Religious Freedom Panel: Terror, Violence Spreading Worldwide
(WNS)–The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) urged the Obama administration to increase public pressure on foreign governments “perpetrating or tolerating” severe persecution of religious minorities around the world. “Humanitarian crises fueled by waves of terror, intimidation, and violence have engulfed an alarming number of countries in the year since the release of [USCIRF’s] prior annual report last May,” the report says. “The horrors of the past year speak volumes about how and why religious freedom and the protection of the rights of vulnerable religious communities matter.” The report, which spans January 2014 to January 2015, is USCIRF’s 16th since Congress created the commission in 1998 to provide independent recommendations to the president, secretary of state, and Congress. True to form, USCIRF called on the State Department to dramatically increase its list of “countries of particular concern,” or CPCs, from the current nine to 17.
