|
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
CONTACT: Nadine Hoffman
Subcommittee on Africa, Global Human Rights, and International Operations Accepts LCHR Testimony
at Hearing on 2006 International Religious Freedom Report
Washington, D.C. – Leadership Council for Human Rights President Kathryn Cameron Porter submitted testimony to Subcommittee Chairman Chris Smith today at a hearing on the 2006 International Religious Freedom Report. The testimony, included below, examines religious freedom issues in Egypt and Vietnam, two of LCHR’s countries of focus.
At the hearing, Rep. Smith expressed “deep reservations” about the State Department’s recent decision to remove Vietnam’s designation as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC). He said he found it difficult to believe that enough progress had been made in the last year to warrant the removal, and urged the Office of International Religious Freedom (IRF) to continue to push for progress, and to link trade to human rights concerns. Rep. Smith also urged the IRF Office to inform U.S. policy in the Middle East, fostering greater understanding of religion’s role in the region. All Foreign Service officers should be trained to treat religious freedom as a top U.S. policy priority, he added. In countries where governments have shown little respect for religious freedom, like China, Rep. Smith said the time had come for the “penalty phase” as laid out in the International Religious Freedom Act (IRFA).
Although Egypt’s restrictions on religious freedom remain a grave concern to LCHR, no one who spoke at the hearing raised the issue.
Stephen Liston, Director of the IRF Office, spoke about the Countries of Particular Concern, focusing specifically on the decision to remove Vietnam’s designation as a CPC. Liston pointed to new laws regarding church registration, training of clergy, and training of local officials on how to implement legislation protecting religious freedom as reasons for the decision. He added that “a great deal of work” remains to be done on religious freedom in Vietnam. In response to Rep. Smith’s comments that new laws may actually be used to restrict religious freedom in Vietnam and that forced renunciations continue, Liston said, “Not designating Vietnam this year hasn’t changed our commitment to addressing major problems,” and the government of Vietnam also recognizes this continued commitment.
Felice Gaer, Chair of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, echoed Rep. Smith’s sentiments of disappointment on the removal of Vietnam’s CPC designation. “Severe problems remain,” Gaer said. “The devil is in the details” of how laws designed to protect religious freedom are implemented. A continued CPC designation “would have continued to provide incentives” for Vietnam to improve its human rights record, Gaer said. The U.S. must “go further than speaking truth to power” and use the “revolutionary menu of options” contained in IRFA, she added.
Dr. Thomas Farr, the former director of the IRF Office, said that IFRA’s passage in 1998 - which allowed for economic sanctions to be imposed on CPCs - has contributed to greater religious tolerance worldwide. Dr. Farr lauded IRFA as “a dynamic piece of legislation,” but stressed that its implementation “has been far too narrow.” Dr. Farr was critical of Western leaders for a failure to appropriately recognize the influence that religion often has on policy internationally and to more fully integrate the issue – so often sidelined as a “private matter” unfit for policy inclusion - into diplomatic efforts.
Nina Shea, director of the Center for Religious Freedom at Freedom House, drew attention to the continuing persecution of religious minorities in Iraq and equated their suffering to that of Jews in the former Soviet Union. Minority villages and businesses have been attacked, Christian children have been kidnapped and crucified, and non-Muslim women who fail to adhere to strict Muslim dress codes have been slain. Still, the plight of Iraqi minorities – who have sought asylum inside and outside of their country in large numbers – has been largely neglected in economic relief and reconstruction interventions.
Pastor Bui Thien Hue of the Hoa Hao Buddhist Church recounted the suffering that he endured at the hands of the brutal Vietnamese regime. In 2001, Pastor Hue was sentenced to several months of house arrest for his religious activities and advocacy. He managed to escape to Cambodia and obtain UNHCR refugee status, but was apprehended by Cambodian authorities shortly thereafter, repatriated and imprisoned. In 2005, Pastor Hue was again detained after he delivered testimony at a U.S. Congressional hearing.
To read the full text of Kathryn Cameron Porter's testimony, please click here for HTML format and here for PDF format. |
