FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 13, 2006

Contact:
Angela Stephens, Assistant Communications Director,
(202) 523-3240, ext. 14

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) will hold a public, on-the-record forum on Tuesday, October 17 on "The Bangladesh Elections: Promoting Democracy and Protecting Rights in a Muslim-majority Country." The forum is scheduled for 3-5 p.m. in the Gold Room (Room 2168) in the Rayburn House Office Building. The forum will coincide with the release of the Commission's latest publication Policy Focus on Bangladesh, which includes recommendations for U.S. policy to advance respect for human rights in the world's third largest Muslim-majority country.

Featured speakers will include Ambassador (retired) A. Tariq Karim, former Ambassador of Bangladesh to the United States and currently a Harrison Fellow in the Department of Government and Politics at the University of Maryland, Mr. Selig S. Harrison, director of the Asia Program at the Center for International Policy and a senior scholar at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Ms. Cynthia R. Bunton, regional program director for Asia at the International Republican Institute, and Mr. Patrick Merloe, senior associate at the National Democratic Institute.

USCIRF Chair Felice D. Gaer, Vice Chair Michael Cromartieand Commissioner Preeta D. Bansal, all of whom took part in a Commission delegation to Bangladesh in February-March of this year, will participate in the forum.

Based on the delegation's discussions in Dhaka, the Commission is concerned that Bangladesh's upcoming national elections could be the occasion for a repeat of the anti-minority violence that marred the October 2001 elections, for the further advance of Islamic extremism in the country, and for the erosion for all Bangladeshis of legal protections of freedom of religion or belief and other universal human rights. The forum will discuss these concerns, the role of the United States in promoting democracy and respect for human rights in Bangladesh, and possible implications for U.S. policy elsewhere in the Muslim world. On October 28, a non-party Caretaker Government is scheduled to be installed in Bangladesh to administer the country during the three-month period preceding the national elections in January 2007.

WHAT: USCIRF Forum "The Bangladesh Elections: Promoting Democracy and Protecting Rights in a Muslim-majority Country"

WHEN: 3-5 p.m., Tuesday, October 17, 2006

WHERE: Gold Room (Room 2168), Rayburn House Office Building, located southwest of the Capitol on a block bounded by Independence Avenue, South Capitol Street, C Street, SW, and First Street SW.

RSVP: Angela Stephens, [email protected], (202) 523-3240, x114

Please note: Signs and placards are prohibited at the forum.

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
October 10, 2006

Contact:
Angela Stephens, Assistant Communications Director,
(202) 523-3240, ext. 14

WASHINGTON-U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) Chair Felice D. Gaer will deliver the U.S. delegation's intervention on violations of freedom of religion or belief to the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe's (OSCE) Human Dimension Implementation Meeting on October 10. Ms. Gaer has been appointed an official member of the U.S. delegation to the meeting.

Ms. Gaer is also Director of the Jacob Blaustein Institute for the Advancement of Human Rights of the American Jewish Committee. She has been a member of USCIRF since 2001, and previously served as Chair (2002-2003) and Vice Chair (2003-2006).

The conference, which will take place Oct. 2-13, will host around 1,000 participants, including representatives from more than 300 nongovernmental organizations.

The conference will review progress made by the OSCE's 56 participating states in implementing their many human rights commitments and devote one of three special days to the promotion of tolerance, non-discrimination, and mutual respect and understanding. In 2004, the OSCE chair appointed personal representatives on anti-Semitism, on discrimination against Muslims, and on Christianophobia, racism and xenophobia. The Commission advocated the creation of these posts.

Among the other human rights challenges in the OSCE region-which includes Europe, Canada, the United States and Eurasia-are harassment of human rights defenders, limitations on the rule of law, election fraud, and other issues such as torture and cruel treatment, and trafficking in persons.

In the OSCE region, USCIRF has expressed strong and continued concern regarding particularly severe violations of freedom of religion in Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, recommending that the U.S. government designate each of them as a "country of particular concern" (CPC) under the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998. The Commission has also placed Belarus on its Watch List of countries where religious freedom merits ongoing scrutiny. In June, the Commission traveled to Russia to examine conditions in that country, including the upsurge of violent attacks widely attributed to racism and xenophobia. It will issue a report on its findings in the coming month. USCIRF's assessments of religious freedom conditions in these countries are available in its 2006 annual report.

USCIRF, a bipartisan, independent federal body, has been an active participant in previous HDim meetings as well as OSCE conferences, including as members of the U.S. delegation to the OSCE Conference on Anti-Semitism and on Other Forms of Intolerance held in June 2005 in Cordoba, Spain.

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
October 4, 2006

Contact:
Angela Stephens, Assistant Communications Director,
(202) 523-3240, ext. 14

Please join us for a briefing by Ibrahim al-Mugaiteeb, president of Human Rights First Society, the only independent group in Saudi Arabia that monitors human rights. Mr. al-Mugaiteeb will speak about the current situation of human rights in Saudi Arabia and comment on whether or not the Saudi government is committed to genuine political reforms.

The most recent 2006 State Department Country Report on Human Rights Practices concludes that the Saudi government's human rights record "remained poor overall with continuing serious problems." The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom also finds that the Saudi government continues to engage in systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of the right to freedom of religion or belief.

Ibrahim al-Mugaiteeb is a leading human rights activist and the president and founder of Human Rights First Society in Saudi Arabia. Despite repeated attempts to gain official recognition, the Saudi government has never granted a license permitting his organization to function. Mr. al-Mugaiteeb operates in the Kingdom at his own risk. He was involved in the high profile case of three Saudi reformers who were imprisoned March 2004 and eventually pardoned by King Abdullah in August 2005 after much international media attention and advocacy. In the past, Mr. al-Mugaiteeb has faced travel bans by the Saudi government and served 13 months in prison in the 1990s for political activism. Mr. al-Mugaiteeb was trained as a journalist and has worked for Reuters and other news agencies in Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

** Seating is limited, so please RSVP by calling Dwight Bashir at(202) 523-3240, ext. 22or by email at  [email protected] **

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.