USCIRF, a bipartisan commission tasked with informing Congress and the federal government about global religious freedom concerns, released its 2021 annual report detailing the international religious freedom conditions in a year plagued by a pandemic.

The cover of this year’s report, which details where religious freedom is “improving or in peril,” features a globe shrouded in a face mask, showing the worldwide implications the pandemic had.

USCIRF Chair Gayle Manchin said at a press conference that though public health measures in most countries to slow the spread of COVID-19 complied with international human rights standards, some countries used these measures to discriminate against religious minorities.

USCIRF recommended that the U.S. State Department recognise over half of the countries analysed as countries of particular concern. The CPC designation is for the “worst of the worst” countries whose governments “engage in or tolerate systematic, ongoing, and egregious violations of religious freedom.” The designation carries with it the possibility of sanctions. 

Source: christianpost.com