An arm of the US government named 15 nations as the “worst violators of religious freedom”.
The Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF), an independent advisory body created by the International Religious Freedom Act to monitor religious freedom abuses internationally, released its 2013 report, which idenitifes “governments that are the most egregious violators.”
The 15 countries are Burma, China, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Uzbekistan, Egypt, Iraq, Nigeria, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Vietnam, all of which severely restrict independent religious activity and harass individuals and groups for religious activity or beliefs. These nations are classified as Tier 1 “countries of particular concern” (CPCs) in the report.
Despite its recent opening and political reforms, change in Burma have “yet to significantly improve the situation for freedom of religion and belief.” The report states that most violations occurred against minority Christian and Muslim adherents. China’s government is also cited for its ongoing severe abuses against its citizens’ freedom of thought.
The report said that Egypt’s transitional and elected governments have made progress toward religious freedom, it further highlighted the attacks that Coptic Christians have sustained in the period after the Arab Spring that brought down the Mubarak regime. “In many cases, the government failed or was slow to protect religious minorities from violence.”
The former Soviet states of Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan were included for pursuing state control over religion, targeting Muslims and minorities alike. Iraq was cited for, among other things, tolerating “violent religiously motivated attacks” and Iran for “prolonged detention, torture, and executions based primarily or entirely on the religion of the accused.”
Saudi Arabia continues to suppress religious practices outside of the officially-sanctioned Wahhabi interpretation of Islam, interferes with the faith of guest workers and prosecutes individuals for “apostasy, blasphemy and sorcery”, according to the report. Pakistan has a strict blasphemy law and failure to prosecute acts of religious violence, the report said.
The situation in Sudan has deteriorated since South Sudan gained its independence. Criminalization of apostasy, the imposition of the government’s strict interpretation of Shari’ah on both Muslims and non-Muslims and attacks against Christians, were cited in the report for the decline.
The report also identified Nigeria for continuing religious violence between Muslims and Christians compounded by the government’s toleration of the sectarian attacks. North Korea’s totalitarian regime was also included for its ongoing harassment and torture of citizens based on religious beliefs.
A second tier includes Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Cuba, India, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Laos and Russia, where abuses of religious freedom are tolerated by the government and meet the threshold for CPC designation by the US Department of State, but don’t meet all of the standards for “systemic, ongoing, egregious” measurements.
Other countries regions being monitored included Bahrain, Bangladesh, Belarus, Ethiopia, Turkey, Venezuela and Western Europe.
A Christian man who was demoted after making posts opposing gay marriage on Facebook won in an employment case against his employers today. Adrian Smith, an employee of Manchester’s Trafford Housing Trust, lost his managerial position and received a 40 per cent pay cut after receiving a written warning from his employer reprimanding him for making a post saying that allowing same-sex weddings in churches were “an equality too far”. The court ruled that the demotion was a breach of contract, as Smith’s posts were made on a private page and outside of working hours. A legal technicality limited Smith’s damages to £100.
An 11-year-old girl with Down’s Syndrome was last week arrested in Pakistan, after an angry mob demanded that the girl be punished for allegedly desecrating the Qur’an — the Islamic holy book. The young girl is a resident of a Christian neighbourhood on the outskirts of Islamabad, from where over 600 citizens have now fled after calls for her arrest were accompanied by threats to burn Christian homes in the area. This isn’t the first blasphemy case we’ve seen come out of Pakistan — earlier this year, charges were brought against Facebook for hosting “blasphemous content”. In September 2011, a young Christian school girl was expelled for misspelling a word on an exam question tied to a poem revering the Prophet Muhammad.
Religious sensitivities have mostly been responsible for silence from Pakistani politicians on the controversial laws — slammed internationally for their usage against religious minorities in the country. Politicians speaking out against the laws have faced hardship, and even in some cases — death. In January this year, governor of the state of Punjab Salman Taseer was slain after criticising the law, and Minorities Minister Shahbaz Bhatti was murdered last year after speaking out against the country’s blasphemy laws, under which 1,000 cases have been lodged against individuals for allegedly desecrating the Qur’an since 1998.
Of course, Pakistan is not alone in upholding vague blasphemy laws that make it easy to clamp down on free speech in the name of protecting religion. Here are some ridiculous blasphemy cases from around the world this year.
RUSSIA — PUSSY RIOT
Three members of feminist punk group Pussy Riot were this month sentenced to two years in prison after being charged with “hooliganism motivated by religious hatred” for a 40-second performance staged in Moscow’s Christ the Saviour Church. Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, Maria Alekhina and Ekaterina Samutsevic were arrested in March for their “punk prayer” — which invoked the Virgin Mary to cast out Russian President Vladimir Putin. The case has garnered international outrage, as local activists believe that the charges brought against the women are actually politically motivated.
TUNISIA — PERSEPOLIS
In post-revolution Tunisia, the General Director of a TV station that aired a film depicting God as an old bearded man, was prosecuted and fined for “violating sacred values”. Nabil Karoui’s station, Nessma TV, aired the animated film Persepolis, based on Iranian artist Marjane Satrapi’s graphic novel by the same name.
And concerns about freedom of expression in Tunisia only seem to grow, as its ruling Islamist party moved to outlaw blasphemy in a bill filed on 1 August. If passed, “cursing, insulting, mocking, undermining, and desecrating” religious symbols from the three Abrahamic faiths (Islam, Judaism, and Christianity) could lead to two years in jail, as well as a hefty fine of 2000 TND (£794). While the ruling Ennadha Party claims to want to protect free speech, blasphemy is treated differently — in the name of protecting an “Arab Muslim identity”.
INDIA — SANAL EDAMARUKU
Indian skeptic Sanal Edamaruku, has built a career out of challenging religious superstitions and mystics. Edamaruku now faces blasphemy charges for “deliberately hurting religious feelings” after pointing out that the “miracle” of “holy water” dripping from a crucifix in a Mumbai-based Catholic church was actually the result of a leaky pipe rather than divine intervention. He potentially faces jail time, and is currently remaining outside of the country in order to avoid arrest.
EGYPT — NAGUIB SAWIRIS & ADEL IMAM
Earlier this year, beloved Egyptian comic Adel Imam was sentenced to three months in jail for “insulting Islam” in films he made in the early 1990s. A Cairo court eventually dropped the charges, which were brought against the comic by Islamist lawyer Asran Mansour, for allegedly ridiculing political and religious figures. Also this year, Islamists accused Coptic businessman Naguib Sawiris of “blasphemy and insulting Islam” after he posted a picture of a veiled Minnie and bearded Mickey Mouse on the social networking site Twitter. The charges were eventually dismissed. Both of these case sparked outrage and fears that a clampdown on free expression in the country might take place, as the newly elected President Mohamed Morsi is a member of the Muslim Brotherhood.
POLAND — POP STAR DODA Well-known Polish pop star Doda was fined at the start of the year for comments she made in a 2009 interview, where she said that she had difficulty believing in the Bible, as it “was written by someone drunk on wine and smoking some herbs”. Doda, who launched her career with a solo album entitled Diamond Bitch, was fined 5,000 zlotys by Polish authorities for her comments — deemed to be offensive in the deeply Roman Catholic country.
Sara Yasin is an Editorial Assistant at Index on Censorship. She tweets from @missyasin
Egyptian author Youssef Ziedan faces a five-year jail term after being accused of insulting Christianity in his prize-winning novel Azazeel (Beelzebub). Set in 5th-century Egypt, Alexandria and northern Syria, Ziedan’s novel tells the story of an Egyptian monk who witnesses debates over doctrine between early Christians. The book was an Egyptian bestseller and last year won the International Prize for Arabic Fiction but the Coptic church had denounced it as offensive for its violent portrait of Coptic church father St Cyril. Now, a group of Egyptian and foreign Copts are using an Egyptian law — which prohibits insults against Islam, Christianity and Judaism — to prosecute Ziedan. In the past, the author has described his novel as “not against Christianity but against violence, especially violence in the name of the sacred”.
A devout Christian couple have been cleared of insulting a Muslim guest at their hotel because of her faith and asking her if she was a terrorist when she wore the hijab. Benjamin and Sharon Vogelenzang denied using threatening, abusive or insulting words which were religiously aggravated. District judge Richard Clancy dismissed the case against them at Liverpool magistrates’ court. He said that the evidence against the couple was inconsistent. Read more here
The Pope has condemned a Scottish art exhibition which invites visitors to deface a copy of the Bible as “disgusting”. The exhibit at the Gallery of Modern Art in Glasgow was intended for the LGBT community who felt left out of religion to “write their way back in” to the holy book. A Vatican spokesperson said the project was “disgusting and offensive,” adding “they would not think of doing it to the Koran.” The Bible will remain on display in a glass case and the public will now have to write comments in another book alongside. Read more here
In Texas a panel of experts appointed to revise the state’s history curriculum is recommending changing the history of the United States, as taught at school, to emphasise the role played by God and Christianity in its founding. The board of education will also hear recommendations from social science teachers and has the final say. Read more here
