USCIRF annual report on international religious freedom released

The Commission is a bipartisan federal entity, established in 1998, that makes foreign policy recommendations to the U.S. government and Congress designed to deter religious persecution and promote freedom of religion or belief abroad. The recommendations are included in a report published each year to help the U.S. Department of State compile an annual list of governments and non-state actors engaged in “systematic, persistent, and egregious violations” of religious freedoms. freedom, or tolerate it.

Action against the hijab in Iran

In its recently released 2024 annual report, USCIRF re-listed Iran as a country of special concern (CPC), i.e., states with the worst record of religious freedom violations, and recommended that the U.S. government adopt targeted sanctions on to Iranian government authorities and officials responsible for serious violations of religious freedom by freezing the assets of these individuals and/or denying them entry into the United States.

In April this year, Iranian authorities launched a new hijab campaign, Nour (“light” in Persian), forcibly arresting women and girls who refused to wear it. This new wave of arrests comes just weeks after the UN’s Independent International Fact-Finding Mission found that Iran’s crackdown on protests against mandatory hijab and other violations of religious freedom amounted to crimes against humanity. USCIRF called on the US government to support these findings.

Five more countries of special interest

In its annual report, the Commission also urged the US State Department to add Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, India, Nigeria and Vietnam to the existing list of twelve countries of special interest (CPC), bringing the total to seventeen . Korea, Nicaragua, China, Eritrea, Pakistan, Myanmar, Cuba, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan.

Countries on the special watchlist and entities of particular concern

According to USCIRF, Egypt, Indonesia, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Syria, Turkey and Uzbekistan should be included in the Special Watch List (SWL) of countries whose governments engage in ‘serious’ violations of religious freedom or tolerate them.

The report also includes recommendations for entities of special interest (EPCs)

these are non-state groups that engage in particularly serious violations of religious freedom, often involving violence. Among them are the terrorist organization Al-Shabaab in Somalia, Boko Haram in Nigeria, the Syrian Islamist group Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham, the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen, the Islamic State Sahel Province, the Islamic State in Western Africa. Province – also called ISIS West Africa – and the jihadist organization Jamaat Nasr al-Islam wal Muslimin (JNIM) which is active in the Maghreb and West Africa region.

USCIRF’s 2024 report is the 25th issued since the Commission was established in 1998 by the International Religious Freedom Act (IRFA). The first was released in 2000.