Will the Senate Quietly Kill the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom?

October 20, 2011 09:50


H.R. 2867 was poised to pass under a unanimous consent agreement when a single senator anonymously called it back for undisclosed reasons. If that secret hold is not lifted by November 18, the Senate will not be able to act and USCIRF will go out of existence. – Hudson Institute

by Nina Shea at The Hudson Institute


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Religious persecution around the world threatens many minority groups — Egyptian Copts, Pakistani Ahmadiyas, Saudi Ismaili Shiites, Baha’is in Iran, and Chinese Sunni Uighurs, Catholics, and Tibetan Buddhists. Despite the presence of American troops, Iraq is in its seventh year of a “religious cleansing” against its native Christian, Yizidi, and Mandean populations, while its handful of remaining Jews are now desperately trying to flee after being identified by Wikileaks.

USCIRF’s mandate was to expire at the end of last month, but it was given a short reprieve through the continuing resolution on the budget. Meanwhile, on September 15, the House of Representatives, in a 391–21 vote, overwhelmingly passed H.R. 2867 to reauthorize USCIRF for two more years. In the Senate, H.R. 2867 was poised to pass under a unanimous consent agreement when a single senator anonymously called it back for undisclosed reasons. If that secret hold is not lifted by November 18, the Senate will not be able to act and USCIRF will go out of existence.

At $4 million, its budget is a fraction of the U.S. Institute for Peace’s; it rents a modest suite of offices for its staff, and its commissioners receive no remuneration for their time. Nevertheless, USCIRF is distinguished as a bold voice within the government and has seen important accomplishments. It pushed the Bush administration to understand the north–south conflict in Sudan as primarily a religious one, and not merely a fight over resources; this led to specific policies that resulted in the secession of South Sudan this past July and political independence and religious freedom for its people. It got the State Department to designate as “egregious” persecutors China, Saudi Arabia, and Uzbekistan. It keeps the focus on religious atrocities in places like Vietnam, Pakistan, Iraq, and Egypt, even when the State Department does not.

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