated, security concerns aren't the sole driver of Russia's religious freedom abuses. All too often, security is a pretext for unacceptable religious repression. Authorities view certain groups, particularly those seeking converts, as threats to the country's religious and cultural identity as embodied in the Russian Orthodox Church's Moscow Patriarchate. A case in point is the prosecution of human rights defender Maxim Yefimov in the Karelia region after he criticized the church on his blog in December 2011.

Both the extremism law and its application flatly violate Russia's international human rights commitments, including the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In 2009, the United Nations Human Rights Committee, which oversees compliance with the covenant, recommended that Russia's extremism law limit its definition of extremism to threats or acts of violence. In June, the Council of Europe's Venice Commission also called for reform of this law, noting that its definitions of extremism are overly broad, lack clarity, invite arbitrary application and violate international human rights standards.

How should the United States respond to Russia's violations of religious freedom and related human rights abuses?

The U.S. Congress must maintain the Jackson-Vanik sanctions until the proposed Magnitsky Act becomes law. This bill would impose U.S. visa bans on and freeze bank assets of publicly named Russian officials, including Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov, who are implicated in abusing human rights and religious freedom. The U.S. government should also implement the Smith amendment, which would bar assistance to Russia's government because of its treatment of nonviolent religious minority groups, and urge Russia to reform its extremism law so it ceases to apply to peaceful groups and individuals.

Before Russia enters the World Trade Organization, the United States needs to impress upon the Kremlin — and the world — that human rights and religious freedom matter.

Katrina Lantos Swett chairs the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. Robert George is a commissioner on the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. 

To interview a USCIRF Commissioner, please contact Samantha Schnitzer at [email protected] This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or (202) 786-0613. 

July 30, 2012| by USCIRF

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Today, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom welcomed the State Department's issuance of its 2011 International Religious Freedom Report.

"As always, the State Department does a commendable job of cataloguing the wide-ranging manifestations of religious freedom abuses around the world,” said USCIRF Chair Katrina Lantos Swett. "The next step, and real challenge, is convincing policymakers that prioritizing religious freedom through our bilateral and multilateral relationships is both a moral imperative and serves our national interests. The other challenge is convincing foreign governments to make needed improvements. USCIRF looks forward to working with the State Department in this effort to serve our common goal of promoting and protecting freedom of religion and belief globally.”

USCIRF particularly commends the State Department's Office of International Religious Freedom and Ambassador at Large for International Religious Freedom Suzan Johnson Cook for their efforts in spearheading the compilation of this comprehensive annual report.

The International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 (IRFA) requires the State Department to undertake an annual review of every country to "determine whether the government of that country has engaged in or tolerated particularly severe violations of religious freedom.” Any country meeting that threshold is to be designated a "country of particular concern,” or CPC, and the U.S. government is required to take action to encourage improvements in each CPC country. IRFA provides a range of possibilities for such action, from bilateral agreements to sanctions.

USCIRF urges the State Department to promptly designate CPCs and to follow up those designations with vigorous U.S. diplomatic activity to seek improvements with respect to this fundamental human right. While IRFA does not set a specific deadline for CPC designations, the law indicates that these designations should take place soon after the issuance of the State Department's annual report since the decisions are to be based on that review.

USCIRF is an independent, bipartisan U.S. federal government commission. USCIRF Commissioners are appointed by the President and the leadership of both political parties in the Senate and the House of Representatives. USCIRF's principal responsibilities are to review the facts and circumstances of violations of religious freedom internationally and to make policy recommendations to the President, Secretary of State and Congress.

To interview a USCIRF Commissioner, please contact Samantha Schnitzer at [email protected] or (202) 786-0613.