U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE

WASHINGTON : 

For sale by the Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office

Internet: bookstore.gpo.gov Phone: toll free (866) 512–1800; DC area (202) 512–1800

Fax: (202) 512–2104 Mail: Stop IDCC, Washington, DC 20402–0001

66–782PDF 2011

PRIORITIZING INTERNATIONAL RELIGIOUS

FREEDOM IN U.S. FOREIGN POLICY

HEARING

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH, 

AND HUMAN RIGHTS

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

JUNE 3, 2011

Serial No. 112–64

Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/

(II)

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS 

ILEANA ROS-LEHTINEN, Florida, Chairman 

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey 

DAN BURTON, Indiana 

ELTON GALLEGLY, California 

DANA ROHRABACHER, California 

DONALD A. MANZULLO, Illinois 

EDWARD R. ROYCE, California 

STEVE CHABOT, Ohio 

RON PAUL, Texas 

MIKE PENCE, Indiana 

JOE WILSON, South Carolina 

CONNIE MACK, Florida 

JEFF FORTENBERRY, Nebraska 

MICHAEL T. MCCAUL, Texas 

TED POE, Texas 

GUS M. BILIRAKIS, Florida 

JEAN SCHMIDT, Ohio 

BILL JOHNSON, Ohio 

DAVID RIVERA, Florida 

MIKE KELLY, Pennsylvania 

TIM GRIFFIN, Arkansas 

TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania 

JEFF DUNCAN, South Carolina 

ANN MARIE BUERKLE, New York 

RENEE ELLMERS, North Carolina 

VACANT 

HOWARD L. BERMAN, California 

GARY L. ACKERMAN, New York 

ENI F.H. FALEOMAVAEGA, American 

Samoa 

DONALD M. PAYNE, New Jersey 

BRAD SHERMAN, California 

ELIOT L. ENGEL, New York 

GREGORY W. MEEKS, New York 

RUSS CARNAHAN, Missouri 

ALBIO SIRES, New Jersey 

GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia 

THEODORE E. DEUTCH, Florida 

DENNIS CARDOZA, California 

BEN CHANDLER, Kentucky 

BRIAN HIGGINS, New York 

ALLYSON SCHWARTZ, Pennsylvania 

CHRISTOPHER S. MURPHY, Connecticut 

FREDERICA WILSON, Florida 

KAREN BASS, California 

WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts 

DAVID CICILLINE, Rhode Island 

YLEEM D.S. POBLETE, Staff Director 

RICHARD J. KESSLER, Democratic Staff Director 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH, AND HUMAN RIGHTS

CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey, Chairman 

JEFF FORTENBERRY, Nebraska 

TIM GRIFFIN, Arkansas 

TOM MARINO, Pennsylvania 

ANN MARIE BUERKLE, New York 

DONALD M. PAYNE, New Jersey 

KAREN BASS, California 

RUSS CARNAHAN, Missouri 

(III)

C O N T E N T S 

Page

WITNESSES 

Mr. Leonard Leo, chairman, U.S. Commission on International Religious 

Freedom ................................................................................................................ 7

Mr. Thomas Farr, director, Religious Freedom Project, Berkley Center for 

Religion, Peace, and World Affairs, Georgetown University ............................ 41

Mr. Joseph Grieboski, founder and chairman of the board, Institute on Religion and Public Policy .......................................................................................... 50

Mr. Brian Grim, senior researcher and director of Cross-National Data, 

Forum on Religion & Public Life, Pew Research Center .................................. 64

LETTERS, STATEMENTS, ETC., SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING 

Mr. Leonard Leo: Prepared statement ................................................................... 9

The Honorable Frank R. Wolf, a Representative in Congress from the Commonwealth of Virginia: Prepared statement ...................................................... 36

Mr. Thomas Farr: Prepared statement .................................................................. 44

Mr. Joseph Grieboski: Prepared statement ........................................................... 53

Mr. Brian Grim: Prepared statement .................................................................... 67

APPENDIX 

Hearing notice .......................................................................................................... 86

Hearing minutes ...................................................................................................... 87

The Honorable Howard L. Berman, a Representative in Congress from the 

State of California: Prepared statement ............................................................ 88

The Honorable Christopher H. Smith: Letter in support of H.R. 1856 ............... 89

Written responses from Mr. Leonard Leo to questions submitted for the 

record by the Honorable Russ Carnahan, a Representative in Congress 

from the State of Missouri ................................................................................... 92

Written responses from Mr. Brian Grim to questions submitted for the record 

by the Honorable Russ Carnahan ....................................................................... 94

(1)

PRIORITIZING INTERNATIONAL RELIGIOUS 

FREEDOM IN U.S. FOREIGN POLICY 

FRIDAY, JUNE 3, 2011

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON AFRICA, GLOBAL HEALTH, AND HUMAN RIGHTS

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS, Washington, DC. 

The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 9:30 a.m., in room 

334 Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Christopher H. Smith 

(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. 

Mr. SMITH. The subcommittee will come to order. 

And I want to welcome our distinguished witnesses and our 

guests to this morning’s hearing. 

The subcommittee will be examining the role of international religious freedom in the U.S. foreign policy, particularly in light of 

the International Religious Freedom Act and the amendments 

being proposed to that act, H.R. 1856, the International Religious 

Freedom Act Amendments of 2011. 

I had the privilege of chairing the committee hearings in the 

1990s that prepared the passage of the 1998 International Religious Freedom Act. The act provided our administration with the 

tools necessary to make international religious freedom an integral 

component of the highest priority in U.S. foreign policy. Contrary 

to assertions that singling out religious freedom would somehow 

make it seem more important or separated from other fundamental 

human rights—and I would note parenthetically, the Clinton administration asserted that its strong opposition to the act at the 

time was based on its belief that the act would result in a ‘‘hierarchy of human rights.’’ I remember Assistant Secretary of State 

for Democracy, Human Rights and Labor John Shattuck appearing 

at our hearings saying that it would establish a hierarchy of 

human rights, to which I responded repeatedly and to all those who 

made that argument, when we fought to ensure that Soviet Jewry 

and Soviet Jews immigrated, the Jackson-Vanik Amendment was 

value-added. It was not in lieu of any other legislation. And in like 

manner the effort to combat apartheid. And I was one of those on 

the Foreign Affairs Committee who supported vigorous sanctions to 

combat apartheid against that infamous, racist regime in South Africa. That too was in addition to not in lieu of any other rights policy. 

So those of us who championed the bill argued that it was necessary to ensure that religious freedom was given its rightful place. 

It had been largely displaced in successive administrations and it 

2

was time to make religious freedom a core component of U.S. foreign policy. 

Unfortunately, the urgent call within IRFA to vigorously monitor 

and defend religious freedom as part of U.S. foreign policy has not 

been fully heeded. Religious freedom is threatened around the 

world, and the situation is getting demonstrably worse. Two years 

ago, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom recommended that eight countries be designated as Countries of Particular Concern, or CPC status. In the 2011 USCIRF annual report 

released in April said that we are looking at 14 countries: Burma, 

the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea or North Korea, Egypt, 

Eritrea, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, Pakistan, the People’s Republic of 

China, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Vietnam. 

The basic human rights of hundreds of millions of people are 

being violated each and every day. Their own governments are either direct perpetrators of religious freedom violations or fail to 

prosecute violations by other citizens, creating a climate of impunity. 

Dr. Brian Grim, one of our witnesses this morning, has done significant research in this area. In a study he conducted in 2009, he 

found that nearly 70 percent of the world’s 6.8 billion people live 

in countries with high or very high restrictions on religion. His 

study specifically cited Iran, Pakistan, China and Egypt as among 

the most repressive of religious expression. This is significant, not 

only because it highlights the number of people denied the most 

fundamental of human rights, but also because religious freedom 

is comprised of a ‘‘bundle of rights.’’ Religious freedom implies freedom of conscience, freedom of speech, freedom of association and 

assembly, and even freedom of the press. Absent freedom of religion, all these other rights are in jeopardy. 

In fact, Dr. Grim’s research shows that countries that respect 

these rights reap a host of socio-economic benefits, including better 

education, better health care, greater equity of pay between men 

and women, and higher GDP, and these benefits arguably lead to 

greater social stability. On the other hand, countries without respect for religious freedom do worse on these socio-economic indicators, have greater societal tension, and are more prone to instability. The importance of promoting all components of religious 

freedom, therefore, cannot be overstated. Not only is it a moral imperative, but religious freedom keeps extremism and tyranny at 

bay. 

For these reasons, U.S. leadership on religious freedom is desperately needed in many countries around the world, together with 

a more vigorous, robust utilization of the means provided in the 

IRF Act for promoting religious freedom and human rights. For example, the administration urgently needs to reassess its list of 

Countries of Particular Concern, particularly Egypt. As a result of 

severe and systematic religious freedom abuses against religious 

minorities, particularly Coptic Christians before and after the removal of President Mubarak, USCIRF is now recommending that 

Egypt be designated as a Country of Particular Concern. 

The Obama administration has yet to make any CPC designations since coming to office. I strongly encourage the administration 

3

to review carefully the recommendations made by the Commission, 

call out those countries that are engaging in ‘‘particularly severe 

violations of religious freedom,’’ to quote from the act and apply 

meaningful sanctions as authorized under the International Religious Freedom Act. 

The CPC designation is just one of many mechanisms in IRFA 

that need to be pulled out of the closet and reinvigorated. We will 

also look at how to strengthen the State Department’s IRF office, 

the Commission, the engagement of our diplomatic corps, and the 

IRF Act itself. 

I would just add—and I just would ask a member of my staff, 

if you could just hold up a couple of posters—it seems to me that 

when the administration does finally get around to designating 

CPC—and again I listed the countries that we believe, or I believe, 

should be added, they should look at what has happened in Vietnam—Vietnam has deteriorated so quickly after the Bilateral 

Trade Agreement, after the situation of ascension into the World 

Trade Organization and MFN, obviously, by the United States—

Father Ly and so many of those brave men and women in Vietnam 

who have spoken out for religious freedom have either been rearrested, tortured or under house arrest once again. 

Charter 8, Bloc 8406, which was the equivalent of many of those 

charters that we saw in Eastern Europe, including Charter 77 led 

by Vaclav Havel, has become a list of individuals that now the Government of Vietnam is hunting down and putting into prison and 

meting out very severe tortures to those individuals. 

That is a picture over there of Vietnam today—of Father Ly at 

his sentencing. And he, just like so many others, the venerable 

Thich Quang Do and many others, have suffered and we have been 

silent. 

If you look at this picture here, that was in the early 1990s on 

a trip that I took, one of many, to the People’s Republic of China. 

Bishop Su, a Roman Catholic Bishop of Baoding Province, had 

spent years in prison prior to being re-arrested in 1997 and now 

has not been heard from since. When you ask the Chinese Government, ‘‘Where is Bishop Su?’’ they say, ‘‘We do not know.’’ What an 

unmitigated lie and nonsense. He may have been killed. He has 

been recognized at least on one occasion in a hospital with his face 

all puffed out, presumably having been beaten once again. Here is 

a man that when I met with him in our small delegation he had 

no malice whatsoever for the Chinese Government and told me and 

the others in that picture that he prayed for those who tortured 

him and hoped for a day when China would be free. 

And finally, Gao. Gao is a man who is a human rights defender, 

a lawyer who has spoken up on behalf of the persecuted church 

and especially on behalf of the Falun Gong in the People’s Republic 

of China. He’s been missing almost 900 days. Again, he had been 

tortured without mercy, cattle prods put on his genitals, inside his 

mouth, under his arms and throughout his body. Here is a human 

rights defender that we need to speak out for. He has made religious freedom one of his most important issues. He now languishes 

in prison, probably being tortured as we meet here today. 

He is one of three individuals that I and others asked be named 

as Nobel Peace Prize recipients. Liu Xiaobo was one of those three. 

4

He was recognized. Of course, people like Vaclav Havel also had 

nominated him. But Gao remains unknown. We believe he is incarcerated and being subjected to hideous tortures as we meet here at 

this hearing. 

I would like to yield to my good friend and colleague Mr. Payne, 

ranking member of our subcommittee. 

Mr. PAYNE. Thank you very much. And I thank the chairman for 

calling this very important hearing and our panelists of esteemed 

witnesses for joining us here today. 

As we know, religious freedom is a serious concern globally. According to a study by the Pew Research Center nearly 70 percent 

of the world’s population live in countries with high or very high 

restrictions on religious practice. This is particularly troubling, as 

many experts assert that the absence of religious freedom is highly 

correlated with unsustainable democracies, low economic growth, 

low female literacy rates and religious extremism. 

I look forward to hearing from our esteemed witnesses today 

about the global trends in religious freedom, as well as successful 

policy interventions and recommendations for further action. Unfortunately, restrictions on religious practice are pervasive. Some 

are driven by authoritarian regimes such as China whose progression opposition to Falun Gong, just to name one of the many oppressed groups, is well documented. For 12 years now thousands 

of practitioners of peaceful spiritual movements have been harshly 

persecuted by their governments with tens of thousands more were 

sentenced to forced labor camps. The Chinese Uyghur minority also 

suffered harsh repression of the religious practice. 

The Chinese Government restricts public access to mosques, the 

training and role of imams, the celebration of Ramadan and participation in hajj, the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca. Religious oppression also reared its ugly head in the recent Arab Spring Movement. In Bahrain, one of the Sunni Muslim regime’s responses to 

peaceful protestors who were mostly Shiites seeking more political 

rights was to bulldoze nearly 30 ancient mosques, a breathtaking 

assault on a protestor’s right to free practice and freely practice 

their religion. Such religious oppression is perilous as it only escalates and promotes dangerous social discord. 

Unfortunately, a Pew study reported that worldwide the Middle 

East and North Africa region has the most severe and highest rate 

of government and social restrictions on religion. We should remain 

vigilant about combating religious discrimination in the West. Efforts in some European countries, mainly France, to effectively ban 

Muslim women from wearing head scarfs or veils as well as the 

Swiss ban on the constructions of minarets and on mosques remind 

us that these restrictions on religious freedom can be imposed by 

our democratic allies in Western Europe. We do not have to look 

far into the recent history to see the dangerous consequences of 

such lack of pluralistic tolerance with today’s appearance of Ratko 

Mladic in front of the International Criminal Tribunal Yugoslavia 

for the genocide against Bosnian Muslims in Srebrenica among 

other crimes against humanity reminds the world that once again 

of the tragic consequences of sectarian and national violence. 

In Sudan, Khartoum’s attempts to severely restrict religious freedom and helped fuel the country’s decade long civil war between 

5

the North and South. To date, Sudan still remains a Country of 

Particular Concern for severe violations of religious freedom and 

religion, continues to undergird political alliances. 

Elsewhere in Africa, Eritrea also remains a Country of Particular 

Concern because of the government’s poor record on subjecting religious prisoners to harsh conditions, exercising control over officially 

registered groups and harassing members of unregistered groups. 

In other countries the lack of religious freedom is driven by social 

hostilities rather than official government policies. Yet as governments tolerate such social intolerances, they in effect condone it. In 

Nigeria, for example, as many as 13,000 Nigerians died due to sectarian violence in the last 12 years. The government’s failure to 

forcefully react to such ongoing egregious violations of religious 

freedom and their failure to work to prevent and contain religious 

motivated violence is extremely concerning. 

In Egypt we see social hostility increasing against the local Coptic Christians. Such disturbing trends require vigilance and swift 

response. 

Mr. Grim, I look forward to your testimony on religious freedom 

trends globally, especially in Africa. 

The United States is unique in that it defines religious freedom 

as not only an American value, but a core objective of American 

foreign policy. Our exceptional global leadership is enshrined in the 

International Religious Freedom Act which is designed to promote 

religious freedom and fight persecution. With the act, the Congress 

created the International Religious Freedom office at the State Department charged with highlighting the status of freedom of religion globally as well as a related ambassador-at-large position to 

recommend appropriate diplomatic actions. 

Ambassador Suzan Johnson Cook was sworn in by the Secretary 

just yesterday. Her priority countries she intends to visit in 2011 

include includes Egypt, Pakistan, Afghanistan, China, Vietnam, 

Saudi Arabia, Nigeria and others. The Department is implementing 

tool kits that identify appropriate and achievable strategies for 

Countries of Particular Concern and other key countries to raise religious freedom issues with their diplomatic counterparts and other 

influences. Such individuals’ high profile efforts are unique and effective. Thus, at the first U.S.-China Human Rights dialogue under 

the Obama administration religious freedom was one of the three 

main agenda items resulting in the Chinese agreeing to participate 

in a working group on religion. 

The IRF office has also significantly expanded its engagement 

with inter-religious networks to advance religious freedom, foster 

respect, and decrease sectarian violence. The office played a significant role in participation in the U.S. sponsored Interfaith Collaboration Conference in Indonesia in Bangladesh, the Vatican and Geneva. The conference in Indonesia led to the establishment of that 

nation’s first inter-religious council, a body that is actively promoting harmony between faith communities. 

In addition, the IRF Office and the State Department, Congress 

created the independent U.S. Commission for International Religious Freedom. Thanks to this institution or infrastructure we 

were able to intervene in countries that grievously violated religious freedoms. 

6

In Eritrea, for example, where we observed systematic ongoing 

and egregious violations of religious freedom, the Bush administration reacted by imposing sanctions on all defense articles and service with few exceptions for the purpose of national security which 

the current administration continues to uphold. 

In Nigeria, USAID established the 5-year $4.5 million program 

to provide conflict mitigation assistance in northern and middle 

belt states that has the recognition of sectarian tension. 

In Afghanistan the State Department’s use of quiet diplomacy 

contributed to the release of two Afghan converts from Islam who 

had been charged with apostasy. 

These are just a few examples of our efforts to advance religious 

pluralism and tolerance. More needs to be done and more tools to 

promote inclusive societies need to be explored. For example, we 

should explore ways to facilitate education exchange between people of different backgrounds and religions as an instrument for 

combating religious repression. 

Mr. Leo, Mr. Farr, Mr. Grieboski thank you again for your being 

here today, and I look forward to your testimonies about the countries and regions that require continued vigilance, as well as best 

practices and policy recommendations that we can get for you. And 

actually, Chairman Berman intended to be here, was unable to 

come, and Mr. Chairman, he has an opening statement that he 

would like admitted to the record. 

Mr. SMITH. Without objection so ordered. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Payne. 

I would like to now welcome to the witness table our first witness, Mr. Leonard Leo, who is the chair of the U.S. Commission on 

International Religious Freedom and has served on the Commission since 2007. 

The Commission was created, as we all know, by the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 and has the legislative 

mandate to review the facts and circumstances of religious freedom 

violations presented in the administration’s Human Rights and 

International Religious Freedom reports and to make policy recommendations to the President, the Secretary of State, and the 

Congress with respect to international religious freedom matters. 

Mr. Leo has served as Executive Vice President of the Federalist 

Society for Law and Public Policy Studies and participated actively 

in a number of international forums, and played a major role at the 

United Nations, most recently on the defamations resolution, which 

actually had a very positive outcome. He worked very closely with 

Congress and especially with the administration to ensure that the 

defamation resolution did not move forward. And at the end of the 

day, it was Pakistan that tabled a resolution that comported much 

more closely with the U.S. and what has been the universal recognition of religious freedom as an individual right of conscience to 

practice as one sees fit. 

So, I want to thank Mr. Leo for his leadership on that, and so 

many other issues related to religious freedom. 

7

STATEMENT OF MR. LEONARD LEO, CHAIRMAN, U.S. 

COMMISSION ON INTERNATIONAL RELIGIOUS FREEDOM 

Mr. LEO. Chairman Smith and Ranking Member Payne, I am 

grateful for the opportunity to testify today about the role of the 

U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom or USCIRF, 

the world’s first and only Commission of its kind in strengthening 

the promotion of freedom of religion or belief in U.S. foreign policy. 

And I am joined here today by one of my fellow Commissioners 

Mr. Ted Van Der Meid. 

I would request that my full written statement be placed in the 

record. 

Mr. SMITH. Without objection, so ordered. 

Mr. LEO. Let me stress the importance of Congress acting 

promptly on H.R. 1856, the International Religious Act Amendments of 2011 introduced by Representative Frank Wolf as a 

means of strengthening U.S. religious freedom promotion by reauthorizing USCIRF. Through reauthorization our Commission will 

remain an independent bipartisan Federal agency that monitors 

international religious freedom conditions and provides recommendations to the President, the Secretary of State, and Members of Congress. 

The importance of this work cannot be overstated. Religious freedom is humanity’s first freedom, but religious freedom is also critical to our foreign policy and national security, especially in a post9/11 world. Countries that protect religious freedom are more 

peaceful, prosperous, democratic and stable. Nations that do not 

protect this freedom provide fertile ground for poverty and insecurity, war and terror and violate radical movements and activities. 

Unfortunately around the world, attacks on religious freedom 

occur with alarming frequency. This is why Congress passed the 

International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 or IRFA which mandated the creation of USCIRF. USCIRF gathers key information at 

home and overseas. We issue annual reports to Congress. We advise and work closely with Members of Congress and with White 

House and State Department officials. We participate in multilateral meetings. We get out our message through the media and consult with civil society and religious groups. We leverage the 

strengths and the access we have at minimal cost to the taxpayer. 

Each year USCIRF recommends that the Secretary of State designate as Countries of Particular Concern or CPCs those nations 

that commit severe religious freedom violations. For 2011 USCIRF 

has recommended 14 countries to be so designated: Burma, China, 

Egypt, Eritrea, Iran, Iraq, Nigeria, North Korea, Pakistan, Saudi 

Arabia, Sudan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam. This administration’s State Department has yet to make any designations, 

although we are told that they are imminent. 

USCIRF also recommends that certain countries be closely monitored. For 2011 we included in our Watch List: Afghanistan, 

Belarus, Cuba, India, Indonesia, Laos, Russia, Somalia, Tajikastan, 

Turkey, and Venezuela. 

USCIRF has had important successes in focusing U. S. Government attention on religious freedom issues. For example, in Sudan 

in order to avert another religiously related war, USCIRF called for 

direct U.S. engagement toward implementing the Comprehensive 

8

Peace Agreement and was instrumental in strengthening ties between South Sudan’s government and religious groups essential for 

facilitating voter education and turnout for the independence referendum. 

In Saudi Arabia, we have raised concerns about the production 

of extremist literature and its exportation. Due to our raising concerns before and during our winter visit, six young Shi’a Muslims 

were released in February. 

In Nigeria, after USCIRF visited the country following escalating 

violence between Christians and Muslims and raised the issue of 

impunity with high level government levels, the government 

brought prosecutions for the first time in a decade against violent 

perpetrators. 

In Iran, in response to severe religious freedom violations, 

USCIRF worked with Congress to produce the first ever sanctions 

against Iran for human rights violations. President Obama sanctioned, among others, seven Iranian officials that USCIRF had recommended. 

And at the U.N., USCIRF was a catalyst with the current administration and Congress leading to a historic breakthrough in March 

when the defamation of religions resolution favoring a global blasphemy standard was not introduced in the Human Rights Council 

of the U.N. 

These are important religious freedom achievements, but there is 

so much more to do. Our Government should pressure countries to 

abolish laws that oppress religious minorities. Our Government 

needs to expect that countries will stop the exportation of extremist 

ideology and we need to partner with them in finding solutions. 

And our Government needs to demand that countries bring to justice the perpetrators of religiously related violence and where capacity is lacking, we need to find ways to help. 

These are objectives that advance the worth and dignity of all 

people, and importantly bolster our own nation’s stability and security in today’s interconnected world. 

It is our Commission’s hope and goal that religious freedom will 

become more fully integrated into U.S. foreign policy for both humanitarian and national security reasons. By ensuring that we are 

reauthorized before our sunset date on September 30th, USCIRF 

will be able to continue to facilitate achievement of the same and 

will be able to build on our valuable relationships with you who 

serve in Congress toward that end. 

And, Mr. Chairman, if I might make one other comment. I gather 

last night the Lautenberg Amendment had expired. The Commission has over the years been very supportive of this amendment because it has, as you know, provided a valve for religious minorities 

and others who are persecuted in Iran to be able to leave that 

country. And so as you work through a number of these different 

issues related to religious freedom, we would hope that the Lautenberg Amendment will be reenacted. 

And thank you for the opportunity to be here this morning. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Leo follows:]

9


66782a-1.eps
10


66782a-2.eps
11


66782a-3.eps
12


66782a-4.eps
13


66782a-5.eps
14


66782a-6.eps
15


66782a-7.eps
16


66782a-8.eps
17


66782a-9.eps
18


66782a-10.eps
19


66782a-11.eps
20


66782a-12.eps
21


66782a-13.eps
22


66782a-14.eps
23


66782a-15.eps
24


66782a-16.eps
25

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much for your testimony, and having 

read your full statement, it is very comprehensive and provides us 

with very, very useful insights as to how to proceed. 

Let me ask you first if the International Religious Freedom Act 

is not reauthorized—because we all know that a lot of good bills 

in the House or Senate, often in the Senate, you know through inaction or through when they hotline it something happens along 

the way, somebody just refuses to allow it floor time—what would 

be the consequences if the act were not reauthorized? 

Mr. LEO. Well, I think there are both domestic and international 

consequences. 

Domestically, USCIRF has been a very important resource for 

Congress and for administrations in terms of making recommendations about how to bolster our U.S. foreign policy and our national 

security agenda in ways that promote freedom of religion abroad. 

And so I think we would lose an important resource there. 

I also think that Congress’ failure to reauthorize USCIRF sends 

a signal to both the executive branch and to, unfortunately, the 

civil society world that religious freedom is not as important to our 

Government as it used to be. And that, of course, then in turn 

sends an even more unfortunate signal to the rest of the international community. 

You know, right now we have a commission and an infrastructure that is unique in the world, one that has I think in a number 

of instances been able to have a lot of leverage over foreign governments, that is both USCIRF and our Ambassador-at-Large. And in 

the absence of that infrastructure certainly if it were just allowed 

to die on the vine, I think many countries would view that as a signal that we were no longer focused on this issue and that they are 

allowed to engaged in the kinds of abuses we have seen with impunity. 

Mr. SMITH. I referenced in my opening comments the extreme 

hostility, and it was hostility, toward the legislation by a previous 

administration, by the Clinton administration, although Bill Clinton did sign it. And, you know, we were always very grateful for 

that fact. But sometimes you can sign a bill and then refuse to implement it in a robust way. 

And Tom Farr who ran the office for 4 years points out that no 

administration can claim we will have advanced religious freedom 

in a substantial way. Religious freedom has always been orphaned 

within the State Department. 

Mr. Wolf and I have traveled all over the world on religious freedom issues, and time and again we find it is an asterisk to human 

rights in general or page 4 down at the bottom on talking points 

and religious freedom demoted even further. And usually the Foreign Service officer tasked with religious freedom issues is someone 

very, very low on the totem poll and the Ambassador, the DCM and 

others see it as an irritant. And that has been 31 years of my experience traveling. Even during the worst days of Soviet repression 

of Jews, my first trip to the Soviet Union was with the National 

Conference of Soviet Jewry in January 1982. And at the same time, 

the Siberian 7 Pentecostals had made their way into our Embassy 

seeking protection from the cruelty that was meted out against 

them. And many people in that Embassy were profoundly unhappy 

26

to have them at the Embassy because it complicated our diplomatic 

relations with Moscow. 

And I was sickened by it, frankly. And we have seen it time 

again, Mr. Wolf and I, who has now joined us, the author of the 

International Religious Freedom Act. There are some FSOs, Foreign Service officers who care deeply, but there are many who see 

this, including ambassadors, as an irritant. 

And you might want to comment on the culture. One of the provisions of IRFA was to train Foreign Service officers so that they 

would be not just sensitive to, but would embrace, the cause of religious freedom. Has that happened? 

Mr. LEO. Well as you rightly point out, Mr. Chairman, religious 

freedom has always been a very difficult issue to get to the forefront of our foreign policy and national security agenda. This has 

been the case in every Presidential administration. The challenge 

always in public diplomacy is to take that whole basket of issues; 

trade, security, human rights, religious freedom in particular, and 

to find a way to engage countries on all of them. What I think we 

have to do is we have to educate diplomats and Foreign Service officers that freedom of religion or belief is an essential part of ensuring that countries in our world more generally are stable, prosperous and secure. 

We know from events in recent history that there is a tremendous interrelationship between the extent to which freedom of religion is protected and prosperity and stability. 

You are quite right that education to some extent is not where 

it needs to be right now. There is a course that will be instituted 

soon, in fact I think it may have even started this week, for Foreign Service officers, but it is not yet part of the core curriculum, 

and that needs to happen. 

Also I think that within the State Department it is very important for the Ambassador-at-Large to have the kind of direct access 

that she needs to the President and to the Secretary of State. And 

I had the privilege of seeing our new Ambassador-at-Large Suzan 

Johnson Cook yesterday. She is a captivating, intensely committed 

woman who understands the importance of human rights. And it 

is my hope that she will be given the kind of resources and access 

that she needs to help to put this issue in front of the bureaus in 

the State Department, the National Security Council, at the White 

House and others. 

Mr. SMITH. Let me ask if you could comment on the rising tide 

of persecution against Christians, particularly in places like China. 

You know it was not lost on Beijing that it was people of faith, 

largely, whether it be in Romania, whether it be what empowered 

Lech Walesa to lead his fight and Solidarity’s fight in Poland, and 

my experience backs that up that it was often people of faith in 

each of the countries that led to the demise of the Soviet Empire. 

The lesson learned by Beijing is that you need to crush faith-based 

people. And Christians, which after the United States, it is estimated that China has more Christians then any other country in 

the world, most of them living underground and attending underground churches. 

Pope Benedict XVI made the point in a statement that AP carried on December 16th that at present Christians are the religious 

27

group that suffers most from persecution on account of faith. The 

Pontiff asserted this and cited Christian communities suffering 

from violence and intolerance, particularly in Asia, Africa, the Middle East, and the Holy Land. And, of course, Asia, China and North 

Korea being among the worst violators on the face of the earth. 

And your thoughts on that and on the Pope’s statement? 

Mr. LEO. We have seen three disturbing trends regarding the 

plight of Christians around the world. One would be outright persecution. So for example, the application of laws like blasphemy or 

apostasy laws that can result in torture, execution, imprisonment 

or laws that are invoked to confiscate property, to desecrate property of religious communities around the world. 

Secondly, we have seen a significant uptick in impunity. Basically the kind of violence, Mr. Payne, that you mentioned that occurs in various parts of Africa where essentially there are individuals who strike out against Christian communities and they are 

never brought to justice by the governments. We have seen an uptick of this, and that is part of the reason why the Holy Father, 

as well as actually President Obama at the very end of last year, 

talked about this issue in connection with the Coptic Christians in 

Egypt and also mentioned Nigeria. 

And then the third kind of trend we have seen is an increase in 

controls on the hierarchies or institutional infrastructure of Christian churches. So, you will see for example countries like China 

trying to control the priests who may be ordained or the ministers 

who may take over a particular church. You may see controls on 

the institution of seminaries, or outright bans on seminaries in 

some cases to dwindle down the number of religious who are able 

to minister to their communities. 

So, those are the three areas where we have seen an uptick in 

various kinds of prohibitions, suppression, and persecution against 

Christians. 

And by the way, for what it is worth, many of these oppressive 

governments are equal opportunity persecutors. So you will see in 

a lot of these countries persecution against lots of other religious 

minorities. As you know, in Asia for example the Buddhists and 

others are equally persecuted. There are many Muslim communities around the world that are facing the brunt of discrimination 

and oppression by governments, too. So there has been an uptick, 

certainly for Christians and there has been a lot of focus on that 

because of what has been going on. And then also quite a number 

of other religious minorities around the world. 

Mr. SMITH. At the appropriate time we will have the administration here, and there will be a second hearing, we will ask the administration why they have not, since the Obama administration 

has been in office, designated countries either on the CPC list or 

not. I mean, we are well into this administration. It seems to be 

a glaring omission that has been made by them. What is your 

thought? 

Mr. LEO. Well, we have called for CPC designations by this administration as well as the previous administration when it was 

not moving fast enough. And we very much hope that those designations are imminent. 

28

You know, there are a couple of problems here. It is not simply 

the fact that there are not designations. It is what happens after 

a country is designated, what do we do about it? You know, there 

are sanctions that are available. There are various kinds of things 

that our country could be doing once a country is designated, engage them. But what historically has happened is that sanctions 

are generally not applied. Only one country, and I think, Mr. 

Payne, you mentioned it, Eritera. Eritera is the only country that 

has sanctions specifically directed against it under IRFA. All the 

other countries that have sanctions, they have double hatted them 

under other statutes. And in addition to that, you know quite often 

these countries may receive waivers. So, for example, Saudia Arabia has an indefinite waiver. 

So it is not just the designations but it is also what happens 

after: What can we do to get officials within our executive branch 

to think seriously about how to leverage that designation through 

sanctions or bilateral negotiations, or other forms of pressure? 

Mr. SMITH. I would agree with you on sanctions. If it goes unused, it becomes impotent. And there was actually a delay, as you 

know, in the bill—with the 18 sanctions prescribed in the bill—so 

that there could be an opportunity for the country to make whole 

and take some remedial action. But if you do not drop the sanction 

after you designate the country a CPC, it becomes, not a useless, 

but a very much diminished threat. So, I think your point is well 

taken. 

Let me just finally ask you about what you say is arguably the 

most glaring omission to the State Department CPC list—Pakistan. 

And all of us, obviously, mourned the assassination of Minister 

Bhatti when he was brutally slain, a man who had called for an 

end, certainly a mitigation, of the blasphemy laws in Pakistan. Do 

you think that is likely to happen within the State Department? 

And secondly, if I could, he was sitting where you are sitting, on 

two occasions, I chaired hearings on anti-Semitism when we had 

Natan Sharansky testify. And he made a very compelling argument 

that the rising tide of anti-Semitism is being spread through mass 

media, through soap operas. He actually brought a soap opera that 

he showed us here of blood libel. He said this is what many in the 

Arab community, especially the young, feed on and think is true. 

In it he showed this young boy, Christopher, which is shown on 

Arab TV broadcasts on satellite television throughout Europe and 

the United States, being killed, his throat slit in order to put his 

blood into matzah. And he said we think it is a horror movie, they 

think it is real. And if you inculcate that into the youth, it only 

leads to more anti-Semitism. 

He also, as he did at the OSCE Conference on anti-Semitism in 

Berlin, talked about the three ‘‘D’s’’ that are very veiled excuses for 

anti-Semitism: Demonization, delegitimization, and denial of 

Israel’s right to exist. That when anyone of those three are present 

you can be very sure it is really at its core anti-Semitism. 

I know we have a separate office, because I actually authored the 

legislation to create it, but do you believe that IRFA has been effective in combating anti-Semitism? And I would just add to that, 

there was a hearing on the Senate side about Muslim and acts 

against Muslims here in the United States. The FBI chronicles 

29

hate crimes. Christians? It is under 9 percent in the United States. 

Muslims? It is under 9 percent within the United States in terms 

of hate crimes based on religion. For Jews, it is 75 percent, even 

though the Jewish population makes up less then 2 percent of the 

U.S. population, about 5–6 million people. Totally disproportionate, 

and yet there are some people somehow in the United States that 

think that there is an equivalency. 

The Jews, there is a rising tide of anti-Semitism even here. I 

know it is State Department, but obviously it has cross-over effects 

into what we do abroad and what we should also be teaching and 

promoting here. What are your thoughts on that, as well as Minister Bhatti? 

Mr. LEO. Well, first on Pakistan. We, the Commission, had a 

very close relationship with Minister Bhatti and we were shattered 

when we heard of his assassination. He was probably the brightest 

light for human rights and religious freedom that Pakistan had at 

that time. And his assassination was a tremendous blow to 

progress in that country. So that is a very serious matter and one 

that we really are grieving over. 

We do want to see Pakistan as a Country of Particular Concern. 

We do not believe that keeping them off the CPC list is a way to 

see progress in that country. It has not worked and it will not work 

in the future. 

This is a country that has one of the most oppressive and misused blasphemy laws in the world. It has been a major proponent 

of the worldwide blasphemy standard. And it is a country that has 

been known for exporting extremist ideology throughout North and 

sub-Saharan Africa. 

When you visit Nigeria and you talk to security officials in Nigeria. When you visit Kano and Kaduna in the North, you will find 

materials—you will find materials that have been exported from 

madrassahs in Pakistan that are hateful and inciteful in the way 

they treat religious minorities or Christians in that country. 

And so the situation in Pakistan is very serious. Impunity is 

rampant. They are exporting extremism in ways that is very troubling for our national security and human rights regime internationally. And they should be deemed a CPC and we should begin 

to pressure them in whatever way possible to begin to rollback 

some of the oppressive laws they have, which in turn I think would 

gradually change that culture. 

With regard to anti-Semitism, of course this is a multi-jurisdictional issue, but you know there has been some attention to antiSemitism under IRFA. You know, two countries come to mind: Russia and Venezuela. 

We have noticed an increasing trend in Russia over the years, 

less attention to dealing with hate crimes related to anti-Semitism. 

And one of the reasons that we continue to keep Venezuela on our 

watch list is because they have not brought to justice individuals 

in their country who have vandalized synagogues and other important places that are gathering points for the Jewish community in 

Venezuela. 

So we have tried to put a spotlight on those issues. I think IRFA 

can be an effective mechanism for doing that. What does have to 

happen, though, is that our Commission and the IRF Office needs 

30

to work with the special ambassador that is appointed for those 

issues so that there can be some coordination and collaboration. 

And we did meet with her earlier, I guess late last year, and we 

hope to continue to work with that office and find points of leverage that we can begin to use to combat anti-Semitism. 

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Payne? 

Mr. PAYNE. Thank you very much for your testimony and for the 

outstanding work that you do. 

Just sort of a general question and then your opinion. Do you 

think that religious tolerance worldwide is improving or do you 

think that there is sort of a continued erosion? Just, I mean the 

world is big so I know it is not a simple answer, but just generally 

speaking. 

Mr. LEO. My own view is that it is eroding. And I think the fact 

that our Commission has, as I think the chairman pointed out, 

gone from eight CPC recommended countries 2 years ago to 14 

today is somewhat testament to that. 

We have seen an awful lot of instability and erosion in North and 

sub-Saharan Africa. We are very concerned as a Commission about 

the situation in Nigeria and in Eritera. We are deeply concerned 

about what may happen in Sudan. We are very troubled by the violence taking place in Abyei. As you well know, the inability to complete the Comprehensive Peace Agreement and really have a peaceful transition to independence could well result in another very 

bloody religiously-related war in that part of the world. 

We have seen an uptick in religious oppression and violence 

through the Middle East. 

China ebbs and flows, but things seem to be on an uptick there 

as well as in Vietnam. 

The Muslim communities in Central Asia, particularly 

Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and to some extent Turkmenistan seem to 

be under continued siege. 

The Indonesians, they are on our watch list. They have a mixed 

record but the fact of the matter is that they continue to refuse to 

recognize that their blasphemy laws and other forms of discrimination against the Ahmadiyah and other religious minorities are 

causing acts of impunity to take place there. 

So there is a real uptick in religious tensions and violence. And, 

Mr. Payne, it is happening in countries where it historically has 

not happened before. 

On the way back from Sudan last time we stopped in Ethiopia 

because, as you may remember, there were around 37 or so Protestant house churches that were torched. And when we were there 

we talked to some of the human rights officers and we were struck 

by the fact that this was new to them. This had not happened in 

recent history or memory in Ethiopia. 

We are seeing those incidents elsewhere around the world. Syria, 

which has been a very important safe harbor for Christians 

throughout the Middle East is now, of course, because of its instability a place where we have to be watching very closely. 

Uzbekistan, there are something like 4,000 or 5,000 prisoners, 

many of them Muslims who are detained there simply for practicing their faith peaceably. And there seems to be no sign of reducing the size of that prison population through releases. 

31

So the situation is not good. And, of course, the economic crises 

that the world’s facing makes it even harder, right? Because everyone is focused on trade and commerce and the economy and not focused as much as they ought to be on human rights, even though 

as you have all said those two issues are inexpiably intertwined 

and you are not going to solve the one without dealing with the 

other. 

Mr. PAYNE. Thank you very much. 

I also agree that in my opinion, too, there is an uptick particularly in Africa. There is up until the recent maybe past decade or 

so religion was really not a dividing force. And a family would have 

Christians, Muslims and it was just the way that the countries 

were. But as you have noted in Nigeria, for example, there is 

heightened tension, killings that go on. 

And in Eritrea, I visited there and you know with the President 

specifically on this whole question several years ago and said that 

they do not have religious persecution. It was interesting that I 

met with a number of religious groups and they, of course, were 

saying that they did not feel any religious persecution. Of course, 

I am not so sure that they were speaking the whole truth. However, it was interesting that there were a number of long term existing religions that they would sort of leave alone to some degree, 

even a Jewish temple actually in Eritrea. 

I met with maybe six or seven different religious groups, each 

just with that group. Because I really wanted to try to get to the 

bottom of what was going on. We did find that they totally excluded any new groups coming in. That was the argument that we 

do not want new groups that disrupt the family, that puts children 

against elders. And the ones that were there were okay, said the 

President. They were restricting those that wanted to come into the 

country. 

And so it was interesting to be able to go to these houses of worship and these people were talking freely about their religious freedom. Of course, I know that when maybe someone from the government happens to be in the group, they are not going to necessarily 

tell the full truth. But I just, to once again say, that I think that 

the situation that in the past was really not a big issue in Africa 

in general now is certainly raising its ugly head and is really becoming a very divisive issue. 

Mr. LEO. Mr. Payne, we would be very interested in working 

with you and others further on Eritrea. As you rightly point out, 

there are the older established religions there, orthodox Christians, 

Jews, some Catholics who do get treated better than some of the 

other minority faiths. And a lot of what happens in Eritrea around 

repression of people of faith often has political overtones to it: Concerns about political authority and security in the country and so 

forth. So it is one of the more complicated places where religion 

ends up bleeding into other issues that shape the political dynamic. 

We are very interested in trying to find some solutions in Eritrea 

and we have been grasping about trying to identify those. There 

may be opportunities there because I think that this new administration, in handling the sort of relations between Ethiopia and Eritrea, we may find a way of also opening doors in Eritrea and having more fruitful human rights discussions. 

32

So, if you or your colleagues have ideas for how we can perhaps 

create some points of leverage there, we would be very interested. 

Mr. PAYNE. That is great. I believe, too, there is an opportunity 

at this time. The question of Badme has sort of been downplayed. 

I visited there, actually, from the Ethiopian side and then went to 

Eritrea and was chastised by the President of why did you go 

through Ethiopia. Since it was easier to get there, that is all. But 

we have had some ability to have dialogue with the President 

there. Of course, it is very difficult as you know to deal with the 

other countries around, Djibouti and problems with of course Ethiopia. But I do think that that we may give it one last shot, and 

I would be very happy to work directly specifically on this issue 

with you on the religious situation. 

Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much, Mr. Payne. 

Regrettably, there is a vote on the floor. If Mr. Fortenberry returns, because he went over to vote first, he will reconvene the 

hearing and ask his questions of Mr. Leo. And then Mr. Wolf will 

be next after that. 

We stand in temporary recess. 

(Whereupon, at 10:29 a.m., the subcommittee recessed, to reconvene at 10:36 a.m., the same day.) 

Mr. FORTENBERRY. The hearing will now reconvene. 

Thank you, Mr. Leo, for your presence here, and I am sorry for 

the disruption. I know you have been up here before, but it is a 

way of life. It is particularly a difficult day in that the House is 

seeking to adjourn while also considering several resolutions relating to the ongoing conflict Libya. So you may have members in and 

out. But we really thank you for your presence. 

And in his absence, I would like to thank Chairman Smith as 

well for elevating this important issue of religious freedom as a foreign policy priority for the United States. I was honored to join him 

and Congressman Wolf as a co-sponsor of the International Religious Freedom Act of 2011. And I want to commend both of those 

gentlemen for their leadership to ensure that this first freedom, the 

freedom of religious discretion, will continue to have a prominent 

seat at the table in U.S. diplomatic engagement. 

Again, thank you for your leadership on the Commission as well, 

Mr. Leo. I believe you have done extraordinary work since the establishment in 1998. It is a small but flexible organization that I 

think has played an indispensable role in informing our oversight 

efforts with critical firsthand knowledge of human rights abuses 

throughout the world and recommendations for U.S. policymakers. 

After I finish some of these opening comments, that is what I 

will ask you, further recommendations for policymakers. 

This year we have witnessed a staggering movement for self-determination throughout the world, particularly in the Middle East 

with serious implications for the future of that region. Religious 

freedom is a most fundamental element of self-determination. The 

acid test of this movement’s success I think will be to the extent 

to which emerging or evolving institutions of government respect 

the human dignity and inherent rights of all persons subject to 

their jurisdiction and foster the rule of law in an impartial and just 

manner. 

33

Tragically, we have also witnessed the worst manifestations of 

ruthlessness and violent attacks, for instance on indigenous Egyptian faith communities. And as you were mentioning earlier, the 

callous murders of Minister Bhatti and Governor Taseer in Pakistan who courageously upheld that nation’s founding vision in 

seeking to protect vulnerable individuals in persecuted faith communities. 

As a side note, I had requested a private meeting just last spring 

with Minister Bhatti and had an extensive conversation about the 

blasphemy laws and his attempt not only to protect Christian minority communities, but other faith minority communities in that 

country. 

These and other pervasive incidents of religiously motivated violence and persecution, wherever they occur, and the environment 

of impunity that so often accompanies them call for a sustained 

and consistent response from the United States through numerous 

venues, and I would also consider trade negotiations one of those 

venues, in which we engage the broader world. 

While there is much work to do we have set a higher bar, thanks 

to your efforts, the Commission’s efforts and I think made some 

significant steps forward. 

Again, I look forward to learning more about your work, but let 

us move quickly to that question about potential recommendations 

that the Commission may have to strengthen this element of fundamental justice for all people. 

Mr. LEO. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Fortenberry, both for 

your attention on these issues and also your leadership. It is so 

very much needed in today’s world and we are very grateful for it. 

And we have enjoyed working with you and your staff, and we look 

forward to that in the future. 

With regard to your question about further recommendations for 

how we can improve conditions for religious freedom, first I think 

we have to bolster attention to the issue here at home. There are 

lots of different ways to do that, but I will mention three. 

First, as I mentioned before, the Ambassador-at-Large needs to 

have very direct access to the Secretary of State and to the Executive Office of the President, the President in particular, to put 

these issues into play as the State Department apparatus and the 

White House apparatus engages in its various bilateral and multilateral negotiations. 

Secondly, while there is some training in religious freedom for 

Foreign Service officers there needs to be more, and it needs to be 

part of the core curriculum. There was a course that I think has 

begun this week, but again more courses are needed and it does 

need to be part of the core curriculum. 

And then finally, it would be very useful I think for raising the 

profile of these issues to have a more systematic monitoring mechanism within our Government for monitoring religious prisoners and 

having those kinds of lists. Because that brings the issue home for 

a lot of folks and it is a way of really raising the profile. 

In terms of other things we could do, we do have to pressure 

countries abroad as vigorously as we can, and I think more vigorously then we are now. Certainly naming countries as Countries of 

Particular Concern is helpful. But as I said before, you have got to 

34

back that up with real pressure and sanctions at times. Certainly 

you have to put the issue of religious freedom higher up on the 

totem pole in bilateral negotiations with countries. 

And then the are some specific things you can sometimes do. For 

example, you could bar severe religious freedom violators from coming into the United States, and those kinds of travel bans sometimes could be helpful particularly when you are dealing with these 

kinds of abuses in North Africa, sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East. 

But, you know it is important not simply to curse the darkness, 

right? So you have to find ways of helping countries to get to where 

they need to be. So, for example, in the case of Nigeria you know 

the Commission simply has not criticized Nigeria for its lack of capacity or lack of will to investigate and prosecute the perpetrators 

of religiously-related violence. We have worked with them in trying 

to find ways where U.S. resources can be brought to bear to help 

them think through the issues of investigation and prosecution. So 

we need to find ways of providing these countries with the capacity 

building or technical assistance that they need in order to deal 

with the issue of impunity or to deal effectively with inner-religious 

dialogue. And I think that those are things that we can do, and we 

need to do more of. 

So, in a nutshell those are some of the ways that I think we can 

bring our resources to bear and also put pressure on countries 

abroad and focus the issue more intensely here at home. 

Mr. FORTENBERRY. Thank you. 

In the Middle East, let us turn there for a moment, there is in 

effect a Christian diaspora occurring at the moment. The Christian 

communities and other minority faiths in that region have an ancient claim to that homeland, as do other peoples. It is my concern 

in addition to being an injustice if you lose these faith communities, which in some ways have provided a leavening influence, in 

some ways an insulating influence between other persons who have 

had traditional conflicts, you exacerbate the geo-political concerns 

in the arena and you complete efforts such as peace between Jewish persons and Palestinian persons who are Muslims. 

So I think that elevating the idea, and to the President’s credit 

he mentioned this in his speech to the Arab world recently, and it 

was somewhat overlooked that religious freedom is a hallmark of 

democratic values. And I thought that that was important. When 

Prime Minister Netanyahu came here shortly after the President’s 

speech he alluded to the same things in regards to having an environment which respects multiple confessions, all of which have 

claim to an ancient homeland there. 

In this regard, I think it is important to continue to talk about 

this hidden, in many ways, diaspora that is going on in many countries: Iraq, Syria, to some degree the pressures in Egypt might be 

significant enough to spark that kind of movement there, as well 

as in other lands in the region. 

I think this is very, very important to continue to elevate that 

particular concern because it is so related to geo-political movements of the moment. If we lose an emphasis on that, I think talking democratic values and the new civil structures that can lead to 

more democratic processes is good, but it has to be undergirded by 

35

some philosophical principles that are inculturated and institutionalized, namely respect for human rights and dignity and religious expression is one of those. 

So as the manifestation of Christians basically being forced to 

leave and other minority faith communities. My own district for instance, I have a significant number of people who practice an ancient religion called the Yazidi faith which is a section Iraq in the 

north who are begging for more security and the ability to simply 

be left alone, but in a safe environment, where they could practice 

their ancient faith. 

So, I think this is important if we could focus attention there as 

well, particularly given the dynamics of the moment I think it 

undergirds what we all hope as further democratic movement in 

the area. 

Mr. LEO. Well, Iraq needs to be a lesson for us. Because as you 

point out, the Christian communities in Iraq are nearly extinct: 

The Yazidis, the Mandeans, the Chaldo-Assyrians, of course the 

Jews as well. These communities are dwindling fast and they have 

little hope those who have left of returning. And that is a sad situation because the long term prosperity; health, security and instability of Iraq is going to depend, in part, upon democratic pluralism. And those communities were very, very important catalysts 

for peace and stability and prosperity. So we should learn from our 

experience in Iraq and when we see sectarian tensions, we should 

not run from them or deny that they exist. We need to find ways 

to take them on straight away. And when we are in the midst of 

a conflict where sectarian tensions are high, we need to find ways 

of building up security for those communities. And that is something that our Commission has been working on and speaking with 

the State Department about. In fact, we have several meetings on 

this next week. 

And, of course, that provides a window into Egypt because now 

the Coptic Christians in Egypt are worried for their own survival 

long term, and it is unclear what is going to happen there. 

But the decisions we make early on in these countries, the institutional and infrastructure-related decisions we make have tremendous bearing on what happens later. And with one quick example, 

which is Afghanistan. 

A number of years ago the United States turned a blind eye to 

the fact that the proposed Afghan constitution contained a 

repugnancy clause that basically said anything inconsistent with 

Sharia principles would not be tolerated or enforced under their 

constitutional regime. One has to wonder whether you will ever 

have religious tolerance, religious harmony and religious freedom 

in Afghanistan with a constitutional provision like that. 

Now when you are starting from that point it is very, very hard 

to make progress. So we have to be very mindful as we talk about 

democratic reform in these countries and we give all sorts of institutions and groups space to grow, that there ought to be certain 

kinds of reforms that are simply off limits because of the way in 

which they degrade human rights, and religious freedom particularly. 

Mr. FORTENBERRY. Well said. Thank you very much. 

Mr. Chairman. 

36

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Fortenberry. 

And I would now like to yield to the chairman of the Commerce, 

Justice, and Science Subcommittee of the Appropriations Committee, the author of the International Religious Freedom Act, Mr. 

Wolf. 

Mr. WOLF. Thank you. 

Mr. Chairman, I have a meeting in my office. They have been 

there since 10:30, so I will not have any questions. I would want 

to ask permission to submit a statement for the record, if I may. 

Mr. SMITH. Without objection. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Wolf follows:]


66782e-1.eps
37


66782e-2.eps
38


66782e-3.eps
39

Mr. WOLF. Secondly, thinking as I wrote some notes out as I was 

listening, one I want to thank Chairman Leo and your entire membership of the Commission and the staff. You have really done a 

great job. And I really appreciate your faithfulness for willingness 

to speak out. Perhaps this has been as good of an operation as I 

have seen. So I want to publicly thank you. 

I want to thank Mr. Smith and Mr. Payne for having this hearing and for being advocates for these issues. 

Thirdly, as I was listening, at the outset I want to say this and 

I want to say it on the record so it is public, it will be there forever 

and ever: I would hate to serve in a Congress where there was not 

a Congressman Chris Smith. I think Chairman Smith has done 

more on these issues: Human rights, religious freedom, anti-Semitism, children left behind, all of these issues than any other member in the 31 years that I have served. He is an advocate. He has 

followed very careful, very successful in the footsteps of two giants, 

Chairman Hyde and Chairman Lantos. And, frankly, I just want 

to publicly say as I watch these things; every time there is something on the floor, every time there is something in the record, 

every time there is one name now that always pops up. And I think 

the people in this town and in our country who have a commitment 

to human rights and religious freedom have to understand, Congressman Smith. Just listening, as you say, ‘‘I went here, I went 

there, I did this.’’

So, I appreciate the chairman’s effort. And as I said, I would not 

want to see a United States Congress where there was not a Chris 

Smith or somebody like Chris Smith. 

And with that, I will just yield and go on to my meeting. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you Chairman Wolf. 

And thank you, again, for your leadership, and we look forward 

to an early markup of your legislation to reauthorize the International Religious Freedom Act. 

Before going to our next panel, Mr. Leo, is there anything else 

you would like to add? 

I just would note for the record in remembrance of the terrible 

massacre at Tiananmen Square, I picked today to introduce legislation. I mean, we are always trying to find ways to hold the government and the perpetrators to account for heinous crimes against 

humanity and genocide and religious persecution. Today I will be 

introducing the China Democracy Promotion Act of 2011. And that 

legislation is designed to empower the President with the ability to 

deny a visa to high government officials who are involved with 

human rights abuse in the People’s Republic of China, including religious persecution. 

In 2004 I authored the Belarus Democracy Act which targeted 

President Lukashenka, the last dictator in Europe, for his heinous 

crimes against his own people. And that legislation, which includes 

denial of visas and encourages lists of people who should not be allowed to make their way to the United States, and also provides 

sanctions of other kinds, has had an impact. As a matter of fact, 

at a meeting in Minsk not so long ago, 11⁄2 years ago, 11 of us were 

meeting with him and he was very perturbed about that legislation 

because it inhibits his ability and especially people within his administration, the ability to travel to the United States. 

40

And if we were to say to the Chinese, ‘‘We are not kidding.’’ And 

Mr. Payne mentioned a moment ago that Mladic was picked up, finally, because of his crimes in Srebrencia and in Sarajevo and elsewhere, but particularly that is what the prosecutor will prosecute 

him on: Genocide in Srebrenica and crimes against humanity in 

Sarajevo. There is no statute of limitation on crimes against humanity. And, you know we learned that from Nuremberg, we 

learned it from the Tokyo War Crimes Tribunal, but especially 

Nuremberg that we will hunt down people who commit these 

crimes, but minimally they should not be allowed a visa to come 

to the United States. That is about the least we could do. So that 

legislation will be introduced today. 

Any further comments? 

Mr. LEO. All I would say, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Payne, is that 

our commissioners and the civil society community draw a lot of 

strength and inspiration from the commitment and leadership that 

is shown up here. So we thank you for what you are doing. 

We stand ready in any way we can to continue to put points on 

the board for religious freedom. The game is not over yet and we 

want to keep on putting as much pressure on other countries as we 

can so that we can have the kind of human rights protection and 

freedom of religion that all peoples deserve. 

Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. Thank you, Mr. Leo. And thank you for your extraordinary leadership. And Ted Van Der Meid, thank you for being 

here, and your leadership as well. 

I would like to now welcome our next panel beginning with Mr. 

Tom Farr, who is visiting associate professor of religion and international affairs at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service. He is a senior fellow at Geogetown’s Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs where he directs the Religious Freedom Project and the Program on Religion and U.S. Foreign Policy. 

A former U.S. diplomat of 21 years, Mr. Farr was the State Department’s first Director of the Office of International Religious Freedom. 

He has published numerous articles on religion and U.S. national 

interests and appeared on many media outlets. 

His book, ‘‘World of Faith and Freedom: Why International Religious Liberty is Vital to American National Security,’’ was published by Oxford University Press. 

Mr. Farr, welcome. 

We will then hear from Mr. Joseph Grieboski, who is the founder 

and chairman of the board of directors of the Institute on Religion 

and Public Policy. He currently serves as the founder and secretary 

general of the Interparliamentary Conference on Human Rights 

and Religious Freedom; founder and chairman of the International 

Consortium on Religion, Culture and Dialogue; a member of the 

board of directors of the Leadership Council for Human Rights. 

And a member of the board of advisors of the Military Religious 

Freedom Foundation. Mr. Grieboski is a regular columnist for the 

Huffington Post. He has worked with the Executive Office on Immigration Review to train U.S. immigration judges and immigration attorneys on issues related to religious liberty and asylum. 

41

Third, we will hear from Mr. Brian Grimm. He is director of 

Cross-National Data and senior researcher in religion and world affairs at the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religious and Public 

Life in Washington, DC. 

Mr. Grim is co-author of ‘‘The Price of Freedom Denied: Religious 

Persecution and Conflict in the Twenty-First Century,’’ and he coedits the World Religion Database at Boston University. 

Dr. Grim has extensive overseas experience from ’82 to 2002. He 

lived and worked as an educator, researcher, and development coordinator in China, the former USSR, Central Asia, Europe, Malta, 

and the Middle East, including being an academic director at the 

UAE Military Academy. 

His findings on international religious demography and religious 

freedom have been covered by all the major news outlets and contributed mightily to our understanding as to what is going on. 

Mr. Farr? 

STATEMENT OF MR. THOMAS FARR, DIRECTOR, RELIGIOUS 

FREEDOM PROJECT, BERKLEY CENTER FOR RELIGION, 

PEACE, AND WORLD AFFAIRS, GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY 

Mr. FARR. Thank you, Chairman Smith. 

Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Payne thank you for holding 

these important hearings and for your leadership on the issue of 

religious freedom. And speaking personally for a moment, let me 

associate myself with Mr. Wolf’s fine comments about you, Mr. 

Chairman, for your decades of dedication to this important issue. 

I am here to testify on behalf of H.R. 1856. I ask that the full 

text of my testimony be entered into the record. 

Mr. SMITH. Without objection. 

Mr. FARR. I also have here a letter in support of the bill signed 

thus far by 35 organizations and leaders from across the political, 

academic and religious spectrum. And I ask that it, too, be entered 

into the record. 

Mr. SMITH. That, too, will be. 

Mr. FARR. There are two broad reasons that the United States 

promotes international religious freedom. First, protecting this fundamental right goes to the core of who we are as a people. Second, 

the advancement of religious liberty brings American values into 

line with American interests, including its national security. It is 

in our fundamental interests for Egypt, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and others to succeed in establishing stable lasting democracies. But history and contemporary empirical studies make it 

clear that such highly religious societies cannot succeed at democracy and reduce religious-related terrorism without religious freedom in full. And very few of these countries have anything approaching religious freedom in full. 

Unfortunately, no administration, including the current one, has 

successfully employed the International Religious Freedom Act, 

IRFA, to advance our values or national security. Over the dozen 

years since IRFA’s passage our policy cannot be said in any substantial way to have reduced religious persecution, advanced religious freedom or increase American national security. 

I believe that H.R. 1856 can help remedy this failure of American 

diplomacy. 

42

Now there are many good features of this bill which I would like 

to have an opportunity to speak about later, but now I want to 

focus on three, all of them having to do with the Department of 

State which is what I know most about. Even though trained as 

an American diplomat, Mr. Chairman, I can speak at some length 

on things I do not know much about. [Laughter] 

First, the bill requires the IRF Ambassador-at-Large to integrate 

religious freedom into U.S. democracy and civil society programs, 

and into the counterterrorism policies of the United States. This is 

critically important. 

The reality is that stable democracies will not emerge in the 

greater Middle East, or anywhere else, and religious terrorism will 

continue to be incubated and exported including to the American 

homeland unless those societies adopt religious freedom. 

I am pleased to see that H.R. 1856 allocates a percentage of the 

Human Rights and Democracy Fund to the Ambassador-at-Large 

for Religious Freedom for such programs. But I believe, Mr. Chairman, that the percentage that is currently in the bill, 5 percent, is 

too low. I would recommend that that be increased to something 

like one-third of the money allocated to the Human Rights and Democracy Fund. 

Second, H.R. 1856 requires the State Department to place the 

Office of International Religious Freedom and the Ambassador-atLarge under the Secretary of State and stipulates that the Ambassador-at-Large will report directly to the Secretary. This placement 

represents the status that most other Ambassadors at Large have 

historically enjoyed at the Department of State, including the current Ambassador, for example, for Global Women’s Issues. If the 

advancement of women’s rights is important enough for such placement, which I believe it is, why not religious freedom? Placement 

in the Secretary’s Office will empower the Ambassador and the religious freedom staff to carry out the duties prescribed by IRFA including as amended, especially those of integrating U.S. policy into 

our democracy and civil society, and counterterrorism programs. 

Its current placement within the Bureau of Democracy, Human 

Rights and Labor not only subordinates the Ambassador to a lower 

ranking official, but communicates to foreign governments, religious communities and U.S. diplomats that religious freedom is not 

a priority for the American Government. 

Third, H.R. 1856 requires the Department to train its diplomats 

in the scope and value of religious freedom. Now Congress thought 

it was levying such a requirement in the 1998 IRFA, which in fact 

mandates training. But it left the details to the Department and 

the results have been disappointing. For the past 12 years training 

has been ad hoc, inconsistent and ineffective. To their credit, the 

Foreign Service Institute has initiated a 3-day course on religion 

and foreign policy. I spoke at that course 2 days ago and it is an 

important beginning for which FSI and the Secretary should be applauded, but it is only a beginning. These courses will not work if 

they are occasional and voluntary. They must be systematically integrated into diplomatic training. H.R. 1856 accomplishes that objective by requiring mandatory training for all diplomats when they 

enter the Foreign Service and when they receiving area studies 

training in route to their next foreign assignment. 

43

Critically, training on religious freedom will also be required for 

all ambassadors and deputy chiefs of mission before they take their 

duties in a foreign post. 

Mr. Chairman, it is difficult to overestimate, in my view, the importance of this part of the amendment to the IRFA. The Department may resist this and other aspects of H.R. 1856, perhaps citing 

in this case the training which has just taken place. But again, 

that training was voluntary. Moreover, it did not focus on U.S. 

international religious freedom policy so much as it did the idea of 

religious engagement. The two are related, but they are not the 

same thing. 

If our policy is to succeed, all of our diplomats need to be trained. 

So, in conclusion, Mr. Chairman, H.R. 1856 is a much needed 

corrective to the way that the 1998 International Religious Freedom Act has been implemented. And I urge that it be passed. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Farr follows:]

44


66782b-1.eps
45


66782b-2.eps
46


66782b-3.eps
47


66782b-4.eps
48


66782b-5.eps
49


66782b-6.eps
50

Mr. SMITH. Mr. Farr, thank you very much. 

Mr. Grieboski? 

STATEMENT OF MR. JOSEPH GRIEBOSKI, FOUNDER AND 

CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD, INSTITUTE ON RELIGION AND 

PUBLIC POLICY 

Mr. GRIEBOSKI. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman and Ranking Member Payne, for the opportunity to be here today and to talk 

to the committee about such a fundamental and urgent issue. 

I am grateful that you have taken the leadership and initiative 

to hold this hearing on a topic that is often either ignored or sidelined as what many policymakers call a ‘‘soft issue’’ and not given 

appropriate attention by policymakers despite the importance it 

plays in so many areas. 

As you know, Mr. Chairman, I have quite a bit to say about this 

topic, so I request that the full statement be introduced into the 

record. 

Mr. SMITH. Without objection so ordered. 

Mr. GRIEBOSKI. Thank you, sir. 

While this hearing focuses on ways to prioritize religious liberty 

and U.S. foreign policy, the issue of religious liberty is not a new 

one. The first act of violence recorded in Judaeo-Christian history 

is one of religious persecution. Cain’s killing of Abel demonstrates 

that even at the very beginning of human history, Man found ways 

in which to demonize, and ultimately persecute and kill, one another based on religious practice. 

Since the days of Cain and Abel, however, conditions have not 

improved. In the 20th century alone, more people died for their 

faith than in all previous 19 centuries combined. Nearly 1 billion 

people face significant discrimination and persecution because of 

their religious beliefs and identity on a daily basis. In related 

terms, on any given day, more than three times the population of 

the United States is potentially threatened or even killed because 

of the way they choose to pray, or not to pray. According to the already referenced Pew Forum study, ‘‘nearly 70 percent of the 

world’s 6.8 billion people live in countries with high restrictions on 

religion, the brunt of which often falls on religious minorities.’’

While the International Religious Freedom Act was meant to 

help alleviate the potential and actual suffering of millions of people around the globe based on their religious and belief choices, the 

situation of religious freedom has, in fact, deteriorated since Congress’ unanimous passage of the bill in 1998. 

Sadly, the great Spirit of IRFA never became incorporated into 

the letter of policy. While each President since the passage of IRFA 

has acknowledged the importance of religious freedom, none has 

been a champion of the cause. Despite the importance of religious 

liberty issues to American security, particularly in a post-9/11 

world, to economics and finance, to our general human rights policies and other vital interests, Presidents have instead fulfilled only 

the most basic requirements of IRFA. 

Thankfully, the lack of Presidential leadership on this issue was 

matched equally with ardent and dedicated and unwavering passion for the issue from Members of Congress. You, Mr. Chairman, 

Mr. Wolf, Mr. Franks, Ms. Ros-Lehtinen, Mr. Cleaver, Mr. SherVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:25 Nov 02, 2011 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00054 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\AGH\060311\66782 HFA PsN: SHIRL
51

man, Mr. Payne, and a few others, have taken immeasurable responsibility in guaranteeing this most basic and fundamental right 

is protected globally. However, if religious liberty is ever to be a 

significant priority in U.S. foreign policy, it is imperative that both 

the executive and legislative branches uphold both the spirit and 

the letter of the International Religious Freedom Act. 

Unfortunately, the executive branch has never grasped the significance of the issue and especially the role it can play in the 

world following 9/11. 

Instead of being fully incorporated into overall U.S. policy, religious freedom was seen as yet another issue item heaved upon the 

State Department by Congress. Thankfully, the Clinton administration had the foresight of naming Bob Seiple as the first Ambassador-at-Large, and the State Department, of appointing my colleague at this table, Tom Farr, as the first Office Director. Their 

early leadership of the office is, in large part, why the office survives and could potentially thrive, despite overwhelming odds. 

Unfortunately, during the early days of implementation, the spirit of the law was lost to the letter of politics and bureaucracy. Religious liberty became the responsibility of the State Department 

alone rather than being fully integrated into overall U.S. foreign 

policy, and the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom simply became the watchdog of the State Department. 

Other departments and agencies with direct and indirect foreign 

policy capacity were never fully engaged on the issue. Commerce, 

Justice, USAID, the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative, Defense, Homeland Security, Central Intelligence Agency, and the 

other agencies and departments involved in the overall making of 

U.S. foreign policy were not a part of the discussion. Similar to the 

faith-based initiatives appointment of liaison offices in appropriate 

agencies and departments, personnel could have been named to be 

religious liberty liaisons to assist in that integration. 

Again, the lack of presidential leadership on the issue perpetuated the perception that religious liberty was not significantly important. Title III Section 301 of the International Religious Freedom Act offers a sense of Congress that a National Security Council staff person be appointed at the level of the Director within the 

Executive Office of the President as a special advisor to the President on international religious freedom. Neither the Clinton administration, the Bush administration, nor the Obama administration 

fully implemented the suggestion of Congress that a special advisor 

be appointed. Instead, they are almost always double-hatted with 

other NSC staff handling other issues. Such a point person on the 

NSC staff responsible for global review and interaction on religious 

liberty would serve not only to advance both the issue of religious 

liberty itself, but also provide the necessary support when such 

matters impact other security concerns and vital interests. 

As the principal advisor to the President and the Secretary of 

State, and as the coordinator for overall U.S. international religious 

freedom policy, the Ambassador-at-Large for International Religious Freedom was never permitted access to even one Cabinet 

meeting in order to brief Cabinet officials on the efforts of the office 

and ways in which each appropriate Cabinet department can work 

with the Ambassador’s office to enhance the issue. As a matter of 

52

fact, it is my understanding that religious liberty has never been 

on the agenda of a Cabinet meeting since the passage of IRFA. It 

seems to me that such a discussion on such a topic would be vital 

to entrench religious liberty into overall policy, as envisioned by 

the authors of IRFA. 

Mr. Chairman, religious liberty is far too significant and 

impactful an issue to be handled halfheartedly. 

As I mentioned in my introduction, prioritizing religious liberty 

requires a commitment of both the executive and legislative 

branches to fulfill the spirit and letter of the law. 

Mr. Wolf’s recently introduced H.R. 1856 provides us with a historic opportunity to review the successes and, more importantly, 

the failures the past 13 years and to improve how religious liberty 

is prioritized and exercised in overall U.S. policy. 

Mr. Chairman, I have a number of recommendations that are included in my testimony, but I would just like to point out a few 

with the time that is remaining. 

First, the U.S. policy in dealing with human rights in general, 

and religious liberty in particular, is one of a stick approach, not 

a carrot and stick approach. Currently there is no incentive for 

non-CPC states with difficult religious liberty situations, or religious discrimination, to improve their conditions. In order to advance religious liberty in states whose conditions do not meet the 

CPC level but, nonetheless, are problematic, the IRF report can 

serve as the functional mechanism. 

Taking a lesson from the Trafficking in Persons report, the IRF 

report can establish categories based on ones already outlined in 

the Executive Summary to categorize all countries in the world. Because even if persecution does not exist and discrimination does, 

discrimination cannot go unreported as incidents of discrimination 

can directly lead to incidents of persecution. 

Mr. Wolf’s new bill establishes a significant amount of new responsibilities for the IRF office, all of which are necessary for the 

advancement of the issue. Unfortunately, the bill does not provide 

for the corresponding resources to follow through on those responsibilities. While the bill does provide for 15 full-time employees, in 

bureaucratic structures like the State Department a floor of 15 becomes a ceiling of 15 staff. As a result, I recommend that the bill 

establish a line item in the budget for the Office of International 

Religious Freedom which would allow the office to manage its own 

personnel and program funds, allowing it to appropriately and 

functionally to promote religious liberty globally, without the hassle of internal budget concerns and without the necessary approval 

of the front office of DRL. 

Attached to that, and my last recommendation for my remarks, 

is to follow on the comments of my colleague, Tom Farr. The original spirit and letter of the International Religious Freedom Act was 

quite clear that the Office of International Religious Freedom is an 

S office. As the principal advisor to the President and the Secretary, the Ambassador-at-Large should not have to seek the permission of the Assistant Secretary for Human Rights. It is a priority of U.S. foreign policy that it was not a regional ambassador, 

it was not a country ambassador, but an ambassador-at-large that 

was given the responsibility of promoting this issue. As a result, 

53

the Ambassador-at-Large and her office should be given both the 

access and the resources to be able to fulfill that duty and that mission on a daily basis. 

Mr. Chairman, thank you for the time. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Grieboski follows:]


66782c-1.eps
54


66782c-2.eps
55


66782c-3.eps
56


66782c-4.eps
57


66782c-5.eps
58


66782c-6.eps
59


66782c-7.eps
60


66782c-8.eps
61


66782c-9.eps
62


66782c-10.eps
63


66782c-11.eps
64

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much for your testimony, your leadership and your very concrete recommendations. 

Mr. Grim? 

STATEMENT OF MR. BRIAN GRIM, SENIOR RESEARCHER AND 

DIRECTOR OF CROSS–NATIONAL DATA, FORUM ON RELIGION & PUBLIC LIFE, PEW RESEARCH CENTER 

Mr. GRIM. Chairman Smith and Ranking Member Payne, thank 

you very much for the opportunity to speak this morning. 

I have been asked to specifically address the situation in Africa 

from a global perspective. And I will summarize findings from our 

ongoing study at the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion and 

Public Life on global restrictions on religion, which is generously 

funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts and the John Templeton 

Foundation. 

And I do request that my comments be made a part of the public 

record. 

Mr. SMITH. Without objection so ordered. 

Mr. GRIM. Thank you. 

The study itself covers 198 countries and territories, representing 

more than 99 percent of the world’s population, for the 3 year period of July 2006 to June 2009. And the study continues to find 

that approximately 70 percent of the world’s population lives in 

countries with high or very high restrictions on religion. 

Across the continent of Africa, however, the situation varies. Restrictions are high or very high in all seven countries in North Africa where a series of popular uprising are still playing out. In contrast, only 9 of the 47 countries in sub-Saharan Africa, or 19 percent, have high or very high restrictions. However, I should note 

that because many of these countries with high restrictions in subSaharan Africa are very populous, nearly half of sub-Saharan Africa’s population, about 48 percent, lives in countries with high or 

very high restrictions. An additional 22 percent of the population 

in sub-Saharan Africa, 12 countries, live with moderate restrictions 

and some 30 percent live in 26 countries with low restrictions. 

Some of these restrictions come from the actions and policies of 

governments while others come from hostile actions of people or 

groups in society. 

The 10 countries on the Africa continent with the highest levels 

of government restrictions include, as I have mentioned, all seven 

North African countries; Egypt, Algeria, Libya, Sudan—in our reckoning of North Africa—Tunisia, Morocco and Western Sahara, plus 

Eritrea, Mauritania and Somalia in sub-Saharan Africa. 

Government restrictions come in various forms, including detentions or imprisonments for religious reason which occurred in approximately two in five countries globally between mid-2006 and 

mid-2009. Such detentions, however, were routine in the East African country of Eritrea, where for instance Jehovah’s Witnesses are 

frequently imprisoned or detained for refusing to do compulsory 

military service, which is against their religious convictions. Eritrea has the highest government restrictions on the African continent aside from Egypt. In fact, prior to the recent uprising in 

Egypt, government restrictions were already high. By mid-2009 

Egypt joined the 5 percent of countries with the most intense social 

65

hostilities involving religion. Again, these were all developments 

before the current uprisings. 

Indeed, restrictions on religion also arise from the hostile actions 

of people and nongovernmental groups in society. In Nigeria, for instance, hostilities between Muslims and Christians were the rise 

well before the April 2011 Presidential election that saw Goodluck 

Jonathan, a Christian from the South, defeat Muhammadu Buhari, 

a Muslim from the North. A series of fatal clashes left hundreds 

dead and many thousands displaced from their homes. While conflicts in Nigeria are often triggered by socio-economic or political 

tensions, in many situations the enemy is identified by his or her 

religion. Indeed, Nigeria is among the 10 countries in the world the 

highest levels of social hostilities involving religion. And being the 

most populous country in Africa, this is a concerning situation. 

On the continent of Africa, social hostilities in Nigeria are second 

only to those in Somalia. In addition to these two countries, social 

hostilities are also high in Egypt, Sudan, Algeria, Comoros, Kenya, 

Ethiopia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Ghana. Part 

of the social hostilities include a slight uptick in recent years of religion-related terrorism throughout Africa with violence occurring 

in 11 countries and recruiting activities in an additional nine countries, meaning that about one in three countries in Africa has some 

problem with religion-related terrorism. 

In many cases, religious minorities in a country bear the brunt 

of these abuses associated with government restrictions or social 

hostilities involving religion. But adherents of the world’s two largest religious groups, Christians and Muslims, who together comprise more than half of the global population, were harassed in the 

largest number of countries around the world. It is important to 

note, however, that these data that I am referring to do not measure the severity of harassment or persecution, so it is not possible 

to say whether one religious group is harassed or persecuted to a 

greater or lesser extent than other religious groups or ethnic minorities. Nevertheless, the data are revealing. Over the 3-year period study, incidents of either government or social harassment 

were reported against Christians in a total of 130 countries or 66 

percent of countries in the world, and against Muslims in a 117 

countries, 59 percent of the world’s countries. Buddhists and Hindus, who together account for roughly one-fifth of the world’s population, faced hostility in fewer places; harassment was reported 

against Buddhists in 16 countries and Hindus in 27 countries. 

In proportion to their numbers, some smaller religious groups 

faced especially widespread hostility. Although Jews, which you 

have mentioned earlier in the hearing, comprise less than 1 percent 

of the world’s population, government or social harassment of Jews 

was reported in 75 countries, or 38 percent of countries of the 

world. Members of other world religions, including ancient faiths 

such as Zoroastrianism, new faith groups such as Baha’is and 

Rastafarians, and localized groups that practice tribal or folk religions faced harassment in approximately 84 countries, or 42 percent of the countries of the world, far higher than their share of 

the global population, which is estimated to be less than 15 percent. 

66

Between mid-2006 and mid-2009 on the continent of Africa one 

religion or another faced harassment in a majority of countries, 47 

of the 54, or 87 percent. Government harassment occurred in 41 

countries, slightly more than social harassment, which occurred in 

37 countries. As with the global situation, Christians and Muslims 

in Africa were harassed in more countries than other religious 

groups, harassed in 39 and 34 countries respectively across the 54 

countries in all of the continent of Africa. The next most commonly 

harassed group included members of localized groups that practice 

tribal or folk religions, such as African traditional religions. Also, 

throughout sub-Saharan Africa there were numerous reports of 

people being abused by members of society when often wrong accused of practicing black magic or witchcraft. By comparison, in Africa particularly, Jews were harassed in eight countries, Hindus in 

two and Buddhists in one. 

While my testimony has focused on countries and situations in 

Africa where restrictions on religion and abuses of religious groups 

are high, I would like to wrap up on a more hopeful note. In the 

statistics I stated before, more than half of the countries in subSaharan Africa have low overall restrictions on religion. In Europe, 

by comparison, 42 percent of countries have low restrictions. And 

in the Asian Pacific region, just a third of countries fall under this 

category. Only the Americas have a larger proportion of countries 

with low overall restrictions on religion. 

And finally, though I have not addressed the issue that the others on this panel have addressed directly, the careful documentation of human rights abuses in the State Department’s annual 

International Religious Freedom report and the reports by the U.S. 

Commission on International Religious Freedom are two of the 16 

international sources used by the Pew Forum researchers, six of 

whom are here with me today, to carry out our ongoing study of 

a changing world. Our next global report on changes and restrictions will come out this summer, so stay tuned. 

Thank you. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Grim follows:]

67


66782d-1.eps
68


66782d-2.eps
69


66782d-3.eps
70


66782d-4.eps
71

Mr. SMITH. Thank you very much for your testimony. 

Just let me ask a few questions, beginning with you, Mr. Farr, 

and anyone else who would like to speak to this. I am encouraged 

that training of our Foreign Service officers seems to be, at least, 

a beginning as you put it. I am wondering if you have any recommendations as to ambassadors. If the Foreign Service officers’ 

career goals is to become ambassadors, hopefully, they will have 

gotten that training and will be sensitive to religious freedom 

issues. But we all know a very significant portion of our ambassadorial ranks are filled by donors to whoever the President might 

be in that particular year, and who may have no interest whatsoever in these issues. 

And I would note parenthetically, right before the Olympics, Mr. 

Wolf and I traveled to Beijing. We had a list of 731 political prisoners, many of whom were religious prisoners. We met with house 

church pastors, all of whom were detained and were precluded 

from meeting with us, except for one. He was harassed after the 

fact. They wanted to meet with us; so we knew it would put them 

at risk, but they actually insisted. They thought that it was part 

of what will lead to change. I mean they are very heroic men and 

women. But our Ambassador, when we met with them, was more 

interested in what event he might attend, be it the basketball or 

track and field, and it was very disconcerting. It was, like, well, we 

know that there is an enhanced persecution occurring. Dissidents 

cannot meet with the press. I mean, you know the Olympic Games 

did not open up China. It led to a further restriction or constriction 

of rights there, including on the Internet. 

And I am wondering what your feeling is with regard to ambassadors. How do we reach them so that they, too, are on the same 

page as, hopefully, a very earnest human rights officer in that Embassy? 

Mr. FARR. Well, thank you for that question, Mr. Smith. My 

mind goes back, as I listen to you talk, to a political appointee who 

was going out to Beijing who was asked in the late 1990s about 

what he was going to do about house churches. And he looked 

blankly at the questioner and said, ‘‘Can you tell me what a house 

church is?’’ So this is not an unusual problem. 

Unfortunately, the importance of religious freedom does not appear to be intuitively obvious to everyone, which is why we need 

training. 

When I was in the Bureau of Intelligence and Research in the 

State Department we would conduct the training for new ambassadors and political appointees, area studies for them to bring them 

to date. In many cases they did not know very much about the 

countries where they were going to be ambassadors. So this would 

not be difficult, but it needs to be systematic, not ad hoc. It is not 

a matter of the day before the ambassador-designate comes that 

you find somebody hurriedly to come in and speak on religious freedom. It needs to be integrated into the wallpaper, if you will, of our 

curricula at the Foreign Service Institute, and among others who 

brief our ambassadors. 

There is one other point I would make. Every ambassador that 

goes to post carries with him or her a set of instructions from the 

President of the United States. They tend to be very general, but 

72

very important, i.e., ‘‘This is what you are going to do while you 

are there.’’ This issue should be in those instructions. To my knowledge, it has never been for any ambassador. I could be wrong about 

that. But I think it needs to be there in every set of instructions 

except for that country in the world where there are no religious 

groups or no religious persecution, which is to say almost no country in the world. We need this to be part of our training for all diplomats, but especially for ambassadors. So thank you for that question. 

Mr. SMITH. Let me ask you—again, remembering that today we 

remember, these couple of days, the Tiananmen Square massacre—

yesterday at one of our hearings at the full committee I reminded 

my colleagues that Hu Jintao began his meteoric rise to where he 

is today as head of China, as the Chinese representative in Tibet. 

And before Tiananmen Square, 4 months or so before it, he was 

brutally crushing the Tibetan Buddhists, beating nuns and monks, 

deploying, closing out the press and then the tortures that followed, 

and continue until this day, that are hideous and mind-numbing. 

And yet when President Obama had Hu Jintao at the White House 

they had a press conference. The Associated Press asked a very 

good question about human rights, and President Obama said they 

have a different culture and a different political system. And he 

went on to say, as The Washington Post said in a scathing editorial 

entitled, ‘‘President Obama Defends Hu,’’ H–U, of course ‘‘Hu 

Jintao on rights’’ that they have a different culture and pointed 

that out—and emphasized—it is a different culture, yes, but a culture that has people all over the country in the laogai and the 

gulag systems because they want freedom. I mean, there is no ethnicity or ethnic group that has a monopoly on freedom and democracy. The Chinese want it just as much as the Americans and everyone else. 

So I thought that was a very, very damaging statement made by 

the President. And ‘‘different political system.’’ It is a dictatorship; 

the people with the guns and secret police have the final say. I 

think huge damage was done to religious freedom or human rights, 

but religious freedom in particular. 

Wei Jingsheng once told me—and I met him in 1994 before he 

went back into prison in Beijing—and he said, ‘‘You Americans do 

not understand when you coddle dictatorships and you say words 

that Clinton had used and then abandoned once he became President, when you kowtow to the Beijing regime, they beat us more, 

they mistreat us more, they torture us more. And when you are 

tough, transparent, predictable they beat us less and human rights 

violations, at least to some extent, are ameliorated.’’

And we continue to play, unfortunately, this other card of accommodation and it gets us nowhere and it hurts the Chinese people 

and particularly the religious believers. 

So my question is, I mean do not know of any other country in 

the world in scope and magnitude that persecutes believers—Falun 

Gong, Uyghurs, Tibetan Buddhists, underground Christians—as 

egregiously and as systematically as China. What would be, perhaps from all of you, your recommendations to the President and 

to the White House in terms of reclaiming what should be an 

73

American core position of saying, ‘‘This matters a great deal to us 

and we are not going to look askance?’’

Mr. FARR. Well, Mr. Chairman, I agree that it is terribly shortsighted of the President—and frankly the Secretary of State who 

said something similar the first time she went to Beijing, i.e., that 

we have to deal with the Chinese concerning the important things. 

Maybe we will talk to them about human rights and religious freedom privately. That communicates something to the Chinese leaders. 

China is a peculiar country. You know, every country has to be 

addressed differently, including in the Islamic world. China’s huge 

plurality of religious groups are exploding in number throughout 

China. And I think our strategy there has to be far more broad 

based and comprehensive than it has been. But it has to begin with 

what the President and the Secretary of State say publicly as well 

as privately. And this has been a problem for as long as there has 

been an IRFA, at least as long as I have been involved in this. 

In 1999 inside the State Department when we argued about the 

first CPC list, and China was the real outlier at the time, Bob 

Seiple was the Ambassador-at-Large. I have written about this, so 

this is not something that is not in the public record. There was 

a huge fight over China. And the argument by the China Desk was 

that, ‘‘sure in Tibet,’’ for example which you mentioned, ‘‘there is 

persecution but it is not religious persecution. It is political persecution because they are separatists. They want to separate from 

China.’’

This is the kind of thinking that wants to set religion aside. Of 

course, there is a little bit of truth in the political aspects of this, 

but to suggest that these people are not being persecuted because 

of their religious beliefs, their belief in reincarnation, their reverence for the Dalai Lama is absurd. It is absurd on its face. 

So I believe the answer to your question is first at the top, our 

leaders have got to speak out against this and show that even 

though we owe China a great deal of money, that we are not going 

to pull our punches about this issue which has been part of the 

American psyche since the founding. 

But secondly I would just add something—I believe, I spoke 

briefly about programs that I want and I hope the Ambassador-atLarge will begin to implement. The Chinese are interested in this 

issue of religion. The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences has more 

people studying religion than, I am convinced, all of the American 

universities on the East Coast of the United States. They are genuinely interested in a problem that their country has, and so they 

are studying it. That, along with the rule of law, along with the 

growth of the economy provides several areas where we can use 

programs to convince the Chinese that it is in their interests to 

stop persecuting the Tibetan Buddhists, the Evangelical Protestants, the Catholics, the Muslims. We do not approach this systematically. And that is why in my view we need an Ambassador-atLarge with the status and the resources for every country in the 

world where this is important. And there is none more important 

than China to develop a strategy for advancing religious freedom. 

Mr. SMITH. Yes, Mr. Grieboski. 

74

Mr. GRIEBOSKI. Mr. Smith, I have to say when you bring up 

China, I remember longingly the days when you used to chair hearings under MFN to bring to the attention of not just your colleagues, but the United States Government and the American people the systematic abuse across the board on human rights that 

exist in China. 

This touches back on one of, I think, the fundamental failures of 

the implementation of IRFA in the first place. It is fundamentally 

important that we understand how the Chinese Government sees 

religion. The Chinese Government sees itself as the final arbitrator 

of all things in the lives of its citizens. If a Chinese believer believes in something greater then the government, they are automatically a political security threat. But we are not having that 

kind of discussion with the Chinese Government. We are not having discussions on how freedom of religion in fact improves the 

lives of their citizens and increases their happiness. 

But what is also failing in how we have implemented IRFA is 

that the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative has never been engaged when we talk about our trade relations with China to include this within the discussions. That there has not been that dialogue. There has not been that participation. 

Another failing has been as much on the civil society side as it 

has been on the administration side is that there has not been 

enough engagement with the business community. If American corporations begin to understand both American law and religious 

freedom issues, but also the responsibility and the access and ability they have in China to advance human rights issues and to advance religious liberty issues, we would begin to see at least a 

small step forward. These are the areas we need to be talking to 

the Chinese about it, and it does not need to be within the larger 

context of human rights. It needs to be in the very practical, very 

basic and substance ways of what the Chinese want and what the 

Chinese understand. 

And to build on something that Dr. Farr had said, it is important 

for those programs—Georgetown University has a relationship with 

the State Administration for Religious Affairs. Our ability, through 

the State Department’s program funding, to work with Georgetown 

and with SARA to be able to bring about understandings in communications is a very large step forward, and we really need to be 

able to push that forward. But that requires the resources for the 

International Religious Freedom office to be able to do what needs 

to be done on those most important countries. 

Mr. GRIM. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

When I was working on the book that I have co-written with 

Roger Finke at Penn State called ‘‘The Price of Freedom Denied: 

Religious Persecution and Conflict in the Twenty-First Century,’’ 

we were able to have some meetings with Chinese, both in the 

State Administration for Religious Affairs and other public security 

officials. And when we discussed that China has very high restrictions on religion, they said, ‘‘Of course. That it is logical. It is a 

dangerous thing. It can cause problems and we should restrict it.’’ 

And so they said, ‘‘Well, we do not disagree with you, but you know 

we are interested, what is the right level of restrictions on religion?’’ A very pragmatic question. 

75

And so I think the Chinese, as they approach this question, do 

not have a philosophical stance that you might find in some other 

countries of the world that would bar them from loosening restrictions. They should want to know if this good for us, will it be dangerous. 

And I think a second thing that the Chinese now are thinking 

about that they did not when I first went to China in 1982, many 

years ago, is what is going on in the rest of the world and how it 

might affect them. And as has been discussed by several people 

today, countries where there is a lack of religious restrictions have 

higher hostilities, more violence, and are more unstable. The Chinese are now needing to depend on the stability of other countries 

for their own resources and their own interests. 

So I think some of these pragmatic questions would be interesting for the Chinese to discuss. Academic researchers could look 

into these questions without having to take a stance and say we 

are trying to defend religious freedom, we are just trying to study 

it and see if it is in the interest of our country to have more or less 

and other countries to have more or less. 

Thank you. 

Mr. SMITH. With regards to the act itself, if I could, obviously, 

this is the time to make the improvements, this is the window of 

opportunity. 

Mr. Grieboski, you talked about double-hatted both personnel 

and penalties, and I think that your point was very well taken and 

the fact that the National Security Council does not have the kind 

of representation that it ought to have. 

And I think you raised a point that really has not been raised 

the way it should have been until you just did it, and that is that 

the CPC status is an all or nothing proposition. 

I actually, as you know, sponsored the Trafficking Victims Protection Act. And one of the lessons we did learn was to have tiers. 

And I am wondering if your thought is that we need to have a tier 

system, which would mean more personnel, I would think, or at 

least a greater emphasis within data calls and everything else 

going out to our Embassies? 

And, Mr. Farr, if you might want to speak to that as well. Should 

we have like a Tier I, Tier II and Tier III and maybe even a Watch 

List? 

I do recall, and you might want to speak to this as well—I will 

throw out a few questions—when John Hanford was our Ambassador-at-Large, you know, he worked very hard on Vietnam and 

Saudi Arabia. He often talked about deliverables, particularly with 

regard to the textbooks and the like in Saudi Arabia. And on Vietnam, much of his work coincided with the bilateral agreement and 

WTO ascension for Hanoi. And unfortunately, the day they got it 

the snap back to severe persecution of religion was not unanticipated, but it was brutal, and some people were taken by surprise 

by it; some were not. 

So, you know they are not a CPC country now, but they ought 

to be. Vietnam, I am talking about. Your thought on that? 

And whether or not, when we were working with other issues 

like in this case the Bush administration wanted to get the bilateral trade agreement agreed to between ourselves and Vietnam, 

76

you know, religious freedom became something of an incentive, but 

it turned, out in my opinion, to be a false one that actually brought 

a lot of the house church leaders out into the open, where now they 

have been rounded up and put into prisons and harassed. And so 

it was even worse. They thought it was a thawing, when it was just 

a ruse. So your thoughts on that. 

Mr. GRIEBOSKI. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the question. 

As to the tiers, I think it is fundamentally important that the report create a tier system. Not just because of levels of persecution 

and distinctions in persecution but because, again as I said in my 

testimony, there is no incentive for non-CPC countries to improve. 

With the way in which the structure currently exists, it is only 

those countries which are the most egregious, which reach levels 

that could potentially lead to sanctions. And even within that sanction regime there are levels of sanctions depending on the CPC violations. 

The tier system allows us to look at every country in the world 

which comes back to, actually, the training issue which means that 

if our Foreign Service officers who are doing human rights work in 

France, in Russia, in Belgium, in Venezuela are now going to be 

responsible for having to coordinate the religious liberty activity 

and then report on it on levels, on standards that have to be met, 

that distinguish one level from another; it, one, increases the capacity for the State Department to do religious liberty on a much 

more effective and priority basis, but it also means that the countries that get away with discrimination but know that there will 

be no American response can no longer act that way. So when we 

see anti-religion laws in places like France, when we see an antiminaret bill in Switzerland, now the French and the Swiss will 

have to say, ‘‘Will this impact our global positioning and how we 

are seen?’’

Your point on Vietnam is very well taken and very important. 

Again, religious liberty is one of the unused tools in these negotiations. We could very easily have included in the negotiations with 

Vietnam as a part of the negotiations certain levels of religious liberty that must be met in order for the trade agreement to be in 

place. I am a firm believer that there is nothing wrong with our 

tying our aid policy to human rights standards. And I think the 

only way that we will see real and significant improvement in 

human rights in general and religious liberty in particular is if we 

have standards of religious liberty and human rights tied to our 

foreign aid. But that does not mean that we cannot have those conversations with those countries with whom we are establishing free 

trade agreements. 

And as we learned from the transition from MFN to PNTR that 

movement significantly harmed the capacity of this body, but also 

the U.S. Government to be able to advance these fundamental 

issues. 

Mr. FARR. I would support the idea of tiers, Mr. Chairman, substantially for the reasons that Joe Grieboski has enumerated. And 

I would also associate myself with his view that we need to bring 

in all the elements of the United States Government, particularly 

those dealing with economics and trade. Indeed, I have long argued 

that we need a subspecialty within the Foreign Service that would 

77

include economics officers who would have a subspecialty in religious freedom. Such specialty is not offered for anybody, it is offered in other areas such as arms control and so forth, but not on 

religion and religious freedom. 

I think, however, that there is a fundamental problem with what 

I think of as a CPC-dominated quiver in our tool kit which somebody mentioned today. I think the State Department is developing 

a tool kit. 

If the only tool you have is CPCs, which is essentially negative, 

it seems to me what we have proven beyond a shadow of a doubt 

in the last 12 years is you are not going to change much structurally. I would quickly add that it is important that we have used 

the act to free some people, and I do not want to trivialize this. It 

is very important that some people have been freed. Often, however, that is through the intervention of people like yourself and 

others in individual cases. 

As a broad matter, we just have not had much impact with this 

CPC dominated approach. I fully support the CPCs. I like the idea 

of tiers. This is why I emphasize the programs. I think it was Joe 

that said, ‘‘carrots and sticks.’’ You know, that is not quite the way 

I would put it, but it makes the point. We do not give other countries like Vietnam reasons why it is in their interests to change 

what they are doing. That is why they went back to what they 

were doing before after they promised us they would stop requiring 

forced renunciations and they would rebuild all the churches, et 

cetera, et cetera. As soon as they got free of the incentive of the 

moment, they just went back to the way they always do things. We 

need to provide them reasons for changing, and that is what has 

been missing in our policy in Vietnam, and frankly most other 

countries. 

Mr. SMITH. Let me just say, Mr. Grim, according to the UNHCR 

there are some 43 million people of interest including 27 million 

IDPs and 15.6 million refugees. In your analysis, how many of 

those, if it has been modified, would you attribute to religious persecution? Is there a breakout? 

Mr. GRIM. That is an excellent question and one that we are 

studying this summer. It is very difficult to study that question 

and in short, no, there is not a good estimate of how many of those 

have been displaced internally or across borders due to religion-related reasons. But it is very difficult to get at because the data exists on how many people in a country have been displaced or are 

there from someplace else, but then the explanation of their stories 

is almost never documented by the U.N. So, we are looking into 

that, but I am not hopeful that we will be able to get it in short 

order. 

Mr. SMITH. Is that something, Mr. Farr, that the office working 

with our refugee folks ought to be looking at, the further breakdown—the profile of the refugees and the IDPs? 

Mr. FARR. There was language in the original IRFA for the Commission to look a little bit into this problem, which they did. They 

did a study, which was a very good study. 

I think that the Office of Religious Freedom ought to be certainly 

very, very aware of the work that Brian Grim is doing and is about 

to produce this summer and on an ongoing basis. But I would also 

78

add, Mr. Chairman, that a dearth of information is not the main 

problem that we have. We know this is a major, major problem. We 

know where the problem exists, we just have not learned the lessons about how to address it and get it in front of the problem 

rather then just reacting to it. 

Mr. SMITH. Dr. Grim, you pointed out in your statement that the 

data does not measure the severity of the harassment or persecution; is there a way to better delineate that? For example, you 

know the Falun Gong in China, the number of tortured well exceed 

several thousands—tortured to death. And obviously the Buddhists 

and the Uyghurs and the Christians suffer similar fates. Is there 

a way to get to severity? 

Mr. GRIM. Yes. Our measures do count severity of persecution 

within a country, but we just do not itemize it by which religious 

groups face the most problems. And it is a little tricky to get that 

exactly, but I think our data at least reflects what is going on in 

a country and then the extent to which each religious group faces 

restrictions globally. 

Mr. SMITH. Let me ask all of you. One of the other hats I wear 

is working on the Helsinki Commission, and ODIHR, which is the 

human rights apparatus for the OSCE, has three special representatives; one on combating prejudice against Muslims, Christians and 

anti-Semitism. If you have any thoughts as to how the office interfaces with them, Mr. Farr, that would be helpful. 

But, you know we got the African Union, the Organization of 

America States and then the U.N. itself, all three of which have 

not done, in my opinion, what could be done on religious freedom. 

I mean, our biggest fear in the last several months has been a resolution that might have passed at the U.N. that would have, as I 

said earlier, been catastrophic to individual religious freedom; 

thankfully, lead by Pakistan, it was a resolution tabled at the 

Human Rights Council that did not go that route. 

And I have spoken to a number of Muslim leaders including the 

head of the OIC, their Ambassador to the U.N., and they seem 

pleased with that outcome. So, you know, maybe we are making 

some traction with our friends in the Muslim community. But how 

can those regional bodies work more closely with the IRFA Office? 

Have we empowered it enough through legislation, and that would 

include the OSCE, which I think is trying at least to address religious persecution? 

Mr. FARR. I am not intimately familiar with the relationship of 

the Office to the ODIHR contemporarily speaking, Mr. Chairman. 

But I do know that the Office of International Religious Freedom 

is staffed, as you know, by some very committed, very intelligent, 

excellent Foreign Service officers and civil servants. And I would 

be very surprised if they did not have this problem on their screen. 

For what it is worth, I think it is a mistake to balkanize religious 

freedom. I think it is a mistake to have an office for the Jews and 

the Muslims and the thises and the thats. It is a human problem. 

It is a problem for all societies, which is why I believe the religious 

freedom ambassador ought to be over all of this for the United 

States. 

I fear that in Europe some of this is just the way they do things. 

They carve these things up. I think we should avoid this. 

79

But to answer your question, I have confidence in the office. My 

successors there, I know these people, they are doing a great job. 

And I bet you if you ask them that question, they will give you a 

good answer. 

Mr. GRIEBOSKI. Mr. Chairman, your question about the special 

representatives, it is fundamentally important and I support Tom’s 

position on this. And what I wanted to mention about this is my 

concern that when we have the division among the three different 

special representatives, the first two special representatives you 

mentioned of the Muslims and the Jews is very clear. But then the 

third, which talks about Christianaphobia is a title too long for 

even the special representative to remember. Because the duties 

and responsibilities for that person are not just Christianaphobia, 

they are Christianaphobia plus. And so within the OSCE structure, 

anyone within the ODIHR system, there is not the appropriate 

structuralization of the issue of religious liberty but instead are 

issue areas that are not well coordinated above those special representatives. 

At the same time, there has also been a movement within the 

OSCE system which you yourself have spoken on, Mr. Chairman, 

away from protecting rights and talking more about tolerance. And 

so it is a much looser support for fundamental rights then originally it was within the structure. 

As for the question of the multilateralism, I mentioned in my 

written testimony that we have done a very good job, I think, in 

the State Department with what limited capacity they had to do 

it to advance religious liberty on a bilateral basis. But we have not 

seen that same overactive and impressive engagement in a multilateral form. I understand that Ambassador-at-Large Johnson Cook 

was just at the United Nations last week, but 1 week a year is not 

enough to actually have that engagement, which comes back to my 

encouragement that the IRF office be granted the resources within 

a line item, but also the access within an S/ system to be able to 

engage with these multi-lateral fora. 

Mr. SMITH. Final question, and I will submit more for the record 

because I have about another 20. But I would ask you, Mr. Farr, 

how seriously does the State Department religious freedom office 

regard the hearings—the recommendations especially—for granting 

a country CPC that come from the Commission? Is it seen as a 

rival? Is it seen as a very useful mirror as to what is happening 

and, you know, hey, we missed that? 

I mean, one of the things that I have learned in this job, and I 

learn it more everyday, is that I take seriously criticism because 

I often learn that there is a germ of truth, maybe a whole lot of 

truth to it, and you are missing something. And the whole idea of 

establishing the Commission in the first place was to be a parallel 

effort buoyed by what we do in Congress. And I probably have held 

more than 300 human rights hearings as chairman of Helsinki and 

the subcommittee that I chair—and I am not kidding, well over 

300—but that is still not enough. And the Commission travels, it 

focuses, but does the State Department take it seriously or do they 

see it as a nuisance? 

Mr. FARR. It is a great question, Mr. Chairman. 

80

My view is that the Office of International Religious Freedom 

does take it seriously, but the State Department is a very different 

thing from the Office of International Religious Freedom. 

This is a tiny office in a huge bureaucracy. I think the attitude 

of the Office of International Religious Freedom, at least when I 

was there and what I know of them now, is that there are many 

possibilities to work in coordination with the Commission. For example good cop/bad cop; to be able to go to countries and say, 

‘‘Look, the Commission is making all of this trouble, you know, on 

the Hill and let us work together to avoid this.’’ I mean, that is just 

one small example of how these two can work in tandem. 

But I do think that more broadly the State Department views the 

Commission as an irritant. That it does not pay more than just lip 

service to many of its recommendations over the years, many of 

which have been extraordinarily good. 

I support the reauthorization of the Commission. I think it is 

very important. I believe it is very important for the Commission 

to aim more of its fire on the State Department. 

Joe and I may disagree a bit on this. But I think that the State 

Department needs scrutiny. More people need to reveal what it is 

not doing. And the reality is, Mr. Chairman, and this is not a criticism of the Commission, but it does not matter who is on the Commission, how much money they get, what their mandate is in the 

IRFA, if the State Department does not do its job, this policy is 

going to fail. And so this is why I say that the provisions of H.R. 

1856 that focus on the State Department are vital and I urge you 

and Mr. Wolf and others to hold the line. Because I think there is 

going to be some attempt to roll some of these things back. 

Mr. GRIEBOSKI. Mr. Chairman, I think my opinion on the Commission is quite well known. But I actually will back one part of 

what Tom just said. I will stand on the rooftops and support the 

reauthorization of the Commission from now until the end of time 

if the Commission takes on a different responsibility then being a 

watchdog. I think the watchdog role is a part of the Commission’s 

responsibility, but not its only responsibility. 

The Commission is the only agency, the only quasi-governmental 

agency with the capacity and the authority to be the mediator and 

integrator of religious liberty into all other government agencies. 

We talked about training and education of ambassadors and Foreign Service officers earlier. I cannot overemphasize the importance 

of also training our CIA station chiefs and our intelligence officers. 

That our intelligence agencies need to be studying this issue and 

dealing with this issue. The State Department cannot do that. The 

CIA will not do not of its own free will. The Commission is the one 

body that has the capacity and the ability and the authority to do 

that. 

And if you will indulge me with a comparison, part of my concern 

about the oversight role and the watchdog role of USCIRF is that 

I am not familiar with an oversight agency that matches personfor-person on personnel or on resources. In that sense, if I could 

make the comparison, that would be like a principal hiring three 

teachers to educate 1,000 students on every subject in the school 

and then hiring three consultants on the side, but paying those 

teachers by the way minimum wage and not giving them any reVerDate 0ct 09 2002 16:25 Nov 02, 2011 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00084 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\WORK\AGH\060311\66782 HFA PsN: SHIRL
81

sources to have teaching material. But at the same time, hiring 

three outside consultants, paying them $0.25 million a year, giving 

them unlimited resources to write reports about the teachers and 

why they are not teaching enough or why their capacity is not 

there. 

I think the Commission can do a tremendous job in making sure 

that the State Department has the capacity to do what it does as 

long as the two are engaged, as long as the two are cooperating 

and as long as there is not that competition, which Tom so appropriately discussed. But I think the Commission with both its resources and the tremendous capacity of its Commissioners, that 

they can do more than simply tell the State Department what it 

is not doing right. 

Mr. SMITH. One final question; let me ask all of you for any recommendations you may have as we go to markup, in terms of text. 

You have already made a number of outstanding recommendations, 

which I hope we can incorporate into the bill. 

But let me just ask you with regards to inter-religious dialogue 

among religions themselves. I have gotten to know a man named 

Mustafa Ceric, the Grand Mufti of Bosnia very, very well. I was 

there when they re-interred 800 people who were slaughtered during the genocide in Srebrenica. I spent a lot of time with him. I 

hosted him here. I have been back to Sarajevo to meet with him. 

Here is a man who really, genuinely, in his heart of hearts, believes in peace, in respecting all religions, and I do believe that is 

the model that we need to lift up and say among all religions that 

is what we all need to be following. He has been a part of the Vatican dialogue among religious leaders globally. And it just seems to 

me there is not enough of that. There needs to be a whole lot more 

among the Orthodox Church and all the other churches. 

Recently I met with an imam and a bishop who were literally 

traveling throughout Nigeria talking about reconciliation and tolerance for one another. And, of course, Minister Bhatti ate, slept and 

breathed that. Sadly, it lead to his assassination. 

I should have asked Mr. Leo this, but Mr. Farr, you might want 

to speak to this or anyone else. Is the Office and is the Commission, in your view, reaching out to religious bodies robustly enough, 

like the Vatican? I mean, we have a man, His Beatitude Jonah, 

who heads up the Orthodox Church here in the United States, and 

who profoundly believes in religious dialogue and wants to work 

across lines for human rights and respect for those rights. Do we 

do it enough? 

Mr. FARR. I believe both the Commission and the Office of International Religious Freedom are doing a good deal of this, Mr. 

Chairman. Whether or not they are doing enough, I think the answer is probably no. But I would emphasize that dialogue for the 

sake of dialogue is not a policy. What is needed is the targeting of 

religious leaders and religious actors who are influential. Shahbaz 

Bhatti was killed by people who have a particular interpretation of 

Islam and the place of blasphemy in Islam. We should think about 

ways to change the dialogue within Pakistan on the issue of blasphemy. 

So, it is not just talking. I mean, I am in an atmosphere of where 

there are any lists religious dialogues that go on and on a glacial 

82

pace toward oblivion. They need to have a purpose. And this is why 

I come back again and again to the programs. I fear talk is cheap, 

and we have had an awful lot of talk. 

So the answer to your question is yes, it is valuable, it needs to 

be targeted. And I think the office will do a good job of this is given 

the resources, the mandate and the authority to do it. 

Mr. GRIM. As a side comment I can make on social hostilities involving in religion that the research that I have done both outside 

of Pew and at Pew sees a close connection between the level of social hostilities in a country and the government restrictions on religion. 

One observation I have of the State Department International 

Religious Freedom reports is that over the past several years the 

sections on social intolerance or societal intolerance toward others 

have become shorter. They have been doing a bit less reporting. I 

do not think necessarily because there is less to report, but for 

some reasons, maybe editorial reasons those sections are becoming 

shorter. So I think that is an important topic to be covering. It is 

not exactly on interfaith dialogue, but some of these sections have 

been reporting on interfaith dialogue sort of on the positive side 

but not covering all that is going on in the country with as much 

depth as they did maybe 5 years ago. So, I just offer that as an 

observation. 

Mr. SMITH. You know, I do have one final question, if I could. 

And that is on the Human Rights Council. The Human Rights 

Commission was flawed, very very misguided for years. I would go 

to it in Geneva, not every year but almost every year, and found 

that their only agenda was to bash Israel. Even getting a Cuba resolution and a resolution on Sudan was very, very difficult. 

Now the Human Right Council was supposed to replace that. So 

far we have seen it is ‘‘deja vu all over again,’’ to quote Yogi Berra. 

It is the same old, same old. 

We now have a seat on there. Are we using it wisely to promote 

religious freedom at the Human Rights Council? 

Mr. FARR. The Human Rights Council is a farce, but I am going 

to revert to my diplomatic demeanor, for a moment, and say that 

we have to be a player. We have to be there, even in a farce, because this is the way the international community wants to play 

the game and we have to be part of this. I have not paid as much 

attention to this perhaps as I should, but when I do I do see that 

we are sending some good people. 

I know NGOs attend these things and work very hard to get 

their voices heard, Mr. Chairman. So I would say that it is important for us to keep working this issue. It has been out there for a 

long time. You remember in the 1990s we lost every year on China, 

again and again. I used to be involved in meetings about how we 

are going change this. Well, we came up with a bright idea and the 

Chinese beat us every time. It was an attempt to condemn the Chinese for human rights abuses and religious persecution and they 

went out and bought the votes and did everything they needed to 

defeat us. And they won every time. And so, this is a longstanding 

problem. 

If I could just say one other thing in response to Joe Grieboski’s 

point about the Commission. As I said, I agree with him about the 

83

need to integrate this into other aspects of the government, particularly into trade and economic issues. I am not sure the Commission is the body to do that. Joe believe it has the authority to 

do it. I believe that it is that National Security official, I forget the 

title of it. I believe I am correct that in this bill, I may be wrong, 

that this is made mandatory. Frankly, I have forgotten. Forgive 

me. But if it is not mandatory that there ought to be an NSC official involved in religious freedom, an advisor to the President, it 

should be mandatory. And this is what this person ought to be 

doing; looking at this issue of how to involve all of the activities 

of the United States, all the executive agencies and coordinating 

them. This is where this ought to be done, in my view, rather than 

the Commission. 

Mr. SMITH. Any final words from any of our witnesses before we 

conclude? 

Again, I want to thank you so much for your passion and commitment to religious freedom, for your testimony today, your time, 

and above all for your recommendations, which will help us, hopefully, craft a good reauthorization bill. So thank you so much. 

The hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 12:08 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.] 

(85)

A P P E N D I X 

MATERIAL SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING RECORD

86

f


66782n.eps
87

f


66782m.eps
88

f


66782f.eps
89


66782g-1.eps
90


66782g-2.eps
91

f


66782g-3.eps
92


66782h-1.eps
93

f


66782h-2.eps
94


66782i-1.eps
95


66782i-2.eps
96

Æ


66782i-3.eps