New US report alleges religious freedom violations in China, Iran, India

The State Department’s newest survey of religious freedom world wide displays that prerequisites in one of the maximum oppressive countries world wide are rising much more dire in addition to new, troubling tendencies, Secretary of State Antony Blinken mentioned on Monday.

“Governments in many parts of the world continue to target religious minorities using a host of methods, including torture, beatings, unlawful surveillance, and so-called re-education camps,” he mentioned.

Blinken underscored abuses towards the predominately Muslim Uyghur minority crew in the Xinjiang province of China, a rustic one senior State Department respectable described as “one of the worst abusers of human rights and religious freedom in the world.”

The U.S. has up to now decided that Beijing’s remedy of the Uyghurs quantities to genocide and crimes towards humanity, and the report, which covers the 12 months 2022, mentioned that persecution has persisted frequently.

Although knowledge is restricted, the survey additionally famous that the Chinese Communist Party has considerably and widely cracked down on religious freedom over the process the 12 months, and that the selection of other people imprisoned for his or her non secular ideals was once estimated to vary between the low 1000’s to most likely over 10,000.

Chinese govt officers have denied all allegations of human rights abuses and tried to justify movements towards Uyghurs as counterterrorism measures.

Blinken additionally addresses Iran’s Islamic theocracy, which imposes draconian restrictions on its inhabitants and brutal punishments for offenses, in addition to the continuing wave of demonstrations impressed via the demise of a young person closing September.

“People across Iran, led by young women, continue peaceful protests demanding their human rights, including freedom of religion, galvanized by the killing of Mahsa Amini, who was arrested by the so-called morality police because her hijab did not fully cover her hair,” he mentioned.

The report emphasizes that the motion has include steep prices. Referencing statistics from human rights teams running in Iran, it says that in the months of 2022 after Amini’s demise, govt safety forces killed 512 protestors, adding 69 kids, arrested 19,204 people and achieved no less than one individual related to the demonstrations at the fee of “enmity against God.”

The survey, which is needed via legislation to be compiled and submitted to Congress every year, additionally expressed various issues about prerequisites in India—a rustic now not these days designated via the State Department as a “Country of Particular Concern” for serious violations of religious freedom. Among the problems indexed are prison prohibitions towards conversions in more than one states, accusations of systemic discrimination towards Muslims, and assaults on religious minorities–including “cow vigilantism” towards non-Hindus in line with allegations of cow slaughter or business in red meat.

“We’re continuing to encourage the government to condemn violence and hold accountable and protect all groups who engage in rhetoric that’s dehumanizing towards religious minorities and all groups who engage in violence against religious communities and other communities in India,” a senior State Department respectable suggested journalists.

Additionally, the report defined popular violations towards religious freedom perpetrated via Moscow, each in Russia and in occupied spaces of Ukraine.

“Authorities continued to investigate, detain, imprison, torture, physically abuse persons, and seize their property because of their religious belief or affiliation or membership in groups designated “extremist,” “terrorist,” or “unwanted,” including Jehovah’s Witnesses, the Mejlis of the Crimean Tatars, Hizb ut-Tahrir, Tablighi Jamaat, followers of Turkish Muslim theologian Said Nursi, the Church of Scientology, Falun Gong, and multiple evangelical Protestant groups,” the report says, including that people had been reportedly subjected to lengthy phrases in hard work camps, torture, house searches, and different mistreatment.

The report additionally mentioned that even participants of the Russian Orthodox Church weren’t utterly secure, noting some had been “fined or banned from continuing in their religious duties” after criticizing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

In Crimea and different spaces of Ukraine beneath Russian rule, the report mentioned there was once plentiful proof that government “have committed widespread, ongoing, and egregious violations of the right to freedom of religion and conscience as well as physical and psychological abuse of

But Blinken also said across the globe, the report captured examples of progress, citing Belgium formally recognizing its Buddhist minority, lawmakers in Brazil codifying religious freedom guarantees for Afro-Brazilian indigenous communities, and various countries launching offices to combat islamophobia and antisemitism.

“More widely, civil society and different involved governments world wide have effectively secured the discharge of many that had been detained, even in jail for exercising their freedom of faith or trust,” he mentioned.