III 

114TH CONGRESS 

1ST SESSION S. RES. 69 

Calling for the protection of religious minority rights and freedoms worldwide. 

IN THE SENATE OF THE UNITED STATES 

FEBRUARY 5, 2015 

Mr. INHOFE (for himself, Mr. THUNE, Mr. WICKER, Mr. BOOZMAN, Mr. 

PORTMAN, Mr. KING, Mr. RUBIO, and Mr. LANKFORD) submitted the following resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations 

RESOLUTION 

Calling for the protection of religious minority rights and 

freedoms worldwide. 

Whereas it is a human right for all peoples to enjoy the fundamental freedom of religion, and the United States remains committed to promoting and protecting those that 

have been marginalized and persecuted because of their 

faith; 

Whereas Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human 

Rights recognizes that ‘‘everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience, and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in 

public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in 

teaching, practice, worship, and observance’’; 


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•SRES 69 IS 

Whereas the freedom to worship by minority religious communities worldwide has come under repeated and deadly 

attack, and often religious minorities are regarded as enemies of the state; 

Whereas the freedom to proselytize by minority religious communities has also come under repeated and deadly attack 

in recent years through so-called blasphemy laws and 

anti-conversion laws that are punishable by fines, imprisonment, and death; 

Whereas, on November 1, 2010, the deadliest ever recorded 

attack on Iraqi Christians occurred at the Sayidat alNejat Catholic Cathedral located in central Baghdad, 

where militants stormed the church and detonated 2 suicide vests filled with ball bearings, killing 58, including 

2 priests, and wounding 78 parishioners; 

Whereas, in November 2010, Aasia Bibi, a Christian mother 

of five, was fined $1,100 and sentenced to death by 

hanging for blasphemy, becoming the first woman condemned to death on blasphemy charges in Pakistan, and 

remains jailed today appealing her sentence; 

Whereas, on December 29, 2011, the Shia religious leader 

Tajul Muluk’s Islamic boarding school in Madura Island, 

Indonesia, was burned down in an arson attack by 300 

anti-Shi’ite protestors, causing 500 Shia residents to flee 

from their homes, and on January 1, 2012, the Indonesian Ulema Council issued a fatwa against his teachings, leading to blasphemy charges and the arrest of 

Muluk on April 12, 2012, in Sampang, where he remains 

in prison; 

Whereas, on July 28, 2012, Saeed Abedini, a Christian pastor with dual Iranian and United States citizenship, was 


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•SRES 69 IS 

arrested on charges solely based on his Christian faith, 

convicted, and sentenced to eight years in a brutal Iranian prison where he remains today; 

Whereas, on October 17, 2013, 10 bombs exploded in the minority Shi’ite districts of Baghdad, killing 44 people, including 6 children, and on that same day a suicide bomber drove into a village in the northern province of 

Ninebeh, killing 15 Shabaks, who are mainly Shi’ites and 

are viewed as apostates by extreme Sunni Islamists; 

Whereas, on November 16, 2013, Zhang Shaojie, a member 

of Three-Self church and pastor of the government-sanctioned Nanle County Christian Church, China, was arrested, fined $16,000, and given a 12-year prison sentence for ‘‘gathering a crowd to disrupt the public order,’’ 

in what is believed to be retaliation for his advocacy on 

behalf of his congregation and community; 

Whereas, on May 15, 2014, a Sudanese Christian woman, 

Meriam Ibrahim, was imprisoned and sentenced to death 

by hanging for allegedly committing apostasy from Islam 

and faced constant pressure to renounce her faith of 

Christianity while in prison, and only after immediate 

and sustained pressure by the United States Senate and 

the Department of State was she released and allowed to 

leave the country, settling in New Hampshire with her 

husband and two children; 

Whereas, on November 10, 2014, a young Christian Pakistani couple, Shama Bibi and Sajjad Maseeh, who was 

four months pregnant with her fifth child, were brutally 

beaten by a mob in Punjab Province, had their legs broken so they could not flee, and were locked in a brick kiln 

to burn to death while a crowd of 1,200 watched for alleged blasphemy of the desecration of a Koran; 


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•SRES 69 IS 

Whereas, since 2010, the Nigerian terrorist organization 

Boko Haram, which translates to ‘‘western education is 

a sin,’’ has destroyed more than 1,000 churches across 

Nigeria, abducted hundreds of Christians to forcibly convert to Islam, and in increasingly violent attacks beginning in 2014, has killed more than 1,700 Christians; 

Whereas, according to the United States Commission on 

International Religious Freedom, over 15,000 people in 

North Korea are presently incarcerated in prison labor 

camps for attempting to practice their religion and face 

constant abuse in attempts to force them to renounce 

their faith; 

Whereas, since the beginning of its reign of terror, ISIL has 

sought to destroy any person of faith that does not embrace their own perverted interpretation of Islam, leading 

to the destruction of Jonah’s tomb in Mosul, the destruction of Sunni shrines and mosques in Ninevah, the destruction of Christian churches in Syria, and the slaughter of anyone who resists their teachings; and 

Whereas seven Indian states have so-called ‘‘anti-conversion’’ 

apostasy laws that require officials to assess the legality 

of conversions, and fine and/or imprison those responsible 

for the conversions if it is determined to be illegal: Now, 

therefore, be it 

1 Resolved, That the Senate— 

2 (1) remains committed to protecting the human 

3 right and the fundamental freedom of religion, espe4 cially those of religious minorities; 

5 (2) recognizes that government policies prohib6 iting the freedom of thought and religion are deVerDate Sep 11 2014 23:52 Feb 05, 2015 Jkt 049200 PO 00000 Frm 00004 Fmt 6652 Sfmt 6201 E:\BILLS\SR69.IS SR69

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•SRES 69 IS 

1 signed to harass and intimidate religious groups; 

2 and 

3 (3) urges in the strongest terms that the 

4 United States Government lead the international ef5 fort in calling for the repeal of all existing apostasy 

6 and blasphemy laws. 

Æ 


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