IV 
114TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION 
H. RES. 105 
Calling for the protection of religious minority rights and freedoms worldwide. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
FEBRUARY 11, 2015 
Mr. BRIDENSTINE (for himself and Mr. WALBERG) submitted the following 
resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Affairs 
RESOLUTION 
Calling for the protection of religious minority rights and 
freedoms worldwide. 
Whereas it is a human right for all peoples to enjoy the fun-
damental freedom of religion, and the United States re-
mains 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 free-
dom of thought, conscience, and religion; this right in-
cludes freedom to change his religion or belief, and free-
dom, 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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•HRES 105 IH 
Whereas the freedom to worship by minority religious com-
munities worldwide has come under repeated and deadly 
attack, and often religious minorities are regarded as en-
emies of the state; 
Whereas the freedom to proselytize by minority religious com-
munities 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, impris-
onment, and death; 
Whereas, on November 1, 2010, the deadliest ever recorded 
attack on Iraqi Christians occurred at the Sayidat al- 
Nejat Catholic Cathedral located in central Baghdad, 
where militants stormed the church and detonated 2 sui-
cide 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 con-
demned 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 Indo-
nesian Ulema Council issued a fatwa against his teach-
ings, 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 pas-
tor with dual Iranian and United States citizenship, was 
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•HRES 105 IH 
arrested on charges solely based on his Christian faith, 
convicted, and sentenced to eight years in a brutal Ira-
nian prison where he remains today; 
Whereas, on October 17, 2013, 10 bombs exploded in the mi-
nority Shi’ite districts of Baghdad, killing 44 people, in-
cluding 6 children, and on that same day a suicide bomb-
er 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-sanc-
tioned Nanle County Christian Church, China, was ar-
rested, fined $16,000, and given a 12-year prison sen-
tence 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 Paki-
stani 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 bro-
ken so they could not flee, and were locked in a brick kiln 
to burn to death while a crowd of 1,200 watched for al-
leged blasphemy of the desecration of a Koran; 
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•HRES 105 IH 
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 con-
vert to Islam, and in increasingly violent attacks begin-
ning 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 em-
brace their own perverted interpretation of Islam, leading 
to the destruction of Jonah’s tomb in Mosul, the destruc-
tion of Sunni shrines and mosques in Ninevah, the de-
struction of Christian churches in Syria, and the slaugh-
ter 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 
Resolved, That the House of Representatives— 
(1) remains committed to protecting the human 
right and the fundamental freedom of religion, espe-
cially those of religious minorities; 
(2) recognizes that government policies prohib-
iting the freedom of thought and religion are de-
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signed to harass and intimidate religious groups; 
and 
(3) urges in the strongest terms that the 
United States Government lead the international ef-
fort in calling for the repeal of all existing apostasy 
and blasphemy laws. 
Æ 
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