The U.S. State Department has released the 2011 report on international religious freedom. While significant areas of concern are present, there are also some signs of hope. The website with the report is quite helpful and easy to navigate. Visit: http://www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/irf/religiousfreedom/index.htm
Category: Article18
RLTV’s first weekly blog specifically dedicated to religious liberty issues in other countries around the world. Each week, we will be focusing on a different nation, and the struggles facing its different religious communities.
Article18: Afghanistan — The Land that Freedom Forgot; A Profile on Religious Persecution in One of the World’s Most Depressing Nations (Liberty Magazine)
The following excerpt is from an article written by RLTV associate editor and Article18 creator Martin Surridge that appeared in the November/December 2011 issue of Liberty Magazine. EXCERPT: The sound and smell of motorcycles roaring down a street in Kandahar must have overwhelmed 16-year-old Atifa in the moments before the attack. Before she really knew…
Article18: Germany — Pope Benedict XVI Addresses Legislators; Chancellor Merkel Calls for Global Religious Tolerance
By Martin Surridge – Like many of the other countries profiled in this blog, Germany has had a problematic, yet fundamentally important religious history. Home to both the Holocaust and the Protestant Reformation, Germany provided Europe with the impetus to take giant strides forward in the name of religious freedom, but also inflicted terrible losses…
Article18: Poland — Citizens March in Bialystok to Protest Antisemitism; Death Metal Singer Not-Guilty After Trashing Bible on Stage
By Martin Surridge – For much of the twentieth century, Poland served as a sort of punching bag for many of Europe’s strongest armies. Half a million Polish soldiers died in the First World War, the country was brutalized by the Nazis in the Second World War, and for the last half of the century, Poland was repressed by Soviet-inspired…
Article18: Kosovo — Muslim Headscarf Ban Upheld for Schools, Christians Required to be Buried in Islamic Graveyards
By Martin Surridge – Only a few years ago, the country of Kosovo, in Southern Europe, didn’t even exist. Like South Sudan in recent weeks, Kosovo became independent after the war-torn region declared independence because of a strong separatist movement that sought to break away from Serbia. While the country may be small, one of…
Article18: Pakistan — Christian Flood Victims in Punjab Face Land Discrimination in Disaster Aftermath
By Martin Surridge – The bad news that comes out of Islamabad typically features either nuclear proliferation, harboring of terrorists, a military coup, or tension with India. Sadly for many of the citizens living within its borders, Pakistan is also one of the world’s most egregious violators of religious liberty. This is Article18-RLTV’s weekly blog…
Article18: Norway — Personal Reflections on the Origin of a Tragedy
The fact of the matter is that the demon of terrorism is one that will practice whatever religion it must to satisfy its craving for violence. Terrorism knows no religion that it can’t corrupt. Violence can find a home in any religion, any belief system, be it Muslim, Christian, or Sikh and it is not partial to any one in particular, despite the ramblings in the media.
Article18: Uzbekistan — Recent Incidents of Violence Against Christians Alarm Religious Minorities
By Martin Surridge – The former Soviet republic of Uzbekistan occupies a precarious and oft-forgotten spot in Central Asia. Unlike other egregious religious liberty offenders such as Saudi Arabia, China, and North Korea, Uzbekistan is discussed little in the United States and is not well-known for any one thing. Unfortunately, it is often lumped in…
Article18: Cuba — Three Protestant Pastors Interrogated; Roman Catholic Church in Havana Helps Free 126 Prisoners of Conscience
Like the classic American cars that drive up and down Havana’s hot streets, communist Cuba is a country from another era–Cold War isolationism, a American trade embargo that began fifty years ago, and a pair of aging dictator-brothers who have ruled the nation and restricted its freedom for decades. But while Cuba may be living in the past in many respects, its religious freedoms are a curious blend of old-fashioned totalitarian crackdown and modern globalist acquiescence.
Article18: Saudi Arabia — Prominent Saudi Cleric Hopes Women Who Violate Driving Ban Incur Wrath of God and Die
By Martin Surridge – Of the dozen or so countries that Article18 has profiled so far, Saudi Arabia might be the most repressive when it comes to religious freedoms. The famously oil-rich Middle Eastern nation is one of the world’s few remaining absolute monarchies, and the west consistently turns a blind eye towards its human…