{"id":55003,"date":"2022-12-02T10:26:17","date_gmt":"2022-12-02T18:26:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=55003"},"modified":"2022-12-02T15:26:43","modified_gmt":"2022-12-02T23:26:43","slug":"religious-freedom-designations-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/?p=55003","title":{"rendered":"Religious Freedom Designations"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>12\/02\/2022 12:48 PM EST<\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Antony J. Blinken, Secretary of State<\/p>\n<p>Around the world, governments and non-state actors harass, threaten, jail, and even kill individuals on account of their beliefs.\u00a0 In some instances, they stifle individuals\u2019 freedom of religion or belief to exploit opportunities for political gain.\u00a0 These actions sow division, undermine economic security, and threaten political stability and peace.\u00a0 The United States will not stand by in the face of these abuses.<\/p>\n<p>Today, I am announcing designations against Burma, the People\u2019s Republic of China, Cuba, Eritrea, Iran, Nicaragua, the DPRK, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan as Countries of Particular Concern under the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 for having engaged in or tolerated particularly severe violations of religious freedom.\u00a0 I am also placing Algeria, the Central African Republic, Comoros, and Vietnam on the Special Watch List for engaging in or tolerating severe violations of religious freedom.\u00a0 Finally, I am designating al-Shabab, Boko Haram,\u00a0Hayat Tahrir al-Sham,\u00a0the Houthis, ISIS-Greater Sahara, ISIS-West Africa, Jama\u2019at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin, the Taliban, and the Wagner Group based on its actions in the Central African Republic as Entities of Particular Concern.<\/p>\n<p>Our announcement of these designations is in keeping with our values and interests to protect national security and to advance human rights around the globe.\u00a0 Countries that effectively safeguard this and other human rights are more peaceful, stable, prosperous and more reliable partners of the United States than those that do not.<\/p>\n<p>We will continue to carefully monitor the status of freedom of religion or belief in every country around the world and advocate for those facing religious persecution or discrimination.\u00a0 We will also regularly engage countries about our concerns regarding limitations on freedom of religion or belief, regardless of whether those countries have been designated.\u00a0 We welcome the opportunity to meet with all governments to address laws and practices that do not meet international standards and commitments, and to outline concrete steps in a pathway to removal from these lists.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>12\/02\/2022 12:48 PM EST &nbsp; Antony&#46;&#46;&#46;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-55003","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55003","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=55003"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55003\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":55004,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/55003\/revisions\/55004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=55003"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=55003"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lapost.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=55003"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}